Half Blood Blues [Paperback]

Charles C. Jones (call him 'Chip' and don't ask what the 'C' stands for) and Sidney Griffiths have been friends since they were kids in Baltimore. They are musicians and they find themselves in Berlin at the start of WWII, along with a band including the exotically named Hieronymous Falk, who is young, amazingly gifted, half German and black. A brawl with some 'boots' as German soldiers are referred to in the book, leads to the band taking up an offer to go to Paris, just before it fell to the Germans. This is easier said than done and the author shows the tension involved at that time, when the authorities had such control over the population. When Paris falls, Hiero is in danger for being German as well as for his colour. Chip and Sid are also black (although Sid, being much lighter, finds it easier to move around without being noticed) and, as US citizens, they have a better chance of leaving the city. When Hiero is suddenly arrested in a cafe, he disappears without a trace.

This book has many intersting themes - friendship, betrayal and, at its core, jealousy. Not only sexual jealousy, but that of someone who lacks musical genius for someone naturally gifted. A large part of the book is set during the fall of Paris, but the story also includes Chip and Sid returning to Berlin in 1992 for a Music Festival, and a mysterious letter that Chip received about Hiero's fate. This trip forces Sid to return to that time and re-evaluate what happened. Although the main action of the book is set during the very early months of the war, the author makes it clear that the musicians had no doubt about what arrest meant - the knowledge that people can easily disappear or be killed is starkly understood. This was a time when the Germans were unbeaten, seemingly able to take cities such as Paris without a fight, and the fear of them is realistically portrayed.

Sid and Chip are extremely funny and likeable characters. You feel that their friendship is strong and, even though they needle each other endlessly, they have a bond that is deep and with a long and shared history. It is always hard to know how you would act in certain situations - jealousy, ambition and resentment are strong emotions and Esi Edugyan evokes them and the time period well. The scenes set when the two men are old are often humorous and bring lightness to a story which could have become bleak in less talented hands, and the dialogue thoughout the novel is well written. This is a remarkable novel and I enjoyed it immensely. I felt that it was extremely realistic and strangely heart warming and recommend it highly, as an original take on a time period which has been much written about.

Since I don't care for jazz and have little in common with hard-drinking Black American male musicians, why was I so quickly hooked on "Half Blood Blues"? At first, it was the dry, wisecracking wit, and the rhythm of the Black American speech patterns which didn't grate as I would have expected - "he stood..leaning like a brisk wind done come up" or "Man, Sid, ain't you ever going to clean up? You live in plain disrepair" and so on.

Then, I was struck by the spate of vivid, original similes. "He got oddly thin lips, and with the drink still glistening on them they looked like oysters".

I realised too that there is scope for a compelling drama in a situation where a group of jazz musicians, some black, realise that the world of swing in 1930s Berlin has suddenly turned dark as the Nazis brand it "degenerate art" and begin to beat up black artists.

The author knows how to create tension. From the opening sentence, "Chip told us not to go out", the first chapter builds up a sense of impending calamity, as the narrator Sid reluctantly accompanies Hiero, a youthful prodigy on the trumpet, in his unwise quest for a drink of milk in occupied Paris, where his high visibility as a Black German combined with a lack of the right papers place him at risk of deportation to a death camp.

Esi Edugyan takes risks in introducing the real-life Louis Armstrong to the plot, but carries it off convincingly. She also succeeds in helping me to understand the appeal of jazz music. She finds apt words to describe in detail how Hiero's playing sounds to Sid.

"Hiero thrown out note after shimmering note, like sunshine sliding over the surface of a lake, and Armstrong was the water, all depth and thought, not one wasted note. Hiero, he just reaching out, seeking the shore; Armstrong stood there calling across to him. Their horns sounded so naked, so blunt, you felt almost guilty listening to it, like you eavesdropping."

This is not just a tale of a jazz group under pressure, surviving violent fist fights with the brutal "boots" (Nazi soldiers) but also a subtle psychological study of the interplay between the members of a group, providing a keen insight into personal and professional jealousy. Almost until the end, we are unsure whether Sid betrayed Hiero long ago, exactly how, and if he is a reliable narrator.

Some of the minor scenes drag a little and I found a few points implausible e.g. would it really take so many weeks to make a single record, without actually completing it, would/could the seductive singer Delilah make a headscarf out of a stiff, dusty theatre curtain? Despite this, overall "Half Blood Blues" is an original, well-plotted and beautifully written work. I shall certainly look out for Edugyan's future novels.

Half Blood Blues carries a tremendous sense of time and place. That being - the jazz clubs of Berlin and Paris at the outbreak of World War Two, and specifically seen through the eyes of Sid Griffiths, a black American musician.

Sid narrates his story in a voice lifted straight from the old jazz records of the 1930s. Idiosyncratic, smoky and fused with a passion for music. Sid and his crew - Chip C Jones, Hieronymous Falk and the delightful Delilah - are not political beings. Sid and Chip, as Americans, look at the ongoing political developments with a certain detachment. They fear the Nazis - or "boots" as they are called - but still concentrate more on food, drink and chasing the ladies. And as Sid reminds us, life back in the US was not a bed of roses for black musicians.

The intrigue comes in the shape of the German musicians who join them. These include Paul, a Jewish pianist; Ernst, a white Aryan with a wealthy father; and Hiero, a German citizen of African heritage. Whilst the Nazis were ambivalent towards Sid and Chip, they were far less tolerant of their own nationals who chose a bohemian jazz life and positively apoplectic at the prospect of Jewish jazzers. As the band play cat and mouse with the boots, flitting across borders with false papers in the dead of night, there are opportunities for great courage - and opportunities for base betrayal. With the wine and women in play, there's mayhem.

This is set in relief by scenes set shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall, as a documentary maker seeks to narrate the life of Hiero. Hiero's brief life as a trumpeter had left a legacy of almost mythic proportion. Sid and Chip are invited along as bit part players. This gives them the opportunity to reunite and reflect on past deeds and it's not always pretty - old men transported back 50 years to relive their petty squabbles.

Although the narrative can be confusing at first - it's not always linear and the colloquial language does take a bit of tuning in - it gels into a wonderful, complex whole. There are moments of comedy - none more so than the ban's appearance at Ernst's father's chateau. The old man is a high ranking Nazi with pretty conservative musical tastes. He clearly doesn't approve of the jazz lifestyle, and nor does he approve of his son's choice of company. But at the same time, he is compelled to display impeccable manners as the host and he oozes a self-confidence that only a true believer could ever dare. Then there's Louis Armstrong's cameo - holed up in bed in a dingy room in Montmartre, convalescing. He is not a good patient and delightfully to the point in getting what he wants.

And finally, the ending is as powerful and weepy and you could hope.

The characters are real and deep. They have a story which exists above and beyond the Deutsches Reich setting. Their fierce loyalties and passions tell their own story, regardless of the backdrop. But the backdrop is of interest too - it tells the true story of those foreign or stateless people who found themselves caught up by the war in Europe, whose stories are often neglected by the focus on atrocities on a grander scale. This is an important novel, done very well.

Esi Edugyan is a writer of considerable talent. I wish her well for the Booker Prize 2011 and look forward to reading her other work in the future.