Undiscovered Scotland

 

"Rabbits" by Hugo Rifkind is a captivating coming-of-age novel with a dark mystery at its heart. It's the early 1990s and 16-year-old Tommo has moved from his day school in Edinburgh to a prestigious boarding school close to the city. He's a product of the middle classes, but his father, an author, is increasingly away from home and his ailing mother is increasingly confined to hospital.

The book follows Tommo's story as he comes to terms with the new world he's becoming part of. We follow him through his final years at school and then to university in Cambridge. The elite he is accepted into is alienated from the mainstream of society and struggling for relevance. Tommo finds himself at first seduced by the presence and poise of his new peers and by the wild hedonism of their lifestyle. Only gradually does he become aware of sinister undercurrents as he's invited into a succession of the fading, crumbling Scottish country houses or grand city dwellings of his friends.

Beneath the veneer of finery and extreme partying, all is far from well. When Tommo's friend Johnnie's brother is found dead, a shotgun nearby, he begins to realise that there are secrets that everyone except him knows, secrets that are never discussed or even acknowledged. At the end of the day, secrets have a habit of revealing themselves, whether bidden or not.

Hugo Rifkind's style draws you in and carries you along effortlessly. The book is written from Tommo's perspective and is conversational in tone, a little like a story told over a couple of pints in the dark corner of an Edinburgh or Cambridge pub some years after the events it describes. Wry and humourous in places, Tommo's story moves from scene to scene, from party to party, with a self-awareness that is remarkable given the quantity of alcohol and other intoxicants he consumes.

The book reaches its climax with a satisfying sense of circularity and closure. This is one of those books whose ending leaves you with the feeling it will live longer in the memory than most.