Memoir set in MÁLAGA
A novel of road trip dynamics through SWITZERLAND
30th June 2025
Eurotrash by Christian Kracht, a novel of road trip dynamics through SWITZERLAND
Translated by Daniel Bowles
Longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2025
Christian is a jaded writer who decides to take his mother – recently released from a psychiatric facility – on a trip by car through Switzerland. In the build up to setting out, there is much rumination about the life he has been facilitated by the nefarious deals his maternal grandfather had concluded, ensuring wealth and privilege within the family for future generations.
His grandparents clearly moved in the echelons of high society, trading villas in luxury resorts around the globe. Christian (the character, as it’s auto-fiction one might assume there is an element of the author) recounts events, setting his sights on people and places, delving into family history in scattergun fashion. There is no sequence, and the butterfly effect of perusal provides a colourful arc of inventive storytelling. It rambles through its paces, disjointed and perplexing and by p69 even Mum, just as they embark on their road trip, quips “This doesn’t make any sense“. The story is in part a reckoning with the past, focussing on the ill-gotten gains of the family business and soon the voyagers are intent on giving away – at random – the ‘filthy money‘ that has accrued over the years.
The journey together starts and it is not long before Christian is dealing with her colostomy bag, and she is affirming she would actually LIKE/prefer to visit Africa.
Switzerland comes through, although sections of the populace are unflatteringly portrayed.
In Saanenland he comments on the thousands of chalets, “all constructed in the exact same style. According to the prescribed design, there had to be two balconies on the front, then pitched roofs, low-hanging eaves, and the whole thing was to be fashioned inside and outside from unsightly blond wood that that would darken handsomely over the years”
The real fascination in this novel is the construct of the prose. The author clearly loves wordplay and savours the interplay and resonance.
The translation maintains the lengthy sentence structure that is prevalent in German writing and it serves as a reminder of the author’s provenance. At times I just felt that the sub-clause order in English didn’t feel quite right, it felt laboured at times and somehow undermined the fluency of the translation. It’s a very American translation.
An odd and curious novel – auto-fiction – that probably won’t have broad appeal but nevertheless has something about it.
Tina for the TripFiction Team
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