BOOK
Ordinary Thunderstorms, by William Boyd
Bloomsbury, £11.99
4/5
IN A NUTSHELL
Boyd explores the nature of identity in this thriller about a man hidden in plain sight on the streets of London.
REVIEW
Author William Boyd has a beguiling habit of taking the architecture of genre fiction and then twisting expectations sufficiently to create an original and nourishing read.
Ordinary Thunderstorms is a case in point. The essential plot is not a million miles away from, say, The 39 Steps. Adam Kindred is in the wrong place at the wrong time, stumbles on a bloodied corpse and has to go "off grid" to evade arrest or his own murder while he pulls together enough evidence to clear his name and nail the bad guys.
However Boyd has used this premise as a means of exploring the nature of identity in an age when we are triangulated, barcoded and photographed every second of the day.
Kindred is the innocent who loses everything in a conspiracy to cover up the dubious results of a new asthma drug. In acquiring new identities, Kindred becomes one of the shifting faceless masses of immigrants and underclass wastrels who swash about unnoticed beneath the shining towers.
Boyd makes a point of placing this novel firmly in the capital. From the sink estates of Rotherhithe to affluent Chelsea apartments, he explores, with a restless eye, the social accommodation Londoners make as a matter of course.
