(Tom Petsinis, “The Twelfth Dialogue”)
#2 From the moment you open this book, you are struck by a strange other-worldliness.
On the face of it, it is a simple enough story. A young woman who loves books opens a second-hand bookshop.
She is a singular character, immersed in the nature of books, treating them as something beyond simple words on a page.
While the business struggles in a recession, she finds a series of mysterious dialogues, addressed to her, appearing in the shop.
At first she is not sure where they come from. They are a kind of emotional bounty.
The dialogues are strangely mannered conversations between a range of historic figures, including writers Ernest Hemingway and Franz Kafka, and Moses and Marx.
The bookseller slowly makes contact with the dialogue’s author and a resolution to her financial problems emerges.
This is in no way a conventional novel, yet it explores the novelist’s conventions of story-telling. It is a gentle and compelling rendition of an emotional landscape.
There are deep philosophical discussions here, too, which are handled with elegance and finesse.
Tom Petsinis has written a rare book. Not only does it capture the booklover’s obsession, but it also manages to include a wide sweep of ideas.
This is stimulating storytelling, done simply and with the lightest touch.
(Published in “Herald Sun Weekend” – 25 March 2000)