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The Light of Day, Graham Swift
Penguin
Reviewed by Hal Williams (Courtesy of Taranaki Daily News)

Murder, an affair, unrequited love, a private detective – sound a bit clichéd? Fear not. The Light of Day, even outlined in those basic terms, is a long way from those well-worn private-eye penny horribles.

The detective in this novel is George Webb, a disgraced ex-cop now running his own agency, working mostly on "matrimonials" – tracking errant spouses (usually husbands) and providing hard evidence of infidelity.

This is a private eye without the need for a revolver, fast car or hi-tech surveillance gear. He just follows people in his plodding way, reports back. Provides photographs if necessary. Then he gets back to his own life, which isn't much. His wife has left him; his grown-up daughter visits now and again. He cooks a bit, fancies himself as a chef.

Into that emptiness comes a new client – except this one isn't just another client. George finds himself falling in love with Sarah Nash, whose husband is having a fling with a Croatian refugee she brought into their home in an act of kindness.

To give away more than that might spoil the unfolding drama, although it must be said that Swift tends to do that himself, by constantly skipping from present to past to future.

It doesn't really matter, because this is an effortless read. Swift has brought the private detective novel out of the closet and on to the literary bookshelf. The Light of Day won the Booker Prize, and the hearts and minds of countless British critics.

Whether this is really Booker Prize material is another story. Any reservations I have are nothing to do with subject matter – the strength of any story is in the way it's told, and Graham Swift tells a damn fine tale. But I was starting to feel just a hint of irritation with his technique of using repetition as a literary tool as I headed into the home straight.

Booker Prize-winning writers should be so accomplished that the reader isn't aware of technique, or anything else. We should be lost and besotted with the simple act of reading. Then again, The Light of Day came close to achieving that – and last I heard, I wasn't on the Booker Prize judging panel...