Let Me Go Mad in My Own Way

by Elaine Feeney

A multi-generational family story of the west of Ireland and its women and a love story of second chances from the Booker-longlisted author of How to Build a Boat

Claire O’Connor’s life has been on hold since she broke up with Tom Morton and moved from cosmopolitan London back home to the rugged West of Ireland to care for her dying father. But snatches of her old life are sure to follow her, when Tom unexpectedly moves nearby for work. As Claire is thrown back into a love she thought she’d left behind, she questions if Tom has come for her or for himself.

Living in her childhood home brings its own challenges. While Claire tries to maintain a normal life – obsessing over the internet, going to work and minding her own business – Tom’s return stirs up haunting family memories trapped within the walls of the old house that looms nearby.

Let Me Go Mad in My Own Way is a story of love and resilience, rich with history and drama, and the legacies of violence and redemption. As the secrets of the past are revealed, Claire must confront whether she can escape her history to make a future for herself – and whether finding yourself means facing yourself too.

Genres: Fiction, Irish Literature, Ireland, Literary Fiction, Book Club, Audiobook, Poetry

296 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 29, 2025

About the author

Elaine Feeney was born in the West of Ireland and lives in Athenry. She published her first chapbook, Indiscipline in 2007, and has since published three collections of poetry, Where’s Katie? (2010), The Radio Was Gospel (2014) and Rise (2017) with Salmon Publishing.

Feeney’s work has been widely published and anthologised in Poetry Review, The Stinging Fly, Oxford Poetry, Poetry Ireland, The Irish Times, The Manchester Review, Stonecutter Journal and Coppernickel.

Her debut novel, As You Were, was published by Harvill Secker/ VINTAGE in August 2020.

Reviews

[Christy fictional_traits · Rating 4 out of 5]

'...had grief made me forget where I was? Who I was? Had I any idea now who I was? Was this grief?'

Claire O'Connor answers the phone one day, to the news that her ex-boyfriend is going to move to Ireland, to her home town. A town that he never visited when they were together, so why now? What does it mean? Does it mean anything at all? The unexpected news sends Claire down a path of re-examination, not only of the demise of their relationship but the death of her mother and her subsequent return home - the catalyst of relationship breakdown.

'Let me Go Mad in My Own Way' is a dual timeline story mostly: what was and what is, but occasionally we are taken right back to 1920 and the Irish War of Independence and the violence of the Black and Tans. Through this journey we discover the intergenerational trauma that affected not only Claire's family, and her upbringing, but that of the community. Your heart will ache over this sad history; the pain of staying and the pain of leaving. However, as Claire continues to heal from her trauma, there is redemption and hope.

This story crosses many genres and will leave you pondering after you've finished.

'Revolution is always personal...as is love, so if you expect them to change, maybe you need to engage'.

[Vada · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 ⭐️

I loved what this book almost was.

[May Dinneen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Elaine Feeney manages to articulate the specific horror of being an Irish woman in a way i've never read before: the pain of being here and the pain of leaving, wondering what your mothers and grandmothers and great-grandmothers could have been without the weights of colonialism and tradition, how easily we can become the things we fear the most. a truly beautiful book. i can't wait for you all to read it!

[Chloe · Rating 5 out of 5]

#Gifted

“She called me up on a bright yellow day in late summer, a day that turned cold in the early evening- the kind of day that made me think, reassuringly, of an autumn routine.”

Swoon.

Well, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Elaine Feeney is a literary genius. I loved this book and I feel grateful to have read it.

Set across generations of an Irish family, Feeney takes us back and forth between the terror of the Black and Tans in 1920’s Athenry, to poverty and domestic violence in the 1980’s, and up to present day 2023 where the surviving members of the O’ Connor clan, (led by only daughter Claire), find themselves struggling with their memories from childhood, and the strain generational trauma has left on them.
In order to make a real future for herself, Claire must first confront the past.

That all sounds very heavy, but the writing is so beautiful, lyrical almost at times, and swathes of it are just incredibly comforting (see the second slide).

The way the different timelines weave together is honestly seamless; I wanted to be in all of them to find out what happens next; and they all meet together at the end of the book in perfect synchronicity.

This is a story of hope, family, love, and redemption, even in the face of grief, historical wrongs, and violent legacies. A must read.

Love! Love love love.

With many thanks @penguinbooksireland for my early copy. All opinions are my own as always. Let Me Go Mad In My Own Way is available to buy now.

[Claire]

The title of Feeney’s book is a statement from the ancient Greek playwright Sophocles. The line appears in his play Electra, translated as: “I ask this one thing: let me go mad in my own way.” In the play, the main character, overwhelmed by grief, injustice and familial violence, demands to grieve and rage on her own terms. It is a cry for the right to express and feel one’s own emotional suffering and pain, in the way it is desired, needed.

“Don’t tell me how to feel or how to react, let me experience my madness as I must.”

Elaine Feeney said in an interview that she encountered the phrase in Anne Carson’s translation of Electra and immediately felt its resonance, both personally and within her book’s themes.

Going Mad or Getting to Grips With the Past

Her novel is about an Irish woman named Claire O’Connor who had been living in London with her boyfriend Tom Morton, unravelling after the death of her mother. Unable to cope, she breaks up with Tom and returns to the West of Ireland, initially to care for her father.

Back living in the family home awakens memories and issues for Claire and her two brothers, who are more used to avoiding and ignoring past and present bad behaviours.

The unexpected arrival of Tom and new friends Claire makes at her new university job, create a situation that brings people together that wouldn’t ordinarily meet.

Choosing to Live Differently

This new dynamic challenges some of those repressed feelings and the characters will either continue to deny or choose to grow.

The story is told in different timelines, in the first person present, when Claire is an adult and has returned to Ireland, in 2022 and then there are chapters about the family from 1920, events around the old abandoned house at the back their property.Though 100 years in the past, undercurrents of that violent era continue to pump through the veins of this family.

Then there is Claire’s childhood memory of a Hunt Day in 1990, when the Queen of England was looking for a black mare for the Household Cavalry. Flashes of memory bring it all back as Claire confronts the past in order to better create any chance she might have of a better future.

Great Storytelling and Thought Provoking Depth

It is a thought provoking novel rooted in personal, collective and inherited memory, that deals with ‘the home‘ as the institution that requires dismantling, and it is the coming together of family, friends and the new relationships in Claire’s life that will facilitate the change that can redefine what home can become.

It’s also a novel that is entertaining with or without the layers of meaning that come from the references, but it is one that I have enjoyed all the more for understanding more about the motivations of the author and the literary influences she has referenced and talks about in an interview with Ash Davida Janeof Bad Apple, Aotearoa.

[Theresa Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

*This review contains spoilers

Every so often I read a novel that cracks me open in a wholly unique way, and these are the ones that define why I read. The way these books make me feel goes beyond a five-star rating. It’s more of an immortalisation of the text within my subconscious. I already expected to get along well with Let Me Go Mad In My Own Way, right from seeing an article about it titled: ‘This might just be the best book to come out of Ireland this year’. I was never not going to read a book with an expectation like that attached to it.

The synopsis for this one reads like it’s a story about a relationship, about coming home, and grappling with the ghosts of the past. Yes, it is about these things, but that doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface. I rarely write reviews that contain spoilers, but I just wanted the freedom to stomp about with this one instead of treading carefully. In the beginning of this novel, Claire has been home in the West of Ireland for some time, having moved back there from London after the death of her mother to care for her father who has a terminal illness. She receives a phone call from her ex-partner’s sister, telling her that Tom is moving to the West of Ireland, in fact, he will be quite close to her, because he is working on a book about Irish men and feels the need to be on the ground, so to speak. This is not welcome news for Claire and derails her. She has lost both of her parents within a short space of time and recalling the way her relationship ended with Tom, while she was in the midst of grieving her mother, is like a wound reopening. To know that Tom is moving to Ireland to write, when he never once accompanied her to visit her family, nor did he attend her mother’s funeral with her, stuns Claire and throws her contained existence into a disarray.

‘Tom Morton had always refused to visit my family in Athenry, even in the wild spring of 2019 when I fell apart entirely and eventually returned home for good as they say. And so – his imminent arrival – it felt like a trespass.’

The story indicates early on that the O’Connor family were not exactly a happy family. The first instance on this is in the retelling of the preparation of their mother’s body for burial and her funeral. The full extent of the dynamics of the household are revealed in pieces, through bitter recriminations and unending grief, things almost disclosed to each other but then left unsaid, a refusal to talk openly about certain things. There is a shadow of violence about the house, lurking and pulling at each of the O’Connor siblings, who have experienced the rage of their father in different ways, borne witness to the indignity their mother was subjected to, and each of them the product of abuse and neglect – the neglect coming from a mother who was unable to care for them as she may have wanted to on account of expending all of her energies on managing her husband’s moods.

‘As though no one would ever know my roots. I didn’t have to tell them about lambs to slaughter, or the sting of Father’s hand long after it left my cheek or thighs, or the tight grip he often had on my upper arm, teeth gnashing drumming home something, once again, that I had done wrong. I didn’t have to explain to them that I used to wet the bed for years, and how it seemed to me that French was far too fine a language to talk of such coarseness, that as a language it could not house the awful vulgarity of my childhood, and there was a freedom in this.’

Claire’s grief is more for her mother than her father. She is living in her family home alone, a place she left and only on occasion returned to in the years after. She did not come back when her mother was ill, and indeed, this weighs heavily on her as she sorts through objects and belongings, sifting through memories and moments, steeped in regret. I felt this keenly, the memories that objects can evoke. Seeing the bits of people lying about and tucked into drawers, even the most insignificant of items possessing the ability to steal your breath. Elaine Feeney writes of this with such tenderness, honouring the way that grief can manifest itself into the form of household items and random bits of flotsam that one remains desperate to hold onto.

‘Mother was about the place in raincoats, some paint cans, her wicker sewing basket still full with tiny spools of coloured thread, needles and measuring tape.’

‘I was, since returning and not leaving, trying to piece her together about the bungalow – bits of her falling out of presses and wardrobes, the drawers of pills.’

Abruptly, the story leaves the present and goes back to two different times. One of them is when Claire and her brothers were young, the other, back further, to the early 1900s, a time when all of Ireland was still one country and the Black and Tans were in force, searching for Fenians by way of pillage, torture, rape, and murder. We begin to see the traumatic legacy that lies within the family history of the O’Connor family, inherited trauma that extends way back to the Famine. Their family provides a microcosm in which Elaine Feeney can examine the history that exists in living intergenerational memory for so many Irish people. These sections from the past are not delivered lightly, in either era. The violence is front and centre, but Feeney also writes of it with such an instinctive ability to convey fear and trepidation, so it is never gratuitous, but still infinitely painful and shocking to be immersed within.

‘It was all the left-behind pain of other people in a building that suffocates me.’

‘Some didn’t take the free round at the bar, others walked out, indignant, and stood about, one man spat viciously outside the pub and another smashed a glass against the arch in honour of his grandfather who was hung upside down by the Black and Tans and his throat slit so he died a long and slow death.’

‘The were owed, they were owed, oh, but they were owed.’

The story in the present day sees Claire reconnecting with Tom and the two of them moving on from their past into a newer kind of territory for both of them. When Claire’s brothers begin to witness this reconnection and note a change in Claire’s character, the younger regards it as positive, the older one is terrified. The only sibling to fully know what caused his mother’s death, the burden of being the eldest son of a violent man and fully informed on his family history has Connor in the grips of a breakdown and he is barely holding it together. He mistakenly believes his sister is treading in their mother’s footsteps within her relationship with Tom, and he cannot accept that she should be at the mercy of a violent man, moreover, an Englishman as well. His fear morphs into a rage against Tom that has a profound effect on the entire family. The full extent of what happened to the O’Connor family at the hands of the Black and Tans one fateful evening is revealed, but the extent that this still weighs upon the current generation was splintering in its intensity. Alongside this, Claire is at last made aware of how her mother died. She starved herself to death, refused to eat for months and months, to avoid having to nurse her husband through his final days, dying before him and leaving him alone, and for one single moment in time, taking control of her own fate.

‘Claire was a good daughter, reading her father, trying to predict his moods, his laughter, if he had drink taken, read his silence, reading the road ahead of him – the day, the weather. She had become much like her mother for trying to make everything fall into place for the family.’

This story is intense, often brutal and stunning, but it was also magnificent. To witness this family break apart and then begin to heal was astonishingly life affirming. Elaine Feeney is a force, the way she writes and the way she lets a story fall open at the most unexpected moments. I know I’ve got a real thing for Irish fiction and rarely do anything other than rave about each Irish novel I read, but this one is truly in a class of its own. I can’t remember which publication it was that I read that initial article in, but I agree entirely that Let Me Go Mad In My Own Way is indeed ‘the best book to come out of Ireland this year’. Perhaps ever.

‘Of course you can love, you’re full of daft love, Claire O’Connor – and that’s both to your credit and your madness.’

[Aoife Cassidy McM · Rating 4 out of 5]

Only Elaine Feeney could tie in subjects like TikTok trad wives to the Irish War of Independence and make it work.

Let Me Go Mad In My Own Way is Elaine Feeney’s third novel and it’s magnificent really, tackling feminism, colonialism, domestic violence, multigenerational trauma and modern social discourse, but with subtlety so that the reader always feels grounded in the story.

Claire, Conor and Brian are three siblings from the West of Ireland. Claire is living in the home place when her ex Tom moves from London to a house close to where she is living, ostensibly to write a book. Tom’s presence throws Claire’s delicate balance off and dredges up the ghosts of the past barely buried within the walls of the old house near her family home, forcing Claire to confront the past and present to see if she can break free and build a future for herself.

The book moves between 1920, the 1980s and the present day - the first chapter set in 1920 seemed a bit jarring at first but then I hit upon an “aha” moment where it clicked into place within the structures of the story.

Some of my favourite passages were the ones around the dinner table, listening to the characters’ perspectives on all manner of social issues. It was so real to me, I almost felt I was in the room listening and observing, ready to contribute to the discourse!

Elaine Feeney is a deeply empathetic, clever writer who, for me, excels at breathing life into her characters. This is a novel you can sit with for a while after and allow it to percolate, drawing lines between past and present, both in the story and in society at large. 4/5 ⭐️

Thanks so much @penguinbooksireland for the early copy of Let Me Go Mad In My Own Way. It was published in May and is widely available in bookshops and your local library.

[Ross · Rating 4 out of 5]

stunning! elaine feeney is a magnificent, extremely talented writer

[Zoe Adams · Rating 3 out of 5]

I LOVED how to build a boat. But this books just did not work for me. I still don't really 'get' it. What was it about? Why was it written? I'm not entirely sure. Feeney writes beautifully, but I felt this just lost its way - perhaps even from the start.

[Kimmibear26 · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best books i have read all year you cannot put it down .I loved the writer continues flow of words it would appeal to anyone who needs to follow their way .

[Carmel xoxo · Rating 3 out of 5]

A beautiful, quiet kind of novel that crept up on me. I always find myself connecting a little deeper with Irish stories, there’s something unique about our culture, and the way grief and humour exist side by side. Elaine Feeney captures it all so well here.

We follow Claire, a woman navigating layers of grief, loss, and reflection. Through her story, Feeney gently explores the role of women in Irish society and how it’s evolved from her mother’s time to now, and the emotional cost that still remains. “We had been taught, generation after generation, to internalise our madness. We were experts in quiet suffering.” ❤️‍🩹

That’s the main theme and topic I connected with but this book is packed with much more topics…. It is quietly powerful ❣️

[Mary MacMahon · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautifully written book capturing the complexity of family life in a rural Irish setting spanning back over 3 generations and the effect it has on the main female character and then the effect grief has on her.
Would recommend

[Erin McNulty]

review post book club!

[Patricia Power · Rating 3 out of 5]

Let me go mad in my own way by Elaine Feeney. Honestly I wanted to love this one as I have loved her others but really didn’t feel this one. Claire struggles with the death of her mother , returns home and attempts to deal with both her and her families past. I think book tries to do too much and while I appreciate why people will like it , it was only ok from me. With the exception of Maire and Tom I wasn’t overly fond of the characters

[Leona · Rating 5 out of 5]

Let me go mad in my own way is the first Elaine Feeney book I have read and I absolutely loved it! Such a fabulous book that dives into a multi generational story about a family from the west of Ireland. It deals with grief, trauma, love, reliance and it's rich in showing the inner workings of families.

This book is split into three timelines with the main timeline focused in present day on Claire. Claire's life turns upside down with the passing of her mother, the breakup of her relationship and her subsequent caring for her father. Moving back home brings its challenges for Claire and even more so when Tom her ex moves to the village for work. Claire is thrown back into a state of will she get back with Tom while still dealing with her grief and new life. The other timeline is set in the 90s when Claire was a child and shows her complicated relationship with her father. While the final timeline is set in 1920 and details the horrors of the black and tans in Ireland.

I loved this book, I love a book with multiple timelines and a historical element when it's done well and in this book it's done fantastic. I felt transported to the 1920s west of Ireland and the fear of trying to live through that time and keep your family safe. I loved Claire's ancestors in this section but it is a hard section to read at one particular point but it doesn't shy away from the real events that happened then. I also loved the 90s chapter and how we got a deeper understanding of Claire and her father's relationship and the relationship between her mother and father, also how this shaped how Claire approached relationships and her relationship with Tom.

The writing is excellent, the historical elements so engaging I loved everything about this book from the complex relationships to the historical elements. I loved how Claire is flawed but you still really connect with her character. Overall, a brilliant book that I adored.

[Aimee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Elaine Feeney's latest novel is a beautiful, brutal, devestating and vital exploration of intergenerational trauma and violence.

"Let Me Go Mad in My Own Way" is a carefully and compassionately woven, multinarrative story that rightfully centres the lives, loves and suffering of West of Ireland women at the hands of their husbands, lovers and fathers, as well as at the hands of the men who stood and stand as the proud faces of the systematic abuse and terrorism of a colonising aggressor.

Feeney contends with the way that Ireland's history of being made to bleed beneath the boots of an occupying force can bury itself deep in the bones of those left alive to carry it, so deeply that it passes down into the generations that come after, a twisted epigenetic gift that will make itself known, whether it be welcome or not.
Similarly, the author, through the character of Tom, warns of the danger of being casually ignorant of this history and its consequences.

This is another utter triumph from Feeney— quite possibly my book of the year

[Milly Reynolds · Rating 4 out of 5]

A super novel about intergenerational trauma and violence by an author whose only other work I have read was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2023. This is about so many things and the writing is almost poetic at times. It’s also about coming home, about grief, about relationships and family. Our main character, Claire, had returned home to the West of Ireland following the death of her mother and to care for her dying father. The return from a life in London also coincided with the break-up of her relationship with Tom. At the start of the book, Claire O’Connor, having now also lost her father some time ago, gets the news that Tom is moving to the west of Ireland also, something that throws her as he never once accompanied her to Ireland when they were together. Infact he even stayed away from her mother’s funeral, which led to the break-up. So knowing he is coming to her part of Ireland confuses her. The story is told in various timelines - we cover the period of her mother’s death where Claire and her two brothers navigate their grief through recriminations and things left unsaid. We have present time, we also go back to the 1980s and see the violence that was part of Claire’s upbringing and the neglect they felt as their mother was so consumed with avoiding her husband’s moods that there was no room for the children.. And, we even go back to the 1920 when the Black and Tans were hunting for Fenians and dishing out rape, violence and murder. This timeline shows us just how much trauma there is in the O’Connor line. Claire is not a perfect person but you are with her as she deals with the guilt that she never come home when her mother was ill, only coming back when she had died. We sit beside her as she opens her memories. We also watch as she reconnects with Tom and how her brothers see a change in their sister now she is back home. One sees the change as positive, the other sees it as negative and it frightens him as does her relationship with Tom, an outsider who has no knowledge or understanding of the traumatic history of the family, the legacy of which is still on their shoulders. And then Claire learns the truth about her mother’s death. This story is brutal at times but it is compelling as we watch the O’Connors drift apart and then heal. I’d love to see this on the Booker longlist sometime.

[Mary Crawford · Rating 4 out of 5]

A young Irish woman returns to the West of Ireland from London after her mother dies and she goes to look after her ill father. She also splits up with her boyfriend. As she rebuilds her life in Ireland and attempts to be happy in new situation she receives a phone call from her ex’s sister to say he is coming to live in Ireland close to where she is. The time line runs from the 1920s, to the 90s and then to modern day. Colonialism, oppression, cruelty and violence ricochet between these periods of time and leave the reader reeling on occasions. The role of women is explored through the new ‘Trad’ movement which is very creepy. The final dinner party exposes the cracks of family dysfunction, repressed emotions and eventually hope.

[Oisin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautifully written. There were some really gorgeous passages throughout and at points it really reminded me of my youth, visiting my grandparents on their farm, and climbing around the hay bales in the shed with my cousins.

The end hit me quite hard, and I found myself tearing up on the final couple of pages.

This was a wonderful read, that will stay with me for a long time.

[Lisa Coleman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just finished Elaine Feeney's new book.

Loved,loved,loved it. Her characters are so real and you get so invested that you want to go into the book and beat a few people and hug a few others.

My book of the year !!!

[Nicole D. · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very good Irish novel which deals with grief and family trauma and the impacts of both on Claire.

A bit of a family saga with flashbacks to the 20's, 70's, 90's and current day.

It was interesting and well done.

[Lauren]

Cracked me right open. Review to come after book club.

[Jan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A sensational story from start to finish, Elaine Feeney has such a natural, effortless flow to her writing. One of the best books I've read this year. 👏

[Sandy · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

[Audrey D · Rating 5 out of 5]

Let Me Go Mad in My Own Way by Elaine Feeney is a deeply emotive story of how silence, cruelty and trauma can pass through generations. The characters are survivors—fierce, damaged and determined to break the cycle. This novel is both brutal and beautiful.

[Trish · Rating 4 out of 5]

Where to even start?! I wasn’t sure what to expect when I picked this up, but it certainly wasn’t the raw, and at times brutal, insight into the complexities of Irish rural life throughout generations that the author has captured so well. From the impact of colonialism, to intergenerational trauma, abuse, guilt (I guess that was always going to crop up!), love, despair, this book doesn’t pull any punches, and nor should it. Be prepared for all the emotions when reading this!

[Sinéad Gilligan]

The book did not grab by attention and I could not get into it.

[Kerry Larby · Rating 5 out of 5]

A moving story set in the west of Ireland exploring themes around generational and historic trauma. I felt emotionally connected to Claire the protaganist and thought Feeney's prose was goregous-lyrical but grounded. Another talented Irish poet/novelist.

[Bernie Flynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Felt a bit disjointed initially as it flipped through the different timelines, so a bit slow to get going.

But after that, as the timelines gradually started to converge, I couldn’t put it down. Very thought provoking. First book I’ve read by this author and will look out for more.

[Margaret McCann · Rating 2 out of 5]

Two stars because Feeney wrote well and credibly and in detail about the hard, unglamorous, unromantic agricultural lives of the 1920s. But, apart from that.....dear God! I didn't like or believe or care about any one else's story.

I am getting lonely being the only person in Ireland who is not enjoying books by contemporary Irish authors that are universally raved about and positively reviewed. But here I go again...
I could see the themes, misogyny, patriarchy, patriotism, alcohol abuse, emotional repression, parenting styles, domestic violence, colonial violence, immigration, racial prejudice. There may have been a few others. They were writ large and joined together with huge knitting needles and garish yarn to make a loose product with big holes and many dropped stitches.

I just didn't get a bit of it. Like, why would Tom and Claire or either of them have any interest in or any trust in resuming a relationship?. And, like, seriously, what's Tom doing in Athenry? No disrespect to Athenry, but it's a most unlikely location for the enormous coincidence that kick-starts the story. ( I was very disappointed that there was no mention of Trevelyan's corn, though I may have missed it because I did flick through a few pages of artfully cooked crabmeat in its Nicholas Mosse platter. ) And the book......not a spoiler....the book starts with a phonecall between Claire and Tom's sister because she and Claire had kept in touch for some reason. And, when there is every reason for them to be in contact, we just never hear from her again. It's one of the many dropped stitches in the story.

And, like, Tom and Claire's conversations are dull. Very dull. There's food. It's one of the themes. Food and famine and relationships with food and famine. And sea swimming. And literature. But, mother of God! there's no craic. And....like.....there is an unbelievable, and I do mean unbelievable, lack of curiosity in and absence of communication between the central characters. Unrelieved by the quirkiness of a few apparently enlightened and stagily clever tangential university staff members. They turn up at a dinner party, all outré and full of clever quips and then they then sort of disappear. It would maybe be a spoiler to say how they disappear but they've brought their interesting, culturally diverse backgrounds and refreshing, modern lifestyles and so they are dispensed with. They also bring alcohol. There's an awful lot of alcohol in the book and nobody pays a blind bit of notice to it.

And then the book ends. In a ridiculous way. Loose ends all tied up and knotted and the knitting is finished. And there you go. And that's the way it is. And the author's fellow writers quoted on its blurb praise it to the hilt, it's compassionate and gifted and uncanny and touching and intelligent and beautiful and witty, according to them.

I beg to differ.