The Antagonist

Lynn Coady's The Antagonist is on the 2011 Giller Prize Short List.

Gordon "Rank" Rankin is the story's protagonist (and in my opinion the antagonist).

Rank decides to write a novel about his life after coming across an old friend's book that features a character that he thinks is based on his life. Using the guise of needing a professional writer to look over his work, Rank begins to bombard his old friend, Adam, with emails. The entire story is comprised of emails from Rank to Adam. We, the reader, do not get to read Adam's responses to Rank's emails. 

Rank's emails starts off very angry. He's angry at Adam for 'stealing' his life and labeling him as having an 'innate criminality;' he's angry at himself for being naive and giving Adam so much information for his book; and he's especially angry at his father Gordon Rankin, Senior. The only person he's not angry at is his dead mother, Sylvie. We don't find out how Sylvie died until the last few pages of the story. This is one of the reasons I love this novel. Lynn Coady does an amazing job of building suspense and keeping the reader wanting more up until the very last words.

Much of Rank's problems stem from the fact that he is a really big guy who doesn't have the temperament that everyone expects him to have with his hulking build. This usually results in him being pressured to play the violent thug or enforcer role, on a couple occasions to tragic results.

Another reason I love this book is Lynn Coady's casual way of throwing out game changing details.

Without giving away too much, I'll say Rank is not the type of person he appears in the first quarter of the book. He actually turns out to be a bit of a stereotype. I won't say what type of stereotype because I don't want to ruin it for anyone thinking of reading it.
5

Next Up: The Cat's Table