The Dinner

It is very close to the holidays. Holidays mean food and food means family dinners.  As a kid I loved having dinner with my family.  It gave everyone time to catch up.  Holiday dinners were always fun.  It rotated between my aunt and uncles houses and ours.  Each host family brought a different flavor to the table but it was all good.  I use to grab a chair near one of my favorite uncles.  His wit had me laughing throughout the entire meal.  He was a bigger reader than I if that is possible and we always compared notes.  He kept two lists one for books read and one for books to be read.  I miss him.

This book is also about the interaction of family at a dinner.  The author uses the dinner table to slowly peel away the layers of each individual character so it is really not about dinner or eating at all. The dinner is between two brothers and their wives.  The narrator Paul gets a call from his brother to meet him and his wife at a restaurant.  Paul does not want to go.  That is absolutely clear but after all it is his brother. From the narrative the reader certainly gets the feeling that the brotherly relationship has issues.  Paul’s brother, Serge is a politician who wants to be the next Prime Minister of the Netherlands. There is resentment, at least Paul is resentful. He also dreads the potential conversation he might have to have with his brother.

During the dinner it becomes obvious that there is some type of dark secret or event.  I have to say that I never expected the secret to be what it was and I can’t say anymore because I would ruin the story and then you might not read the book.  This book took awhile to get into and I almost put it down but it I was curious and felt the need to see how things got resolved.

The book was apparently written in Dutch and I thought this was an excellent translation.