The Unknown Terrorist (Richard Flanagan)

A pole dancer (“Doll”) saving money for a home of her own beds a sexy but sketchy man with olive skin. The next morning, she finds that he’s a suspected terrorist (a proven one in the media, of course) and that now she is, too. She’s the “unknown terrorist,” a domestic, non-Arab and non-Muslim terrorist, the scariest of all threats to the Australian populace.

So she laughs, goes down to a police station and explains her case, despite the little bit of cocaine that’s involved with the sexual tryst. No, no. Wait, that would be what MOST SANE PEOPLE would do, but that wouldn’t make a good plot, now would it? Instead, she runs away, hides, begins to feel paranoid, dwells on her trial by public opinion in the media, lets her own past overwhelm her, indulges in pages of intense inner monologue, allows her ruined future plans to inflame her, shaves her head and, well, does what MOST SANE PEOPLE would never do.

Oh gee, did I spoil it? No worries, if this tiny summary gives the end away, you would have guessed by the first half of the book just like I did.

Sure, the issues tackled in this novel are incredibly timely and relevant: witch hunts for terrorists, civil liberties, the media as judge and jury, the strength of the fear of the public. But Flanagan obviously came up with an ending he thought was super relevant (aka best selling) and then went back to the beginning, contorting his characters in unnatural and unbelievable ways to reach that preplanned end.

And as I’ve mentioned in the past, I loathe novels that tackle timely issues to take advantage of the emotions that already sit on the surface of their readers minds. Yes, if you talk about the people jumping from the World Trade center, for instance, I will get teary, but not because of your talent for constructing characters or telling a story. It’s cheap emotional exploitation, and I don’t fall for it.

I’m not saying that Flanagan has no talent. On the contrary, I did feel one of his characters as a palpable and powerful force: the city of Sydney in summer. Hot, sticky, building and crowds made up of masses of people stacked like legos, losing their humanity and sanity. The city lives and breathes. The story, on the other hand, falls on its face. Though it takes the author more than 300 pages to (sloppily, heavy-handedly) tie off his loose strings, only four little words could have solved everything neat as pie:

I
want
a
lawyer.

Rating: 2 out of 5 stars – mediocre