Review of the Only story by Julian Barnes

The narration in the book is arranged in such a way so as to reflect the development of the characters’ love story. The novel begins in first-person narrative form describing how Paul and Susan met and how their affair turned into a relationship. This part has a touch of humour in it that lightens the tone and makes you smile. Then the book switches to second-person narration (the author uses the pronoun you ). However, the impression that Paul is talking to the reader is still there. The final part of the story is told by a third-person narrator. Perhaps this is where we hear the voice of the author himself, who is observing Paul. As he is getting more and more detached from the events, the tone becomes more desperate and dark, leading to a heartbreaking and terribly upsetting ending, which leaves a bitter aftertaste.

Barnes’ first-person narration inevitably makes you question Paul’s reliability as a narrator. However, he is quite aware of that himself and admits that memory is the only tool that is available to him and it is not something you can always rely on.

It’s my memory which is my guide here’

‘Memory sorts and sifts according to the demands made on it by the rememberer’

‘If this is your only story, then it’s the one you have most often told and retold, even if – as is the case here – mainly to yourself. The question then is: do all these retellings bring you closer to the truth of what happened, or move you further away? I’m not sure.

Well, neither am I. However, it is probably true that the more an event recedes into the past, the more blurred it becomes in our mind and the harder it is to grasp and reconstruct it.

Overall, I found the book extremely captivating and I thoroughly enjoyed its philosophical slant and how Barnes explored the notions of love, non-standard/unequal relationships and memory.