Review of "The Gustav Sonata" by Rose Tremain

Slightly depressing (but what isn't these days?) novel about a Swiss man growing up unloved by his depressed mother, and the back-story to that, and his relationship with a young apparently-talented Jewish peer who aspires to be a concert pianist. There's a Holocaust dimension, because the first boy's dad was a policeman who falsified documentation to allow fleeing German and Austrian Jewish refugees to stay in Switzerland rather than be deported. He dies not long after the character is born but his disgrace, because his falsification is uncovered, casts a long shadow over the mother and then the son.

Unhappy relationships, mental illness, mediocrity and failure...it's really a bundle of fun. It's beautifully written and captures Switzerland well, and the story carries the reader along - but I do need to read something cheerful or distracting now.