A reclusive young man goes out for a rare night at the pub and has a really unpleasant time.
The characters and voices of this story are strong and distinctive; Bat comes off as more complex than his outward appearance would suggest, and deeply tortured by events of the past and his difficulties relating to other people. He finds brief reprieve in nighttime motorcycle rides on isolated roads and in drinking on his mother’s roof, poor but effective coping skills. “The drinking doesn’t help … but it does help,” he reflects, a grim little koan indeed. The setting is a bleak and depressed Irish town, both gritty and homey, with a cast of characters who are facing circumscribed lives with a mix of humor and rage. The story’s ending is menacing and quiet and inconclusive, a little like a Joycean epiphany gone wrong.