Brief 5: Sweet Sorrow

Another summery book I’ve read recently is ‘Sweet Sorrow’ by David Nicholls. It’s the third of his I’ve read, after the bestseller ‘One Day’, then ‘Us’. I’ve also seen the film of his ‘Starter for Ten’. He occupies a similar space to Nick Hornby, and, lately, Sally Rooney – popular, rather than “literary” fiction – not disdained, by any means, but, I imagine, the kind of book that people who read fancy books are a little embarrassed to have read, but they read, and enjoy, nevertheless.

His writing is unpretentious and funny – he has a knack for grounding his story in situations that people will recognise (no doubt targeting specifically the English middle-class who left school between 1980 and 2000, which would make up a large proportion of his readership.)

The titles pretty much lay out what the book’s all about – ‘One Day’, ‘Us’ …  now, ‘Sweet Sorrow’ … the joy and pain of a man recalling his first love in the summer of 1997. This is such very well-worn territory, but Nicholls really is excellent on the detail – on the films and the music and the chat and the awkwardness, on the pain boys who think themselves boisterous but benign can cause to sensitive souls, on the way family situations can completely mess with the best intentions on school, on how most of our teenage summers were purest, purest boredom and the golden memories we hold on to usually just make up a fragment of the time.

In the previous two books of his I’d read, the central female character is drawn as well as, if not better than, the central male, whereas, here, the focus is on the young male protagonist, Charlie, and his adult memories, while Frances, the object of his affection, is never given her own voice. That allows the reader, I suppose, to become fully immersed in Charlie’s nostalgic recollections. Though Charlie sees/recollects himself as Mr Dull Everyman, he is suspiciously sharp and endearing.

It being the summer of 1997, there is a very newsworthy event at the end of that summer which Nicholls uses to draw a line under the main action in the plot. It is not heavy-handed though.

Nicholls is very good on class in all his books – the characters don’t exist in a Richard Curtis nebulous neverland – he carefully draws distinctions between the different strata which, to less observant writers, might all be jammed together. He is also, as one would expect of someone who has been an actor and written for film and TV, very good at comic setpieces. Properly funny scenes which could, and almost certainly will, lend themselves to being filmed.

There is an argument the story peters out a little, a brief thought it might subvert its title with a ‘Before Sunset’-like plot twist and a mild disappointment that it doesn’t.

But, fuck it, it’s lovely to read something unambiguously enjoyable here and then, to read someone who’s aiming to entertain, amuse and move you. If you love films like ‘Adventureland’ but set in a small Surrey/Sussex nowhere town, this is a book for you.