"Old Filth", a novel

by Jane Gardam

Filth stands for "Failed In London, Try Hong kong." It's a story about an old British lawyer and judge who dispersed justice in Hong Kong, India and other former Far East colonies of the Empire, although his work was mentioned briefly, only as an afterthought to outline his outstanding reputation as a lawmaker. He retires with his wife to Dorset, she dies (while planting tulips in the garden) and that sends him to revisit people and places from his childhood and youth. Through these travels, the fragmented story of his early life is being told, flashing back and forth from WW2 time to present. Finally, a dark secret (which somehow doesn't seem neither dark nor horrific) is revealed, but by then the reader is so numb of all the pre and post-war Britishness that it feels anticlimactic. Old Filth reminds me of Love in the Time of Cholera, British version.

NPR book reviewers call Gardam the best British author you've never heard of. Call me demanding, but this book left me indifferent. I am not sure I'll give her a second chance.