Ordinary Thunderstorms

Ordinary Thunderstorms from William Boyd is a very fascinating crime thriller about the life of a man, Adam Kindred, which completely changed after he made one momentous decision.

Because of a stupid coincidence, the well-behaved and intelligent climatologist Adam is taken for a murderer and he becomes the prime suspect of a homicide case. Suddenly his whole life changed when he tries to hide and goes underground.

The point of view in the book is always switching between the embittered killer and ex-Iraksoldier Jonjo, the prostitute Mhouse, the self-confident police-woman Rita, the Pharma-Boss Ingram Fryzer and of course Adam Kindred himself. Because of this kind of storytelling, the plotline is very rapid and diversified and the reader really gets a good impression of the development of the main characters. Especially Adam Kindreds character changes within the story, from the hunted one to the hunter, who tries to find out what is going on around him and why he is wanted by so many people.

I think the best aspect of the book is the description of the city with all its facets and of the society. The story shows another part of our society, which many people do not know, the demonstration of the life on the streets and in the skid rows is very realistic and oppressive. On the basis of the role of Adam Kindred, William Boyd shows us how to disappear in a metropolis like London. Every year up to 200 000 people are disappearing in Great Britain, they stop using credit cards and cell phones to do not leave any marks and hints.

“…he had sensed instinctively that the only way to avoid detection in a modern twenty-first century city was to take no advantage of the services it offered – telephonic, financial, social, transportational, welfare-related and so on. If you made no calls, paid no bills, had no address, never voted,…, made no credit card transactions or used cash-point machines, never fell ill or asked asked for state support, then you slipped beneath the modern world’s cognizance.” (p. 55, Ordinary Thunderstorms)

But how can you to survive in a foreign city, without contacts and money? This is the most important topic of the book. The combination of that difficulties and the the process of finding the answer of the crime story, are keeping the novel exciting during the whole 403 pages.

The book animates to think about many problems of our modern society and new issues of growing megacities. It is about the fragility of a human identity, when you have to change your complete behavior and living standards because of a disastrous accident.

What I like is, that the story shows, that animosity, cheating and avidity as well as friendship, compassion and helpfulness is represented in every social class.

William Boyd tells us what it means to lose everything and how to find new ways how to live and survive.

Mira Linzenmeyer