M. G. Sanchez’s New Novel 'The Fetishist' - Book Review
By Humbert Hernandez
From the moment I opened The Fetishist, the latest novel by M. G. Sanchez, and read the first page, I knew I was on to a winner. Described by two-time Booker prize judge Alastair Niven as “one of the most underrated novelists writing in English today”, Sanchez has once again put Gibraltar on the literary map with a thought-provoking novel that will delight and shock local readers in equal measure. Set in Gibraltar and then in Yorkshire, The Fetishist skilfully explores some of the less salubrious mindsets and currents of thought underpinning our local community. Its protagonists are Nathan Holgado and Manuel Holgado, a ‘more-British-than-the-British’ Gibraltarian father and son who every Saturday march up and down Main Street dressed as eighteenth-century redcoats, intent on recreating what they see as the glories of Britain’s imperial past. Without giving any of the riveting plot away, I can tell you that Nathan flies to the UK on a mission to track down the birthplace of Edwin Baxter, his one identified British ancestor. The story then takes some very surprising twists before arriving at a nail-biting ending. What I like best, and most admire, in this work is the marvellous development not only of the plot, but also of Nathan Holgado himself, who by the end of the novel is a very different creature to the one who appears in its opening pages.
