In amped up prose, Richardson gives us a surreal portrait of Melbournians struggling for a foothold. The book thrums with energy, the descriptions frequently over the top as if you just can't contain the hyper reality of their lives. In ways, it reminded me of Arundhati Roy or Alexis Wright's portraits, but where their characters are parts of resiliant communities (well, Roy, maybe that is not so true of Wright), Richardson's degenerates are often spiralling in anti-social ways, scrambling to find a foothold at a cost that others often seem to bear.  And they move through a Melbourne rendered with feverish clarity  -this is an insiders account, with landmarks punctuating their lives just as they do all residents.
 Maha, our storyteller, seeks to give all this, our characters lives, meaning through listening and telling. But the stories have ellipses, gaps, lacuna the reader must fill. Ultimately, this is a search for human meaning somehow on a page or in a book.
I can't really say I enjoyed this book - the characters were too self-involved, I think, even noting that they certainly have their reasons, and over exuberant is not my favourite writing style. But it is really something - I know I will pick up Richardson's next book. It is just too good not to sample, even when tastes don't entirely align.