Reviewed by
Kerry J. Schooley

Point-of-view rotates among competing gangs of dim, Edinburgh louts: a crumbling hold-up crew, a pair of larcenous private detectives and a soft heavy who falls in love working off his debt to a loan shark. Each hopes to outsmart and/or out-tough the others into possession of the loot from a bungled bank job, making for an entertaining mix of motives, sub-plots and asides.

Halfway through is an interesting psychological twist that does more to reveal Guthrie's skill with first-person narrative than it does to advance the understanding of mental illness. It's a kick just the same, but Guthrie puts his best foot forward with the robbery scene itself, simultaneously killing-off and sending-up that hoary, Brit-grit cliche: me old mum. For a moment Two-way Split begins to look like The Lady Killers gone north.

The humour runs splat up against the pseudo-psychology, but Two-way Split still shows a sporran-full of promise for first-time novelist Allan Guthrie.

Reviewer Kerry J. Schooley is a poet, a mystery writer, a cynic, a nag and a pedant in Hamilton, Ontario.

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