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|title=His Father's Son

|author=Tony Black

|publisher=Black & White Publishing

|date=September 2013

|website=http://tonyblack.net/

|summary=Tony Black's first non-crime novel is an unfortunate misfire. It could, and should, have been better, but his portrayal of the Driscol family fails by silencing the mother.

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Having safely established himself as a crime novelist, Tony Black has decided to take a brief holiday from the genre. While there's no doubting the bravery of such a move, the real question is whether it is the right one. There are certain facets of crime writing - intricate plotting, frenetic pacing, and high body count - that do not transfer to the world of humdrum realism. And as the contemporary novel focuses on a slower movement of time and a subtler delineation of character, aren't these all the things Black had to eliminate in the interests of genre expectations? So: as far as transitions go, it is a difficult one to make. Has ''His Father's Son'' managed it? Well, the answer is no, not really.

Overall, then, ''His Father’s Son'' suffers from its wobbly workings. It is difficult to have much faith in a novel when the lifelong feuds depicted can be forgotten in a jiffy, a character's debilitating illness can instantaneously disappear, and an intransigent old waster can repent and die on cue. In fact, it seems that once the characters have received their didactic lessons the world's woes quickly disappear and everything is tickety-boo. Although Marti's narrative goes some way to redeeming the book - his interactions with Ireland and its religious rituals showing the country anew - it cannot conceal its pervading corniness. The ending is too simplistic, too moralistic, and too gushingly sentimental to deliver any real power. There may be an attempt at tackling grim topics (depression, generational baggage, economic austerity), but they do not convince; if anything, they appear tired when contrasted with the sparkling Marti, the only element of light in this gloomy novel.

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