The Cave

Rating:
Summary: Gripping Thriller
Review: Dutch writer Krabbé seems to have a knack for crafting slim but emotionally gripping psychological thrillers (for lack of a better term). His first book to appear in English was The Vanishing, which depicted the emotional implosion of man whose wife disappears at a highway rest stop (Two movies were made from it, skip the American version and see the original Dutch film.). A much earlier book, only recently translated, is an amazingly absorbing account of an amateur bicycle race, filled to the brim with psychological tension. Here, Krabbé adroitly hopscotchs through time to tell the story of two friends, one bad and one good.

The book starts in a Cambodia-like southeast Asian country, where a middle-aged Dutchman is sweating his way though his first assignment as a drug courier. The mild-mannered Egon is a geologist by training, and desperate for money. How he got to this point is taken up in the next section, which flashes back some 25 years to a trip he took as a 14-year-old. At summer camp he met the charismatic Axel van de Graaf, who instantly adopted Egon as his sidekick/admirer. Axel is one of those spectacularly wild and charismatic boys who evokes fascination and dislike at the same time. Egon falls in with his plans, even when he knows they're bad or wrong. This sets the theme for the book, a question which Egon asks himself: why is his life such a struggle when he does all the right things, while Axel grows rich and famous by being completely amoral.

The third section follows a Dutch journalist (and old acquaintance of Egon and Axel's) in the Cambodia substitute, as he explores the aftermath of Egon's trip. Structurally, this chapter doesn't really need to be in the book, but it does add a certain depth and clarity to what happened in the first section. The fourth chapter takes the reader to Massachusetts, where a college student is coping with the disappearance of his mother, who was an unhappily married rockhound. By the end of this, everything has fallen into place, and the final fifth section elegantly dovetails with the second to tie everything together. The story is somewhat contrived, but powerful nonetheless in the questions it raises about how we live our lives. It was made into a highly praised Dutch film called De Grot, which has only been shown on the festival circuit in the US and UK.

Rating:
Summary: wonderfully crafted thriller
Review: I had some trouble getting into the first part of this novel but that probably had more to do with the fact that I started it on a train straight after finishing another book and hadn't given my brain time to adjust to the change of pace (in my head I always finish books faster than I start them).

However, once I entered the second section (the flashback to childhood), I was hooked. Wonderfully crafted this is a thriller less reliant on thrills than subtle revelations.

As the book moves towards its conclusion the subject matter gets progressively more uncomfortable and unpleasant but, conversely, to book begins to delight more and more.

The Cave can be read in one sitting (or two train journeys!) and is likely to be a novel you will want to read again and again.

Rating:
Summary: An exquisitely wrought Chinese puzzle
Review: I was surprised to see the book described in reviews as a thriller. Although it has some elements associated with that genre, thriller-readers will probably be disappointed with The Cave. Aside from the fact that it's a very fine piece of literature--something rarely true of thrillers--it's primarily an enchanting (and ultimately chilling) tale of love and fate. The translation was so smooth I wondered if it hadn't been written in English to begin with. It has the kind of weight that is usually only seen in the work of European masters--Peter Handke and Friedrich Durrenmatt come to mind. Speaking as a novelist, I have to say that I wish I'd written it myself.