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First Person 9781784742195 Books

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First Person 9781784742195 Books

I looked forward to reading First Person, having read Flanagan's Narrow Road to the Deep North - a tough act to follow. I was not disappointed, though neither the characters nor the settings were as thoroughly developed as in Deep North. The premise here - a struggling novelist hired to ghost write an autobiography of a notorious miscreant - allows for much insight into the craft of writing. Still the story is a little thin on plot and doesn't flesh out the Australian settings as well as I had hoped. An impressive work nonetheless and I look forward to more from Flanagan.


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First Person 9781784742195 Books Reviews

It's a swindle, a novel written when nothing to say. Thumbing his nose at the publishing industry and his readers.
It isn’t only his first novel that aspiring writer Kif Kehlmann is struggling with. There’s the abject poverty, the decrepit Tasmanian tenement, the wife and toddler to support, and now, twins on the way. The words won’t come – and when they do, Kif doesn’t think they’re any good. Is he a real writer or not? His rough-house pal Ray certainly seems to think so. Ray is currently the minder of the notorious fraudster, Siegfried Heidl, out on bail and awaiting sentence. Heidl needs a ghostwriter for a potentially lucrative memoir. Ray knows just the man for the job.

It’s a delicious plot. However, Richard Flanagan’s narrative arc struck me as rather mis-shapen. If you’re going to open with the fact that the narrator has accepted the job of ghostwriter, then don’t go back and show us the dithering that went into his decision - a waste of time when we know the outcome. There are also considerable longueurs the difficulty Kif has getting the story out of Siegfried seems to go on and on and on.

Peopled with three-dimensional characters and studded with gems of wit, the writing in the first half of the book is great “I stared at the nightmare of the blank screen and the panting cursor. The most I had ever managed in a single day working on my novel were 562 words, and many of them had veered dangerously close to plagiarism.” The panting cursor is inspired.

But I’m afraid my interest waned in the second half when the narrator grows more introspective and the writing becomes overblown, even a little weird. Nevertheless, this book has the ring of truth apparently, Richard Flanagan’s career kicked off with the ghosting of a memoir which was described at the time as "one of the least reliable but most fascinating memoirs in the annals of Australian publishing". 3.5*

Thank you to Penguin Random House for the ARC via NetGalley.
In 1992, Kif Kehlmann was young, broke, married with one child and twins on the way. He was living with his wife Suzy and three-year-old daughter in Hobart, trying to finish the novel he’d been writing for years. The need to make some money was becoming urgent. And then, Kif is approached to ghost-write a memoir. Siegfried Heidl is a notorious conman and corporate criminal about to go on trial for defrauding the banks of $700 million. Kif will receive $10,000 if he can ghost-write Heidl’s memoir in six weeks.

Kif moves to Melbourne, leaving his heavily pregnant wife and daughter behind. Sure, he’ll travel home on weekends, and the babies aren’t due just yet. In Melbourne, Kif hooks up with his old mate Ray. It’s thanks to Ray that he’s been offered this job, and $10,000 will be very handy. But trying to get any information out of Heidl is difficult. And the publisher, Gene Paley, is pushing Kif for progress. After all, in this part of the publishing world, timing is everything.

‘This too you learnt from Heidl how easy it is to remember; how hard to know if there is truth in even one memory.’

As the story unfolds, as Heidl’s trial date approaches and is then brought forward, Kif is under increased pressure to deliver. It’s difficult to sort fact from fiction in what Heidl tells him, especially when Heidl turns Kif’s questions and suggestions into his own experiences. Is Kif writing Heidl’s memoir, or is Heidl reshaping Kif’s life? If Kif has done a deal with the devil, how will he survive it?

’My first novel, I was aware, had suffered from being autobiographical, but now I feared my first autobiography was becoming a novel.’

I found this novel intriguing. The story opens with Kif reflecting on 1992 with the events around ghost-writing Heidl’s memoir. It then shifts to Kif’s present, to the changes in his life and circumstances. Kif may have survived the experience, but he’s not unscathed by it.

I wondered how much of the material for this novel was drawn from Richard Flanagan’s own experience of ghost-writing John Friederich’s autobiography ‘Codename Iago The Story of John Friedrich’ in 1991.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith
In 63 years I've never read a book in which I've cared less about the characters and story. Meandering, shallow and unbelievably repetitive. Our entire book club hated it. Two words Stay away.
After reading The Narrow Road to the Deep North, I was keen to read First Person and it didn’t disappoint. This book is intelligently written and was a pleasure to read. Care and patience has gone into the writing. I found myself reading each page carefully so as not to miss the wording that can be extraordinary. This book is for people who can appreciate careful attention to detail.
To sure how to describe this novel. Very interesting and well-written, but so dark, haunting, and depressing. Perhaps I was just not able to rise to the occasion.
I looked forward to reading First Person, having read Flanagan's Narrow Road to the Deep North - a tough act to follow. I was not disappointed, though neither the characters nor the settings were as thoroughly developed as in Deep North. The premise here - a struggling novelist hired to ghost write an autobiography of a notorious miscreant - allows for much insight into the craft of writing. Still the story is a little thin on plot and doesn't flesh out the Australian settings as well as I had hoped. An impressive work nonetheless and I look forward to more from Flanagan.