The Pier

Behind the doors of an island house one man is hard-working and persistent, but his work is hidden from the view and no one knows what he does. Boats arrive and depart from the dock across his house, tourists come to make memories and he keeps working hard, laborious and committed to his mysterious activity and his obsession with wood. The wooden floors in the house are more than floors, more than wood, there is something alive in wood, something mystical and important, something that will eventually get a name, meaning and purpose. Naturally, there is also her, because there always has to be her, who made it all begin, who made wood more than wood.

Darko Šeparović is a poet in the shoes of a prose writer and his poetic background is deeply felt in his second novel. The Pier is a densely woven story about love and delusion, solitude and persistence; a story told in a superior, carefully crafted style which flows and captivates. It is one of those books that are so evocative that the line between the reader and the author can often be blurred. The book that makes one rethink the things you thought solved, reminding us that, even though it sometimes doesn’t seem so, nothing is ever resolved.

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