Burley Cross Postbox Theft (original 2010; edition 2010)

This is a high 3/5 stars but that's really all I can say. Barker is witty and exceptional at writing and all of her novels have something special about them but I really expected more from this one. It's about a Postbox Theft where all that is left are a series of letters from the small English town of Burley Cross but really it's about the inner workings of a town between the destitute and the desperately romantic, the homeoerotic secret lover spots and the miserly old spinsters...what is interesting is the vastly different takes on the characters of the town from different perspectives. It really makes you wonder what the truth really is about each human being that supposedly exists and resides there and makes you realize how different your point of view on someone may be from someone else and how differently people may think of you.

This could very easily de-evolve soap opera style if it weren't for Barker's wit and talented prose. Still, it doesn't seem profound or life changing in any way. I still think Darkmans is her best that I've read thus far clearly. ( )

A terrible crime has taken place in the quiet, complacent village of Burley Cross. Some vandal has broken into the village postbox, taken out the contents and dumped them in a back alley. The village bobby is handed the bundle of letters - the only available evidence of who might have committed this nefarious deed. As he, and we, read through them, we get a vivid and funny picture of village life - the busybodies, the nosy neighbours, the sweet old ladies and the downshifting city dwellers.

Some condemn themselves out of their own unreliable-narrator mouths; for others, you have to wait a few letters for the pieces of the story to fit together. The hinge of the narrative is a long letter which details the village 'auction of promises' - where some villagers donate services to be auctioned for charity, from sprucing up a garden to making a quilt or writing a song. Somehow, in the process, everyone is shown at their best or worst (depending on character).

It would be fairly easy to pick holes in this book. The butts of the jokes are often fish in a barrel. There's a surprising number of letters sent considering these days of email. And every single correspondent writes more or less in the style of Nicola Barker - digressive, emotional and emphatic. But you know what? It's a style that I enjoy reading.

This book isn't Darkmans. (Alas, what is?) But it's a very lively read. I whipped through it with a grin on my face, and at the end I realised that the village's inhabitants had worked their way into my heart - I really wanted to know what happened to them next! Given the way that hints scattered through the letters were stitched together at the end, though, I do have a certain confidence that the good ones will end happily... ( )

I’ve thought about this book for some time after I finished it but haven’t really come to any definite conclusion – do I like this book or do I not? Let me list the pros and cons of this book.

PROS
- It’s written all in letters. I like that. Brings me back to some of the books I read in high school.
- You can get a good perspective of the village of Burley Cross through all those letters.
- There are some truly funny moments, such as the ‘sex hex’.
- It’s original.
- The ending is truly innovative.

CONS
- All written in letters means sometimes not a lot of background detail is there.
- Sometimes some characters don’t really seem to fit in all that well into the overall narrative (such as the church play, who was the person writing the letter and what was their role?)
- People don’t really write letters that much nowadays due to email etc. and they don’t always go into extreme detail. (A fairly trivial point though).
- The neighbourly arguments can sometimes be a little too close to reality. (Not applicable if you live in Summer Bay or Neighbours).
- It gets a little boring in places, trying to work out where all these people fit!

There you go. After writing the list, I’ve tempted to lean towards the ‘I like’ list, but you probably won’t feel comfortable reading a book about village life (disputes, love, friendship, planning disputes etc.) if you’re having a neighbour war of your own. On the other hand, it is a witty look at petty politics and worth a laugh, particularly if you’ve ever had any voyeuristic thought about a post box. The characters are over the top (I still shudder thinking of Baxter and his appearance post-sex hex) and cleverly illustrated to display their flaws. There are loving moments and some just plain ridiculous moments (such as the phantom dog dropping bags tied to fences). Like real life, there are some moments that just seem not to do anything or be part of the bigger picture. In retrospect, I found that nice – too often now TV programmes and some books lack any deviation from the Major Plot Line.

This book is an eccentric departure from the linear plot and should be enjoyed as such. You’ll either like it (as I ended up doing after I penned my thoughts) or think it’s a load of junk mail. ( )

Well, certainly 'different' and quite clever in its idiosyncratic way. But I had so many other books on back burner that I couldn't get round to finishing it. I shouldn't have started this review at all really. ( )

I've read a couple of Nicola Barker's novels in the past. The first was Clear, set during the time of David Blaine's stunt in a box in London, which is one of a very very small list of books that I started and never finished. I read the Booker shortlisted Darkmens, and really enjoyed it, and saw her work in a new light. So I was interested by the prospects of this book, and also because I know well the geographical setting of the novel.

Burley Cross is village in Wharfedale, Yorkshire, near the market town of Ilkley. Burley Cross itself is fictional, but there are villages in the real life area with the similar names. The other place names mentioned in the novel (Ilkley, Skipton, Guiseley, Middleton etc.) are all real locations, so added, for me, to a strong sense of place. The structure of the book is based around a series of letters that were stolen from the village's dilapidated postbox. The local bobby is tasked in identifying the person responsible trough the little evidence in the contents of the letters.

I can see this style of book would annoy people, but I lapped it up. It has to be read with tongue firmly in cheek, but once you've done that it is a riot. The different characters in the village, and the circumstances they find themselves in reminded me of a classic British farce. Reality is stretched a little, to good comic effect. So we encounter the complaints of a villager regarding dog mess on the moor and a local councillor's concerns about the potential threat from Chinese gangs stealing manhole covers. But we also see the darker side of village life, ranging from romantic feelings for the village postmistress, to the confusion of a daughter whose mother is dying of cancer.

At first there seems no connection between any of the first few letters, but then the same characters start reappearing in other letters, or become the letter writer themselves. At the end, the loose ends are tied up very well, and the overall picture suddenly becomes much clearer.

I thoroughly enjoyed this, particularly the antics of Baxter Thorndyke. And with many of the letters you a left wondering what became of these characters, given that their letters would never have reached their intended destination. ( )