“Caledonian Road” is a dramatic and epic novel about modern London. It presents snapshots of many different levels of society which mostly circle around this area of the city to the northeast of King's Cross. It gradually forms a grand portrait about how people and the issues they face are interconnected. There's a sense that the economic disparity in this particular area persists despite decades of reforms and that this is representative of imbalances throughout the nation as a whole. From the plight of immigrants, the dangers of criminal gangs, the workings of the media/politics and the immorality of the elite/super-wealthy, Andrew O'Hagan utilizes his journalistic experience to harness many of the most pressing news stories of our day and distills them into a Dickensian tale replete with virtuous and comically repulsive characters.
Though the point of view often switches between many different individuals the most central figure is art historian Campbell Flynn. He's undergoing an artistic and financial crisis having published a respectable biography on Vermeer but now he's written a self help book about men which is projected to be a huge bestseller. He comes from a humble Scottish background but now inhabits the upper echelons of society. Various dealings have left him desperate for money and led him to compromise his integrity and talents to take lucrative jobs ranging from fashion industry write-ups to an inspiring podcast series. He's also an academic that has recently formed a strong connection to his student Milo whose vociferous cultural critiques tap Campbell into something real and modern. However, Milo has his own designs to utilize his skills as a hacker to become a whistle blower reminiscent of Julian Assange (O'Hagan once attempted to ghost write an autobiography for this activist.)
Despite his privilege, Campbell is surrounded by a number of people who regard him with contempt from some of his academic colleagues to the sitting tenant in the apartment of his building. Campbell's good friend Sir William is also going through a crisis as his financial and sexual affairs come under scrutiny. His prosecution and some other dramatic events unravel the secrets and corruption underpinning many of the lives of this large cast of characters – so large that there is a list of the dramatis personae at the start of the novel (a handy reference I frequently flipped back to keep track of who is who.) Although many of the characters are arrogant, corrupt and distasteful (especially amongst the upper set) I enjoyed how O'Hagan reveals their flaws through scenes where they demonstrate how self-justified they feel in their opinions and positions. They're well aware what others think of them but they stick to their guns as they believe they are in the right. A lot of humour emerges from this and keeps the story rollicking along as Campbell moves between the cast. I'm impressed with O'Hagan's ambition to not only present many levels of society and a broad social landscape of contemporary London but to actually inhabit a number of these different characters' voices through dialogue and their mental process. It's brave of him and I couldn't testify to the authenticity of the many different people he portrays but it's handled with confidence. Sometimes it does feel like characters embody certain issues and communities that O'Hagan wants to discuss in a way which makes them feel more representative than authentic. Nevertheless, there are scenes where a psychological complexity and emotional levels develop with certain characters so that I grew to care about several of them and I was intrigued to follow their storylines.
I know some readers have felt somewhat alienated from the book when they're not as intimately familiar with London as a city or British politics, but O'Hagan's evocative descriptions give a strong sense of the environment, people and issues at stake. It's difficult for me to judge how effective this is since I have lived in the city for over twenty years so I've observed how it's changed and I'm more familiar with what's being portrayed. I've even met some people who feel very reminiscent of some of the novel's characters. There's also a pleasure for me recognizing certain aspects of the cityscape in the narrative even when it's something as casual as Byron Burger (a once large food chain which diminished considerably after the pandemic) or Google's enormous new building which is still being build in King's Cross. Many of the characters' routes can be physically traced and followed through the city. I also appreciated how O'Hagan links some characters' experience of the capitol through different imagery (such as swans) and their individual interpretation of these reference points.
The many individual stories of these characters feed into a larger entangled tale of criminal activity, exploitation and economic disparity. It makes sense that “Caledonian Road” is frequently described as a state of the nation novel since so much of the story questions how the country's character and politics is being dictated by greed and a desire to maintain the appearance of power/dominance/being a first world nation. A character comments at one point that the English will do anything for £1million and it's been well reported how much London property is being held as an investment by international tycoons making the city more into a shell rather than a living metropolis. It feels effective how the overarching story is gesturing towards these larger issues and their complexities.
Overall, the story felt consistently engaging to me although I was interested in some characters more than others (Elizabeth, Moira, Jakub being amongst the most sympathetic to me.) However, other characters were intriguingly monstrous such as Yuri, Jake and Antonia. Still others were fascinating in their denial of the truth about what's happening because they are so fixated on their version of reality like Mrs Krupa, Candy and Mrs Voyles. Milo is one of the most contentious characters in the novel. For much of it he feels simply like a counterpoint to Campbell. As a computer wiz who is morally righteous and driven by the loss of his mother/friends, he's intent on disrupting the system and exposing corruption. Rather than feeling invested in his storyline itself I was more interested in how he is one of the few characters not willing to compromise his values in any way. Many characters (gang members, truck drivers, models, pot growers, politicians, writers) set aside their moral sense for the time being as they expect to soon be financially independent enough or socially powerful enough to live by their own code, but the day where that happens keeps getting extended into the future until their actions catch up with them. Campbell seems to be the supreme example of this as his underlying financial crisis/reliance on substance abuse means the more he tries to get himself out of this mess the more he becomes entangled in it until it reaches an absolute crisis point.
I think O'Hagan is effective in demonstrating how difficult it is in this day and age to wholly live by certain moral standards because we're often shielded from how we're involved in a much larger system. The characters' actions show how many of us want to retain our own personal comfort as a priority. Maintaining the status quo is also very appealing. There are certain characters such as a Russian oligarch whose status and actions come across like something directly extracted from a news story - as do many of this novel's plot lines. That's not bad necessarily as the novel uses satire to paint a large canvas with what concerns the English sensibility at this period of time. However, it does add to the sense that some characters come across more like symbols or stereotypes and this feels more problematic for those individuals that come from other nations: the wealthy/criminal Russians, the Polish immigrants, the Irish drivers. Nevertheless, there are moments where I felt emotionally involved with them so I keep going back and forth about how I feel about this novel as a whole. It's one I'd like to return to at some point as I think I'll be able to pick up on the nuances better now that I'm familiar with the characters and overall plot as a whole.
