A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon

---

Novel Travelling

Follow the journey of books around the world and leave your own location and thoughts. For more information and to see the index of other books on this blog go to:
Introduction and Index

Bob Mehew: June 23rd, 2008

Where obtained: Gift from friends Nina and Jemima in Wivenhoe, UK
Where read: Trekking in Gangotri
Where left: Bookshop - Delhi
Thoughts:
A splendid tale of retirement angst and family pressures where the minute detail of everyday life is caught superbly by the author. Seemingly ordinary situations take extra-ordinary turns, mainly because of mis-communications in this dark family saga. The skill and ingenuity in the writing is chopping and changing between each family member very quickly (most chapters are less than five pages long) as the story is told from the point of view of all the major characters: father George who thinks he has cancer but in fact has ezcema; mother Jean who is having an affair with George's ex-business partner; son Jamie who is losing his boyfriend; and daughter Katie who is about to marry a man who is good at fixing things and will be a great step-dad, but she is not sure she loves him. A great line is: 'You don't marry someone because they are capable'. There is a marvellous climax where you know something is going to happen and are trying to read and break-neck speed to find out what it is, but are kept guessing to the end. Sarah my wife read before me and we have fanticised about who would play the roles in what would be a superb BBC2 or Channel4 drama. We have Richard Briers as George, Helen Mirren as Jean, Andrew Lincoln and Daniela Nardini from This Life as Jamie and Katie.

I read this book in Rishikesh and up in the Himalayas on a trek to the Gamukh Glacier - a sacred place just outside Gangotri in Uttrakhand and source of the river Ganga - India's holiest. The best reading moments though were provided on the road to Gangroti - a real struggle on often un-made roads as jeeps and buses jostled for position on hair-pin bends with sheer death-drops hundreds of feet down to the Ganaga river below awaiting the slightest mistake. Sometimes it was better not to look, and being able to read a quick chapter of this enthralling book was a godsend while the traffic piled up around me and beeping and shunting followed. I'm just glad I made it up there (and down again) in one piece.

Novel Travelling

Follow the journey of books around the world and leave your own location and thoughts. For more information and to see the index of other books on this blog go to:
Introduction and Index

---