The Diary of Fiona J McNally

Book Review: Blow Your House Down

Blow Your House Down by Pat Barker

Having read Pat Barker's Border Crossing, I expected this book to be just as dark and morally bankrupt and I wasn't disappointed on that front. Set in a Northern English town, it tells the story of a group of prostitutes who are being hunted and killed by a punter.

Barker effectively weaves an atmosphere of extreme violence and poverty and a cycle of hopelessness. If not working as prostitutes, the women in the book are employed as drudges in the city's chicken factory, a place that reeks of death. Her descriptions of sexual assault and abuse are both graphic and sickening and her depiction of haunts such as the viaduct and the empty tenement buildings, superb. She does, however,manage to create a certain sympathy for her characters who are well drawn and deeply explored.

The face of murdered prostitute Kath, watches over the city on billboards, her eyes seemingly following all those who knew her and worked with her. Kath 's life had been one of abuse, alcoholism and the loss of her children to social services. In the months leading up to her murder she had resorted to living in a condemned building and taking chances with her life. The last one she took proved fatal.

More than a thriller, the book is a gritty and candid look at the lives of prostitutes and their opinion of their clients and men in general. It is a behind the scenes insight into pain and raw emotion as well as a glimpse into the mind of those who are prepared to take another's life.

Pat Barker has won the Booker Prize and is known for her dark bent. Perhaps it is this stark and probing look at the seamier side of life that makes her books so eminently readable. While the reader is at times horrified, Barker keeps the pace and interest at such a level that one simply can't turn away until the end.

posted by Fiona McNally @ 4/25/2005 09:06:00 am