Venetian Cousins

The lack of a likable protagonist is just one of several problems with Carroll's rambling, elegiac debut novel, an ode to lost youth that traces a young man's journeys from Britain to Venice in an effort to define and understand his relationship with his cousin and father. London barrister Thomas Lamb looks back on his childhood and youth. He was conceived in Venice and raised by his mother and uncle in Sussex after his natural parents became estranged. His father, a semi-invalid after a crippling war injury, appears periodically in a series of ineffective attempts at parenthood. Meanwhile, Thomas's childhood is dominated by his close friendship with his cousin Jamie. Midway through the tale, Thomas discovers some revelations about his father's sexual orientation that lead him to suspect that Henry Usher, a supposedly dead family friend with a noble background, may be his real father. The novel shuttles among Thomas's efforts to find Usher, his inability to deal with a tragedy that befalls Jamie and his delicate, tempestuous relationship with Netta, a childhood friend and youthful lover. When not describing the various family machinations, Carroll offers impressions of both Venice and England through the eyes of his young charge. Unfortunately, Thomas is a pedantic prig whose pride in his own fussiness renders much of his quest for family identity tedious. While poignant passages do occur, the combination of a disagreeable hero and a lack of narrative focus ultimately undermines Carroll's literary ambitions. (Oct.)