Dutch writer Bakker tells a slow-burning story of a multi-generational family of hairdressers, who have sons who inherit the business.

Simon is in his mid-40s and is not interested in hairdressing. Besides the business, he inherited his home above the shop and his life is dull and uninteresting. He only does the minimum of work and spends a lot of time gazing out the window. He swims at the local pool and recently is helping his mother with a group of intellectually challenged kids, one of whom, Igor, has sparked sexual desire in Simon.

The most interesting thing to shake the quotidian of Simon’s life is his sudden interest in his father. One of his clients is a writer and although Simon has thought about it from time to time, his questions prompt Simon to try and find the truth about his father’s death. He was told that his father, Cornelis, died in a plane crash in Tenerife. Cornelis left his mother after she told him she was pregnant, and he supposedly died when two planes collided. While browsing the internet, Simon can find no evidence of his father’s death, but he does know that he left with his apprentice at the time.

The story shifts and is told through the eyes of Cornelis, who left the plane on a stopover, and created a new life, as a hairdresser in Tenerife.

The Hairdresser’s Son is a story about loneliness, grief and how the past can affect the present. It’s an uncomfortable read at times, especially when Simon is grooming Igor, but it is a well-crafted story, with a surprising ending.

Reviewed by Sue Stanbridge

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Gerbrand Bakker was born in 1962. He studied Dutch language and literature and worked as a subtitler for nature films before becoming a gardener. Bakker won the 2010 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award for his novel The Twin (Vintage, 2009) and the 2013 Independent Foreign Fiction Prize for his novel The Detour (Vintage, 2013).