Every article I’ve read about Andrew O’Hagan’s “Caledonian Road” has featured the word ‘Dickensian’ somewhere among its text. It’s an apt descriptor. O’Hagan’s novel—my first sampling of his work—is epic in size and scope. It’s a sprawling portrait of post-Pandemic Britain, with a Greek chorus of characters—from aristocrats and Russian oligarchs to to human traffickers and everyday street thugs—whose lives are entwined in a variety of ways.

For a book dauntingly adorned with a two-page cast of characters, the events in “Caledonian Road” transpire linearly, and are anchored by the presence of public intellectual and culture critic Campbell Flynn, whose life is on the precipice of self-made destruction. His unravelling is at the centre of a novel with a plethora of narrative tendrils, some of which inevitably held my interest more than others, but whose existence are all vital to the tapestry of the work.

Truth be told, I was never entirely spellbound with “Caledonian Road,” but such is O’Hagan’s prowess as a storyteller, there was never any doubt I’d see it through to its conclusion. More than anything else, it’s made me want to seek out his other work, “Mayflies” perhaps, to see how his work shines on a slightly smaller canvas.