![T by Alan Fyfe. T by Alan Fyfe.](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/35sFyBanpD896MKnAH5FRtj/ea0e335b-f11f-472a-8fa9-6325a690c375.png/r0_0_1623_912_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
T by Alan Fyfe. Transit Lounge. 232pp. $29.99.
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"There's a right way to be high in public", claims the titular character of Alan Fyfe's debut novel, T. T - short for Timothy - is a tweaker, a methamphetamine user, living in the coastal city of Mandurah, Western Australia. Capitalising on the death of beloved dealer, Gulp, T begins selling meth to Gulp's old clientele to sustain his own habit.
Fyfe's writing is at its best when describing the urban environments of Mandurah as an extension of T's ambiguous identity. He finds himself in the shed of his potential meth suppliers, filled with drug and Fremantle Dockers paraphernalia. In an asbestos-laden house decorated by broken record players and second-hand books, T crashes on the couch of Laurette, known mostly as Lori-Bird. The two come to an agreement: he will sell methamphetamine and pay for the rent, and she will provide a home for his comedowns.
Much of the novel chronicles Lori-Bird and T's relationship. Unemployed, and with a tragic past, Lori-Bird spends her days negotiating the lease of abandoned homes to her fellow impoverished Mandurah locals. As T and Lori-Bird become romantic, the true nature of their relationship - and what it represents to T's potential return to sobriety - reaches a climax when he's met with an ultimatum: give up meth or give up Lori-Bird.
T dazzles with moments of magic realism. A body falls from the sky onto the road in front of T at the end of the first chapter, mimicking the fall of Icarus whose wings melted after flying too close to the sun. The second half of the novel picks up pace as T begins his own proverbial ascent towards the sun.
![Author Alan Fyfe. Picture supplied Author Alan Fyfe. Picture supplied](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/35sFyBanpD896MKnAH5FRtj/21a20250-29e8-477f-8126-d0517914e20e.jpeg/r0_738_3457_2911_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
It would be easy to compare Fyfe's poetic style of prose to that of fellow Western Australian Tim Winton. Yet, T's magical realism is distinct and grounded to its characters. It is a symbolic projection from Timothy's spiralling mind, existential hallucinations from the spirit of a body dependent on methamphetamine.
T is an authentic portrait of the places and people of Australia's methamphetamine epidemic. Fyfe breaks through the media's sometime shallow portrayals of meth users and cuts down to their human and spiritual core of their stories. In a rather captivating chapter, Fyfe draws parallels to the self-destructive powers of methamphetamines to the greediness of European colonisers in Australia.
At times, the novel is intense. It doesn't attempt to romanticise T's underbelly world. Yet, it also succeeds in not taking itself too seriously. Stakes aren't blown out of proportion. T keeps the reader on their toes and, just like its characters, you are never left in one spot to become too comfortable.
Simple in its beauty, T is original, bringing alive characters whose stories have been untold for too long.