Maxwell Sim is this nearly fifty-year-old man lost in his life. His wife and daughter have left him, he is depressed and on medical leave from work. His relationship with his father is catastrophic, and he doesn’t have any friends. He accepts a job that requires going up north to Scotland with ecological toothbrushes. Doing so, he meets old acquaintances and family, revisiting at the same time his life. This introspection will end with Max being found half-naked in his car, drunk, and suffering from hypothermia. From then on, he will retrace his steps and make amends with his past, ending in Australia, where this whole story started. Fantastic novel, an absolute pleasure, and an astonishing last four pages.
“The thing is, Max, we don’t think that way at Guest. That’s short-term thinking. That’s thinking inside the box. We’re outside the box. In fact, we’re so far outside the box, that the box is actually in another room, and we’ve forgotten where that room is, and even if we could remember, we’ve given the keys back ages ago, and for all we know the locks might have been changed since then anyway. None of that matters, do you see ?”