Joshua Spassky

by Gwendoline Riley

In her third novel, Riley charts the peculiar final reckoning of a highly charged romance, exploring the possibility of human connection as two young people try to reconcile themselves to all of life’s bad endings, and give some meaning to their mayfly existences.

Genres: Fiction

164 pages, Paperback

First published May 10, 2007

Reviews

[Toby · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really enjoy Gwendoline Riley. She’s like a grown up Sally Rooney who knows how to get to the point and doesn’t deliberately try to keep her readers at arms length. And I think at least part of that is the brevity of the novella, sure she meanders in the mundanity of her characters existence but she doesn’t prattle on for what feels like eternity either.

[Tyler McGaughey · Rating 3 out of 5]

About as compelling as something this boring can be.

[John Purcell · Rating 5 out of 5]

A big little tardis of a book jammed packed with all of the pain, booze, dirt, vomit, talk, sweat, fucking, lies and tears of that heartbreaking, on again, off again, messy, lust ridden, big love that tormented you in your twenties. Brilliant.

[Kulchur Kat · Rating 4 out of 5]

Riley’s third novel, Joshua Spassky relocates from Manchester to Asheville USA, (still grey then) and focuses on the on-again-off-again relationship with her American lover we had been introduced to in Cold Water and Sick Notes. There he was a flighty singer in a rock band, here he is a dramatist. Still creative, still a cad and a flake. He will still declare on their first date that he’s cheated on every girlfriend he’s had. And of course, the Riley narrator will not be put off by that, it’s treated as yet more validation of her status in her own distorted inner landscape.

The novel is a fragmented cut-up love story, flitting forward and backward in time akin to a Nic Roeg movie. This being a Riley novel, it’s a love story of rejections and rebuttals between the two protagonists, the course of the novel confirming the acknowledgement of an unbridgeable distance. The two damaged characters spar off the other in long, intense passages of dialogue, the reasons for their emotional suffering unaired, but hovering behind the text.

(From an overview of Gwendoline Riley's novels at kulchurkat.uk)

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

quite appallingly self-absorbed, but kinda charming because of it. not quite sure why Asheville: apart from a couple of fleeting references to the Fitzgeralds it was strangely lacking any sense of place.

[Victoria · Rating 4 out of 5]

Seriously fabulous. This is what happens when a poet writes an impossible love story.

[Gretel · Rating 1 out of 5]

Riley writes the same novel again and again. This is the worst one.

[Ashleigh · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoy GR’s stream of consciousness style of writing. Her stories are always short and succinct, giving you just enough and not too much. I love the complex relationship she’s able to describe, without it feeling like it’s full of exposition.

For some reason, this book reminds me of the Holly Humberstone song ‘Scarlett’. Can’t explain why.

[sheenewood68 · Rating 5 out of 5]

exceptionally well-drawn two hander, typically grotesque and Mike Leigh levels of discomfort. The male character is such a type, and love GR's description of Manchester Temple Bar drinkers as being like an installation guzzling

[Oryx · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really very beautiful.

3.76

[Lauramat · Rating 5 out of 5]

This moved me when I read it several years ago and after reading it again, it still holds up strongly. Highly recommend this to be honest.

[Daisy Douglas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bit of a let down to be honest, enjoyed some of her other work but felt slightly bored of reading about a selfish man (my take)

[C · Rating 4 out of 5]

So great on the sentence level and also fun to read a book set in Asheville. As a novella it didn't really hang together for me, but I am still full speed ahead on the Gwendoline Riley train.

[Sundarraj Kaushik · Rating 1 out of 5]

Absolute stinker as far as I am concerned. A completely desultory book with not connection between chapters. It is just not clear how this book was chosen for the different honours it seems to have gathered. Maybe others were even worse.

[Martinxo · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn't enjoy this one as much as her other two novels. Still very good though.

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

This short novel is recommended if you can deal with plotless plots and writers writing about writers.