Second Place (2021) by Rachel Cusk

Book Review

Second Place (2021)

by Rachel Cusk

  Rachel Cusk is another good example of an author who I read because she gets a nomination to the Booker longlist, as she did this year for Second Place.  Second Place comes hot on the heels (relatively speaking) of the completion of her Outline Trilogy, which wrapped up in 2018 with Kudos.  Kudos was very much on my radar screen in 2018, but I just couldn't muster the energy to go back read the first two books in the trilogy.   

  I quite enjoyed Second Place, narrated by an unnamed woman who invites a notorious painter to her out-of-the-way estate.  Listening to the Audiobook, the painter sounded like a cross between Andy Warhol and Lucian Freud.   The truth is that I didn't want to enjoy Second Place, but I most certainly did.  I honestly can't get enough listening/reading to novels that revolve around artists and their behavior.  I can see why it didn't make the shortlist- it's not a signal masterpiece and the ending isn't fantastic- but it isn't some kind of experimental odyssey that makes no sense.