cover image The Banks of the Sea

The Banks of the Sea

Kenneth Tindall. Dalkey Archive Press, $20 (224pp) ISBN 978-0-916583-22-4

This is a ""literary'' novel out of the Henry Miller school of writing. But while Miller's work displays subtle coherence, supple prose and fresh philosophy, Tindall's (Great Heads) second novel is a confusion of high- and low-born phrases and little else. (``You are the sweet ouch knee, the grassy sprain, and I am the mechanic at the valley.'') This last refers to the act of fornication, something the protagonist, Vietnam vet Carol Gamewell, engages in quite frequently. The book is mostly a group of well-turned phrases in search of a story, and what little coherent vignettes there are search vainly for a narrative voice. The novel switches back and forth from third to first person to dizzying effect, and it requires such an investment of effort to make sense of Carol's odyssey in 1960s New York City that the reader is better off returning to Joyce's Finnegans Wake. (October 15)