Austin Duffy

I wasn’t too impressed with this loose, somewhat insubstantial novel. Focusing on a group of three trainee doctors as they walk the wards of an Irish hospital at night, the work feels more like an extended short story. At the sentence level, the novel is satisfactory, but there is minimal narrative drive and characterization is not a strength. The unnamed narrator, well aware of his inexperience and distrustful that the knowledge and skills he does possess are enough to keep him from killing patients, is exhausted and disconnected from others. There’s a brief episode in which he makes a visit home. Sleep-deprived and anxious, unable to engage even with his brother and concerned parents, he attempts to quell his unease by drinking secretively. The spectre of another intern, a gregarious young man whom no one suspected of being so troubled until he fatally threw himself down a hospital stairwell, hangs over the book. A cardiology consultant with marital troubles also dies by suicide.

What the author does manage to communicate well is the toxic hierarchical culture of hospital medicine, the senior doctors puffed up by their power regularly dressing down and humiliating those just beginning their careers.

If Duffy had provided his main character with a back story, some explanation as to why the young man was drawn into medicine in the first place, I feel I might have been more engaged. Instead, he’s settled for more of an impressionistic mood piece, communicating the general feelings of exhaustion and fear that are an intern’s near-constant companions.… (meer)

When his estranged wife is diagnosed with cancer, artist Wolf comes back to the family home to care for her and their daughter Ruth. Miriam's dying wish is to be cremated and her ashes scattered in the Hudson River as she is originally from New York. So Wolf and Ruth travel to New York to reconnect with Miriam's conservative Jewish family but Wolf also has another agenda.
This book is so cleverly put together that the reader is drawn in to the wildly disparate characters. As realisation slowly dawns the mood slips into a form of pathos so when the 'truth' is revealed it is not a surprise but is eminently sad. The whole set-up of Wolf's increasing dementia is portrayed in an incredibly sympathetic manner and the redemptive love of family comes through it all. A short but very poignant read.… (meer)

When his wife Miriam days from cancer, Wolf has to take care of their 16-year-old daughter Ruth whom he hardly knows since the couple has been separated for quite some time. Miriam had one last wish: to have her ashes scattered in the Hudson River. Thus, Wolf and Ruth leave London for New York where he also hopes his daughter can find a new home with his former wife’s Jewish family. They arrive at the holy season between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur; Wolf has never really been religious and also their daughter has not been raised to follow religious traditions. Yet, with Miriam’s believing relatives, conflicts lie at hand. They only seem to have one mission, yet, there is something else the father has to announce to his daughter.

Austin Duffy’s novel “Ten Days” tells the story of people who have to cope with the loss of a beloved mother and wife. Even though they have not been living as a couple anymore, Wolf’s memories come back when he shows Ruth where they met, where their first kiss took place and where everything began. It seems to be quite difficult for him to deal with his intelligent and at times rebellious teenage daughter, however, the more the narration advances the more questions arise about Wolf’s behaviour which becomes not only quarrelsome but strange.

I totally enjoyed the novel since the characters are lively drawn and really appear to be authentic in the way they try to make sense of Miriam’s death. Ruth is quite independent and strong-willed, when Wolf’s secret is revealed, however, we also get to know another side of her character.

Not a totally emotional read, much more a slow novel which makes you ponder.… (meer)