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The Extinction Club by Robert Twigger, Hamish Hamilton, £12.99, ISBN
0241140676

HALFWAY through The Extinction Club, Robert Twigger maintains that a
“bookhead” develops the ability to judge a book’s quality by flipping through a
few of its pages. Any bookhead flipping through Twigger’s book will give it the
thumbs up at once. It’s remarkable, enjoyable—and difficult to
categorise.

The first surprise is a dust jacket that makes it look like a well-used
second-hand book, but you learn that, to Twigger, second-hand bookstores are a
sign of humanity’s saving recalcitrance. The second is that there is no
conventional form: no chapters, just headings to sections. It looks as if the
author has been sidetracked every now and then and has let his mind wander,
delighting in the freedom but still banging away at his keyboard.

Running through all this is the extraordinary story of the preservation of
Père David’s deer. This unique animal had survived only in the palace
parks of the Chinese emperors. But by about 1900 it was wiped out in China by
flood and war, but not before a few specimens had been introduced to
Europe—there is now a thriving herd at Woburn Park. But this tale surfaces
only occasionally, scattered among autobiography, biography (the Russells of
Woburn, Père David), travel, history (China’s Boxer rebellion), fact and
fiction and something that might be either. It creates a puzzling choice for the
reader of which narrative thread to follow, but that only increases the pleasure
of the book.