Tangled Web UK Review February 2010
David's Revenge by
Hans Werner Kettenbach
pbk out May 09
(Bitter Lemon Press)
at £7.99
Hans Werner Kettenbach is, in literary terms, what one might call a late developer.
Now 78, he started out as a football journalist at 28, took a degree in history
and philosophy at age 36, and wrote his first novel at 50. Since then five of
his twelve novels have been turned in to films.
He is said to be a writer in the Patricia Highsmith tradition, and David’s
Revenge is certainly a dark thriller with a slow build. Christian
Kestner, a school teacher with a wife and rebellious son, is perturbed when he
gets a letter from a Georgian called David Ninoshvili. The man claims to be coming
to Germany to try and promote his native country’s literature. But Ketsner
fears another motive. When he was in Georgia on a cultural exchange, he met Ninoshvili,
and his wife Matassi. On a couple of occasions he came close to making love to
Matassi, and it was only circumstance that prevented it. Ketsner’s mind
is in turmoil – even in Georgia he was not sure if the dalliance was a mutual
attraction, or if he was being set up to be politically blackmailed.
Now at home, his son gets angry at the impending arrival of the Georgian. Ralf
is involved with right-wing activists, and Ketsner cannot control him. But when
Ninoshvili arrives, his son is curiously attracted to the man. And so is his wife,
Julia. She tries top help the Georgian, and Ketsner cannot help wondering if she
is having an affair with him. Kestner is prone to imagining situations that might
have been, and soon the imaginary melds with reality. He cannot tell the two apart,
and he is drawn into aiding the secret police, and into an affair of his own.
Kestner’s world falls apart as his behaviour at school sets him against
his colleagues. Then Ninoshvili is badly beaten up, and Ketsner fears his son
is involved.
Kettenbach subtly blends Ketsner’s imagined incidents with real ones, slipping
imperceptibly from reality to what-if. And everything builds slowly, creeping
up on the reader, so that it is hard to see where his character’s state
of mind tipped over. If there can be any criticism, it is expressed in Kestner’s
own words as he himself is perplexed by the slow development of events. He wonders,
‘It can’t go on like this. Something has to happen.’ Gradually
though, it does, but Kettenbach cleverly does not give us a violent ending, but
a painful and insidious breakdown of Kestner’s mental state and his very
normal world.