Intermezzo, by Sally Rooney

Two brothers must confront their troubled past when their father dies.

Peter and Ivan are two brothers. Ivan is in his early twenties, a chess ace who is still coming out of his adolescence. Peter is the older brother by a decade. He works as a lawyer and has a complicated love life with two women. Recently the brothers' father has died from cancer, and unresolved emotional conflicts are still bubbling below the surface. When competing in a chess tournament, younger brother Ivan meets a woman fourteen years his senior. The two tentatively embark on an affair, weary of how friends and family will take their budding romance. When Peter does find out, he is immediately critical and dismissive, infuriating Ivan. Soon their hidden grievances and long simmering animosities burst out into the open. Can the steadying influence of the women in their lives heal these deep wounds and create harmony?

Acclaimed and best-selling author Sally Rooney does it again with a compelling page turner that anatomises a close but fraught relationship between two brothers. The novel is drenched in detail, fleshing out character and place. While the story is as slow moving and introspective as a Bergman film, it has an uncannily addictive quality. It is probably the unflinching intimacy and vulnerability exhibited in Intermezzo that makes it so appealing.     

Sally Rooney fans will no doubt flock to Intermezzo, which heralds a more mature phase in her writing. New fans are sure to get on board too. 

Intermezzo, by Sally Rooney. Published by Faber. $34.99

DEC 24