Paul Theroux’s family values
Paul Theroux is not averse to writing about toxic family relationships. His 2017 novel, Mother Land — written, he said, in lieu of a memoir — chronicled the affairs of the Justus family and its monstrous matriarch. The power plays between the many siblings involved endless backstabbing. At the book’s heart was the rivalry between two brothers, very much inspired by Theroux’s own family. It was an odd, overlong, bitter novel, its characters motivated by spite and revenge, piling up resentments over many hundreds of loosely written pages. Fortunately, The Bad Angel Brothers is a good deal tighter. It also concerns internecine warfare centered around a pair of brothers, who initially seem very different. But, as the narrative progresses, their similarities become all too apparent.
