Christos Tsiolkas’s new book stinks. The In-Between revels in the dank erotics of the human animal, the “fecund odours” of desire – a novel of sweat, musk and brine. Tsiolkas has always been a pungent and unsqueamish writer, one of Ozlit’s boldest id-wranglers. But this book – the Melbourne author’s eighth – balances its carnality with quiet. Tsiolkas has never been more gentle on the page. It suits him.
The premise is elegant. The In-Between traces a love story through its pivotal moments: not the milestone decisions or cataclysmic quarrels, but the encounters that deepen intimacy. The moments of grace. As Tsiolkas skips from one scene to the next – jumping weeks and months ahead – readers are left to fill the narrative gaps, to imagine the “in-between” for themselves.
