Exciting Times – Naoise Dolan

The book-packing journey reaches Asia, touching down in Hong Kong in the form of a girl called Ava.

Unhappy in Dublin, Ava has decided to try elsewhere. On completing her finals, she blows her savings on a flight to Hong Kong and a month’s rent on a room. She gets a low-paid job as a TEFL teacher, imparting the mysteries of the English language to schoolchildren. It pays the rent but covers precious little else.

She meets Julian in a bar. His job as a banker funds a spacious apartment and an expensive lifestyle, which Ava has no qualms about freeloading into. The relationship develops, but it is complicated. Not even Ava and Julian are sure what it is. They jog along.

When Julian is posted back to Europe for a few months, Ava stays in his apartment. She makes friends with Edith, full name Edith Zhang Mei Lang, a Hong Kong local but schooled in England and a Cambridge graduate. Not even her pay can match Hong Kong rents, so she lives at home with her family. That means she can enjoy living the high life in the city bars and clubs, as can Ava, who still has access to Julian’s credit card. They have fun. The relationship develops, but it is complicated. Not even Ava and Edith are sure what it is. They jog along.

With Julian due back to the island, Ava must examine her attachments to her two friends, while taking account of economic realities. Does she have to pick one and ditch one, or can she somehow manage the situation?

Ava’s narration is quirky, maybe it is the Irish accent coming out or just her off-kilter way of expressing herself. It is peppered with references to social media; Ava uses draft texts and Instagram posts to articulate her thoughts but deletes rather than sends them. The Hong Kong location seems more incidental than intrinsic to the story, so there is no real sense of place.

The book is probably not aimed at my demographic, so I found it interesting rather than engaging, providing an insight, bewildering rather than empathetic, into how relationships are managed in that generation.