Dark is the Morning is the latest novel from the British born novelist Rupert Thomson. He has been writing since the late 1980s but only more recently seems to have been gaining critical attention, with the publication in 2023 of How to Make a Bomb (U.S. title Dartmouth Park).

This latest novel, befitting a man who has lived in various parts of the world, is set in Italy, where 9 year old schoolgirl Franca has told schoolfriend Gino that she will marry him one day - but when this prophecy comes true, there is something in her past which sends Gino towards madness. This short novel gripped me throughout, with engaging characters and situations. I read it in one breathless sitting, drawn on by Thomson's prose.

This is the second of his works which I have now read, and I will be seeking out more of his works off the back of this one, which is high praise indeed.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for the ARC.

Gino, a troubled young man, struggling to find his place and purpose in the world, finds the stability he needs when he marries his childhood sweetheart, Franca. But when Franca gives birth a boy who is so beautiful, Gino questions if he is the boy’s father. The stability married life had given him rapidly unravels as Gino questions Franca’s devotion, which drives him to seek out her old lover.

This is a very sweet yet sad story of love between childhood sweethearts that quickly turns dark as we descend with Gino into his violent paranoia. The characters were well drawn and the prose kept me turning the pages.

Probably not one for you if you’re not a fan of books without dialogue tags.

Rupert Thomson is a remarkably consistent writer in terms of the quality of his novels, even as he rarely repeats himself. Although there are echoes in Dark is the Morning of his last two novels, How to Make a Bomb and Barcelona Dreaming, notably in its tracing of the disintegration of Gino, its central figure, his new novel is convincing in its depiction of both the initially charmed relationship between Gino and Franca and its Italian setting. Divided into three parts with two first person narrators, the fairly short novel is impressive in the ground it covers and particularly in the sense of dread it builds in the reader (or at least this one) well before events begin to unravel. Fairly early on, Gino says of Franca, "Her real life happened in the discrepancy between her outward appearance and her inner spirit". This is both lovely writing and implies that the same cannot be said of Gino, which sets in motion all that follows. A fine novel - Rupert Thomson should really be better known and celebrated.

I’ve no idea why the British novelist, Rupert Thomson, isn’t better known. He’s the author of 13 critically acclaimed novels and he writes beautifully.

This novel is set in Abruzzo in Italy in the early 2000s. It is the sad and poignant story of the relationship between Gino and Franca, the corrosive power of his jealousy, the impact which the birth of their son has on Gino and the tragic events which this sets in train.

It’s narrated in the first person by Gino with chapters at the beginning and end narrated by a British ex-pat, Harry, who has a house in the area and is a friend of Gino’s.

I loved:
- the evocation of the wild and mountainous landscapes of Abruzzo;
- the writer’s obvious affinity with the food and culture of the area, including the strawberry festival at Nemi;
- that there is something of a fairy tale or fable about the book emphasised by the references to Roman mythology and the other worldly character of Gino and Franca’s baby;
- the portrayal of Gino’s difficult relationship with his father.

However, I was less convinced by the chapters narrated by Harry which bookend the novel. I wasn’t sure what his perspective was meant to add to the story and I found the sections about his relationship with his wife to be a bit of a digression in what is a very compelling and pacy narrative which reads very quickly. For me it would have been an even stronger book, if we also heard directly from Franca.

Thanks to Bloomsbury and NetGalley for the ARC.

Rupert Thomson's one of those authors who delivers well turned out, interesting fiction with little brouhaha. His work ranges widely from the early days of Soft!, a satire on the advertising world, to Secrecy, set in the Medici court of seventeenth-century Florence. Dark is the Morning takes us to a small town in Abruzzo where a young man’s happiness unravels spectacularly.
Still living with his parents in his mid-twenties, Gino’s finally put the partying days that landed him in rehab behind him, seeking out Franca after his father reminds him of her childhood proposal. Their reunion swiftly turns into love, then marriage and a pregnancy that takes Gino by surprise. but before long he's torturing himself with speculation about Franca's past, delusions that even the British man he thinks of as his second father seems unable to diffuse.
Thomson bookends Gino’s narrative with Harry’s whose visit to a burnt-out house sets us up nicely for drama and a degree of suspense in the brief opening passage. Gino unfolds his own story, early hints suggesting a self-sabotaging jealousy that will destroy the unexpected happiness he and Franca enjoy. The suspense is handled well, foreshadowing adding to the tension, but what sets this absorbing, atmospheric novel apart is Thomson’s summoning up of small-town Italian family life together with his evocation of landscape and legend.