"Of course, by all means let us have the truth, since we have all suffered so much from it."

A disgrace, frankly. I mean, perhaps I shouldn't be surprised as literally the first person to write a Goodreads review (in English) of this novel published 35 years ago, but nevertheless I'm disappointed.

Durrell of course is a major 20th century writer, and [b:Justine|13037|Justine (The Alexandria Quartet #1)|Lawrence Durrell|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1428544115s/13037.jpg|45387] and the remainder of the Alexandria Quartet remain among personal highlights of mine in literature. But it's clear that Durrell-as-author is a very delicate proposition: a little more to the left and his literature becomes just a series of comic interludes; a little more to the right and it's indistinguishable from the screeds of your average lunatic hobo.

Quinx, or The Ripper's Tale caps off the five-book Avignon Quintet - my reviews of which can be found at [b:Monsieur|759685|Monsieur|Lawrence Durrell|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1328453717s/759685.jpg|842035], [b:Livia or Buried Alive|759686|Livia or Buried Alive (The Avignon Quintet #2)|Lawrence Durrell|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1404662423s/759686.jpg|745787], [b:Constance, or Solitary Practices|856500|Constance, or Solitary Practices|Lawrence Durrell|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1272417380s/856500.jpg|2160778], and [b:Sebastian, or, Ruling Passions|1114942|Sebastian, or, Ruling Passions|Lawrence Durrell|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1336157772s/1114942.jpg|1101948] - in a shambolic 200-page ramble, set in the months following the end of WWII. All of the surviving major characters gradually make their way back to Avignon, where relationships must be resolved and - amazingly, more importantly - the treasure of the Templars found at last.

Durrell was in his 70s by the time the book was published and one gets the sense that this master of the form was given free rein by his editor, whether to finish out a contract or just because he no longer had to seek their guidance or their wisdom.

"Reading your verse is like dragging a pond without ever finding the body." - Blanford to Sutcliffe

Despite his famed literary set-pieces, everything feels barely lived-in here, until quite literally the last six pages when we're rewarded (if that's even the word) which something mildly approaching atmosphere, as all of the characters gather to enter a cave of wonders located just outside of Avignon. The rest of the book is spent in the type of puns, vignettes, and literary masturbation that so delight the doubly-fictional (that is, fictional within the novel) Sutcliffe and, clearly, Durrell himself. Most notable is a sequence in which Sutcliffe is reunited with Sabine who, in a meta-fictional twist that's weird even for this author, has essentially been written into a different story where she's become a haggard but lustful gypsy. It treads the line between bathetic and absurdist, and I'm really not sure what side it falls down upon. At his best, Durrell furthered the modernist work of his idols, such as Joyce, while imbuing his characters with a riveting and dangerously lifelike depth. Here, neither his characterisation skills nor his textual ingenuity are on show in any meaningful way.

Meanwhile, although some lip service is paid to closing out the relationship and narratives of Blanford and Constance, Durrell is driven on to engage more and more with the Templar legend, and Galen's search for the treasure. As he weaves together some of the thematic threads that have run through the series, we're given a much clearer purpose for the Judaism thread, and a greater understanding of the role that Avignon plays in underlying the Quintet, but it's far from enough to justify some of the narrative dead-ends that we've been down. Part of this seems to be - I hate to say this - down to the lack of length. The book feels seriously truncated. Take what should be a pair of centrepiece scenes, in which Constance learns from two imprisoned Germans not only the location of the Templars' treasure but the revelation - which we were already somewhat privy to - that her sister Livia became a Nazi primarily because of a sexual relationship with their brother Hilary which became something of a power dynamic against her, and that her eye injury in previous books was from gouging out her own eye after witnessing Hilary's beheading at the hands of the Germans whom she had joined! I mean, that's some serious emotional carnage right there... only, it's sort of treated as nothing by Durrell. All that the General and Smirgel can even do is provide justifications for their actions; while all Constance can do is be momentarily shocked and then analyse. Whither atmosphere? Whither insight? (A small part of that may be deliberate; the books have been so obsessed with rational psychology that an intellectual like Constance can't be allowed into hysterics in the final reels... but nevertheless.)

One gets the sense that Durrell - who, after all, started the series promisingly if abstractly - may have not been up to the challenge of fulfilling his evidently ambitious plan. He had made himself a palette of limited colours with which to create something completely unique in fiction, and instead found himself cheating by reaching across to other students to steal additional shades from time to time, but still unable to complete his task. Consciously (I hope), Durrell chooses to end with a final chapter rich(-ish) in atmosphere but limited in resolution. We conclude with all of our characters together at the mouth of a booby-trapped tunnel hoping that their map works and that there's something worthwhile at the end, many with their personal relationships resolved, on the precipice of a new world after a major war, but it's entirely possible that three seconds after the book ends they all die in a perilous explosion. (It's not dissimilar to that famous final scene of The Sopranos in some ways!)

Late in the book, Sutcliffe says that "Civilisation is a placebo with side-effects". Quinx is a placebo too, but, sadly, it doesn't even linger in the mind long enough for a reaction.

A mistake in toto. ( )

The final book of the 1267 page Avignon Quintet. What is there to say? My Faber paperback edition of the quintet is well bound, good paper, no signs of wear after the lengthy reading process. Sadly, the content fails to support the quality of production. It seems the Durrell was trying to recapitulate his success with the Alexandria Quartet. But that quartet, where several characters relate their versions of the same events, had freshness and originality, and told something universal. The Quintet fails to deliver much at all. I struggle to see what Durrell tried to achieve. He plays with multiple versions of characters, and with characters who are fictional characters created by his characters - all very novel, but to what end? What message was he trying to deliver? Who knows? I completed the series as a type of endurance test. I see that only one other Librarything member has ventured along the same path and reviewed each volume - with similar reservations as to the worth of the books. Each succeeding volume has a smaller representation in the libraries of members. If I had been buying the volumes individually, I would not have made it to the end! Read October 2011. ( )

He put on his single-minded look and gazed around him like a blind buzzard. He had borrowed the look from a bust of Napoleon on St Helena which stood on his desk at home.

After the war everyone converges on Avignon, staying with Lord Galen until Constance's house is fit for occupation. With Lord Galen and the Prince unsure whether to commit any more time and money to the search for the Templar treasure, the group hires a bus and heads for the gypsy festival at Saintes Maries de la Mer (another place I have visited, although not during the gypsy festival), to see whether the gypsy fortune-tellers will agree with an Egyptian who told the Prince that he should keep on with the treasure hunt for another six months. When Constance later contacts German double-agent Smirgel in an attempt to find out what happened to Livia during the war, he asks her to put hiom in touch with Lord Galen, claiming to know the whereabouts of the Templar gold, but can he be trusted?

When it gets on with telling the story this is an interesting book, probably my second favourite after "Monsieur", but I could do without the endless digressions into philosophical waffle. As for tying up loose ends, I did find out what happened to Hilary, Livia and Constance's brother, which I had been wondering about since he hadn't been mentioned since that summer before the war, but I liked the ambiguous ending with a festival at the Pont du Gard, as I don't need all my loose ends tied up. ( )