Divorcing Jack by Colin Bateman - combination fast-paced crime thriller and comic adventure yarn set in bloody Belfast where the narrator is a young journalist by the name of Dan Starkey, a bloke who can fire off one-liners like George Carlin or Eddie Izzard.
Back in 1995, publication date for this, the author's first novel, D. Keith Mano concluded his New York Times review by noting, “A sequel, I read, is planned. Given hard work, some restraint and time, Colin Bateman may write most other novelists under the table.”
D. Keith's prediction hits the bullseye. Colin Bateman went on to write many more novels, including nine more Dan Starkey novels, and currently ranks among the top contemporary authors in Northern Ireland.
Before I say anything about plot or characters or historical and social context, let me shout out as loudly as I possibly can that what makes Divorcing Jack such a fun read, a book that will keep you chuckling as you eagerly turn the pages, is the tale's narrator and all-around comic hero, Dan Starkey.
Snatches of Dan Starkey's noggin noodling -
"When I was thirteen I woke up in the middle of the night and found my brother pissing in my typewriter case. I decided there and then that there must be something wonderful about alcohol."
On wife Patricia: "She had done more damage to my nose in three years of marriage than twenty years of amateur football. My nose had always been big, but it had not bent perceptibly to the left before I started going out with her. Besides that, she had a singing voice that could pickle eggs."
On joining his new flame at her place: "Margaret went and opened the door slightly and an elderly Jack Russell pressed his face through the gap. I could see a stump of a tail, maybe an inch erect above his hindquarters. He was snarling at me. He reminded me of Patricia."
After changing his appearance to elude arrest: "Fashion and thuggery have never gone hand in hand. My hair had not benefited further from a fitful night's sleep. It looked like toffee poured into an icicle mold, briittle and unwieldy, the bruising on my face, all but invisible in the yellowed light of my room, was more noticeable but ignored, as most everyone was too busy looking at my jaggedy hair. My skin was pale and chalky and my eyes red from an alcohol sleep. They wouldn't have sold me glue in a do-it-yourself shop."
Colin Bateman provides readers with a hefty dose of what it must have been like to live in Belfast during the Northern Ireland conflict ('The Troubles') that lasted thirty years beginning in the 1960s, a time when Protestants and Catholics clashed night and day.
The action in the novel is intense, the emotions extreme. Dan Starkey finds himself at the epicenter of a vortex propelled by three engines: wife Patricia catching him kissing Margaret, his unwittingly selling a much sought after cassette tape, his involvement as a journalist with an American interviewing the country's future Prime Minister.
So many twists, turns and surprises, I hesitate to say anything more specific, especially about that nun holding a Jack Russell and pointing a pistol on the book's cover. Divorcing Jack ain't a crime thriller for nothing. All for a reader to discover as you spend some time with Dan Starkey, a newspaper columnist in blood soaked Belfast who could surely also make a living doing stand-up comedy. Thanks, Colin Bateman! I look forward to more Dan Starkey novels.
Colin Bateman, Belfast's finest, born 1962
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