funny, interesting, still prefer his first and waiting for his next

Enormously cheering. ( )

As a certain favorite cat of mine once said, “We’re all mad here.” I would challenge anyone to read 15-20 pages of Mark Haddon’s A Spot of Bother without coming to the same conclusion. Haddon’s second foray into the world of the novel explores the inner workings of one George Hall and his family. With a cheating wife, a daughter getting married (no she’s not… yes she is… maybe), and a gay son going through a bit of an identity crisis, poor George has enough to deal with. But fact is, George is retired, has a lot of time on his hands, and he’s just discovered a lesion on his hip that the doctor might say is eczyma but he just knows it’s cancer, damn it… and he slowly begins to lose his mind.

But is George the only one losing his mind? Life is crazy, but for the Hall family life throws more curveballs than can be found in an ordinary game of baseball, and the way these characters adjust, regroup, and deal with their problems turns out to be a fascinating study of the human psyche. In short, Haddon has done it again. He’s given the reader a character with more mental problems than you can shake a stick at (even if you were on all fours, mooing like a cow… you read me correctly), and still manages to make us wonder if George isn’t the sanest member of the family after all.

While a bit confusing, the relationships and characteristics of the people Haddon has thrown into this mad, mad world are intricate and articulated with amazing talent. I worried, hoped, and celebrated with them just as if they were members of my own family. That’s what makes a book wonderful. The story itself has quite a few different plotlines, and the constant switching back and forth between characters in order to give each plot the attention it deserved was a bit over the top for my taste, but because the story was just so good, so real, it works much better than other books I have read in the same vein.

I firmly believe Haddon has created a following with this book. No longer can some critics claim that The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time was a one hit wonder, of sorts. A Spot of Bother cements him in my mind as a writer with a great talent for exploring the inner madness of us all. The fact that he does so without cheapening the experience is only the icing on the proverbial cake.

The original publication of this review can be seen on my blog: Living Between the Pages. ( )

I'd initially decided to stop reading this book at page 80 because I found the character of George and his hypochrondria very annoying. However, a few days later I picked it up because I really loved Katie and Jamie and wanted to know how things turned out for them. Along the way I grew to sympathize with and like George and even to like Jean (but never sympathized with her "need" for an affair, which I thought she fell into out of boredom with her life and because of a mid-life crisis). I found a good deal of the book very amusing, and much of the prepration for and the wedding itself was laugh-out-loud funny. In the end, I really enjoyed this family and this book. ( )

Excellent, very British book about a family patriarch slowly losing his mind. Funny, poignant, and very well written.