Gold by Dan Rhodes is funny and sweet, with very peculiar characters. There are tall Mr. Hughes, short Mr. Hughes, and Mr. Puw, along with Septic Barry and his band of hangers-on, the Children from Previous Relationships: they are a few of the natives of the Welsh coastal town where the action of this splendidly rocking novel takes place. Most of the time we find ourselves in the local pub, which is where we first meet the out-of-towner Miyuki. Despite her Japanese name, Miyuki is as Japanese as “laverbread” (Welsh delicacy made from seaweed). Rhodes is telling us that looks can deceive and what we perceive to be true, is not always so. Even the stuffed pike decorating the pub realizes that “after thirty-one years of hanging on the wall it hadn’t come close to understanding the currents and the undercurrents that rippled around the room.“ We can always learn more, even about those whom we love, and particularly about those whom we’ve let become part of our landscape but never into our hearts.
Miyuki is a marvelous character, a lesbian decorator with a taste for Brains beer by the pint, flavored chips (the more synthetic the better) and the coastline of Wales: “she couldn’t think of anywhere she would rather be than the coast path on a cold January day, with peanuts in her belly and beer in her veins.” She takes long walks by herself during which she thinks about nothing, or contemplates the way a rock turns gold in the sunset, or debates on what she would do if a barrel of whiskey washes up or she spotted an abandoned baby on the roadside: “if it came to it she would raise the child and drink the whiskey, but she hoped she didn’t have to.”
I really liked this book up until the very end, when a sick (pun intended: read the book and you will know what I mean) twist changes everything, and the one thing we counted on to be true is not. I should have known that all that glitters is not gold. But all the characters and the crazy plot of Gold glitter plenty, enough to keep me smiling and engaged from first page to last. I just wished the golden egg could be laid one more time, for our girl Miyuki.
