Steven

1. As a young boy Marcello has violent tendencies but quickly notices that his peers find these urges abnormal. After he commits a horrible crime in the search for a gun to impress his schoolmates, he makes it his mission to strive towards complete normalcy.
3. As an adult he works as a government agent under the fascist regime of Mussolini. He gets tasked with a mission to make contact with an old professor of him, who has fled to Paris. The newly-wed Marcello offers to use his honeymoon as a cover for his presence in Paris.
5. A novel about a search for normalcy, and an exploration on what it means to be normal. Set against the backdrop of the fascist regime of Mussolini, it's fall, and the second world war.

The Bricks That Build Houses starts out really strong. Kae Tempest has an incredible way of getting straight to a person’s hopes, dreams, and motivations. In the first half of the book, we follow the protagonists: Becky, a waitress/masseuse; her boyfriend Pete, an insecure social failure but with his heart in the right place; and Pete’s sister Harry, who is a drug dealer.

Unfortunately, halfway through the book, the story falls apart. This happens when Kae tries to tie together the various storylines of the characters. Up until this point, the story is largely character-driven, focusing on the (internal) struggles and interactions of Becky, Pete, and Harry. The setup for the climactic turning point in the story is a slapstick standoff in a bar where all the major players are present. The absurdity of this chapter - such as Becky’s uncles being present for no clear reason, or Harry acting so out of character compared to the rest of the book - didn’t do the story any favours. It feels like a narrative shortcut rather than a natural progression and although the story afterwards goes back to more character driven storytelling this hiccup did sour the milk a bit.