Book Review: Flesh by David Szalay

David Szalay’s sixth novel, Flesh, is a provocative, vulnerable and deeply moving portrait of one man’s life shaped by circumstance, sexual entrapment and unresolved childhood trauma.

Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

Genre: Literary fiction

Publisher: Scribner

Review in one word: Vulnerable

*Contains no spoilers.

David Szalay’s sixth novel, Flesh, is a provocative, vulnerable and deeply moving portrait of one man’s life shaped by circumstance, sexual entrapment and unresolved childhood trauma.

This is the first time I have read Szalay’s work and I immediately fell into it like a soft warm duvet. Not that it’s an easy read, not by any means but there’s a sense of voyeurism and being a fly on the wall. I love the idea of using fiction to immerse myself and switching genders and experiencing what it must be like to live like a boy or a man.

Szalay explores life through the eyes of a young male Hungarian protagonist, István and the plot weaves through an unconventional path of his life from youth to middle age in Hungary and London with all of the unexpected, painful and humiliating incidents that happen to István in between.

This is a deeply moving and vulnerable book about men, their emotions, sexual needs and masculinity, but from the perspective of being an outsider immigrant during the boom years when the UK was still a part of the European Union.

Flesh explores the powerful interplay of trauma, class, family, love, intimacy and sex in a haunting, harrowing and tragic way. However this isn’t a novel to make you cry, instead it just might open your eyes up to a different way of seeing the world that is profound and filled with new meaning A complete masterpiece! I rate this book five stars.

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About the Author

David Szalay is the author of several novels, including All That Man Is, which was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. He was born in Canada, grew up in London, and has lived in Hungary and Brussels.