Synopsis: Set in the late eighteenth century, Water Music follows the wild adventures of Ned Rise, thief and whoremaster, and Mungo Park, a Scottish explorer, through London’s seamy gutters and Scotland’s scenic highlands—to their grand meeting in the heart of darkest Africa. There they join forces and wend their hilarious way to the source of the Niger.
Water Music is another book I’m having trouble with review-wise. Maybe I’m not the intended audience for it. Come to think of it, I don’t know who is. A blurb on the back styles it as “The funniest, bawdiest, most adventure-filled novel to come along since Tom Jones”. Having never read Tom Jones I can’t say if this is accurate or not, but I did read Moll Flanders and if you liked that, you’ll probably like this, too.
Take the not-quite-likable cast of characters with Mungo Park taking the lead. Now, as protagonists go he’s pretty good. He gets a lot of screen time and during much of it he’s doing something pretty interesting. Not enviable, mind you, but at least interesting. The thing is, I didn’t really care all that much about him. During his most harrowing moments with Dassoud or in the grip of some awful disease or other (which I swear half of the book is devoted to describing. In great detail.) I didn’t really root for him. Somehow Boyle missed the mark in making me care. I think it was because Mungo himself didn’t really seem to care about anything except making a name for himself as an explorer. He isn’t much of one really. One of the Three Stooges might have made a better one. Probably Larry. When he’s not making a bad decision he’s doing something stupid, when he’s not doing something stupid he’s sick as a dog, when he’s not sick as a dog he’s being attacked or held prisoner and when he’s not doing any of those things he’s home with his family pining to go back and do it some more.
Interspersed with Mungo’s narrative is that of Ned Rise. A more wretched character I have yet to meet. Dickens didn’t go as far as Boyle did with Ned. Think of Fagin, Oliver or any of the other sorrier-than-sorry urchins-turned-criminal and then kick it up a few notches. Or down depending on how your mind works. But despite his callow sliminess and self-serving blindness, I liked Ned better than Mungo and so the ending suited me and probably suited Mungo, too.
The vignettes featuring Ailie and all she endures were nice breaks to the unrelenting action of the explorer bits. Just when things got too squalid, visceral and just plain gross we’re reprieved and sent back to Scotland to see what’s been left behind.
Not much as it turns out. Ailie is spends a lot of her time without Mungo pining for him and alternately being pissed that he left. When he is around she spends most of her time being pregnant. Such is life I guess.
None of that helped me figure out the intended audience for Water Music. Tropical disease specialists? Reincarnated 18th century explorers dying to reminisce? Jilted wives and lovers trying to understand their wayward men? Angry native guides looking to see how brainless the white man is? I don’t know, but I’ve never read anything quite like it and probably never will again.
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