Dull (boring), 17 Oct 2008
This is one of the most boring books I've ever read. The constant (about 3 times in every paragraph) use of brackets is really off putting (the author constantly points out the obvious) and hugely irritating and pointless (she uses these to include information that has no need to be in brackets). I trawled through it hoping that something may happen in line with the back cover description to no avail (it didn't happen).

Many times throughout the book I had to put it down out of sheer frustration it made me so angry. I would have binned it long before the 800 and odd page finale if I wasn't on holiday with no book shops to hand. Don't buy it. The only positive point was one chapter in which a repressed, stuffy character is forced to join a dinner party with a group of middle class couples - this is the only part of the book that I enjoyed. So thats about 25 pages out of 800+ that I liked - not much bang for your buck.

what a drivel, 15 Oct 2008
Shortlisted for Man Booker Prize?? Please! Makes you question the opinions of the Guardian and Observer reviewers. I wasted hours of my time, lost count of the use of SCOWL after about 30, "scowling" comes up on every other page - you call that good writing? The book is so frustrating it made me write my first review on the Internet ever.

Magnificent, 28 Sep 2008
I'm not going to go into long plot explanations - others have done it already far better than I could. I just want to say that this is a magnificent novel. I've not read any Nicola Barker before, and I was just blown away by the sheer audacity and exuberance of her prose. Yes, this book is long, but within a few pages I was completely gripped, barely able to put it down as it built up an exquisite dramatic tension. Barker develops, layer by layer, scene by scene, an almost anarchic assortment of characters, throws them together and shows us the unpredictable results. It's an almost cinematic approach to novel-writing, and makes for a demanding read - you work hard to piece together the clues scattered in her narrative - but it's totally engaging and thoroughly rewarding.

Not for a long time have I come across a writer with such a playful feel for language. Her observations, too, are startlingly fresh and apt. Yes, the novel does rely heavily on coincidence, but then so did Thomas Hardy. I don't think her aim is to be 'realistic'. We're drawn into a more magical and mysterious version of the 'real' world, and leave the novel both entranced and enriched by the experience.

Stunning, 29 Aug 2008
There is a huge amount that is exceptionally good in here, as some other reviewers have stated. However, it certainly is not just humour and history: the book is very poetic and has an extraordinarily poignant and, I think, topical ending. A truly brilliant achievement that is way up there with "Wide Open".

Big, but not clever..., 26 Aug 2008
Prior to reading Darkmans, I knew of Barker by reputation - and by the awards she has recieved and/or been nominated for - but was not familiar with her actual works. If Darkmans is anything to go by, I'd been lucky until now, and certainly won't be seeking to get any better acquainted with this particular author. By its rear-cover blurb, intriguing cover design and faintly irritating title, Darkmans looked and sounded intriguing - and the sheer level of critical praise that's apparantly been heaped upon it made it a must-read...
...But both the blurb and the acclaim must be for a different book. Darkmans is appalling. The plot is virtually non-existent, and what little of it is in evidence is unravelled sporadically and nonsensically via a neverending slew of dull, lifeless exchanges between some of the most laughably implausible and unlikeable characters ever committed to print. Which would be forgivable if Barker's prose and dialogue was anywhere near as clever as she thinks it is - but it's not. The dialogue is clumsy and inept (and bears precisely zero resemblance to actual human interaction) and the writing on the whole is crippled by a comically pointless reliance on parenthesis, equally inane use of spacing - mostly in order to interject monosyllabic thought processes - and a general misuse of grammar, punctuation and meaning that makes reading this book an experience of unparralleled frustration. It's odd that the author has gone to such lengths to remove any entertainment value from this novel, or indeed anything that would make this a pleasurable reading experience. The only use I can see for this book, is of a prime example of how not to write.
I must confess, I gave up on it about halfway through (making this one of only three or four books I have ever given up on), so maybe I'm missing some grand revelation or point that would have made sense of it all. Frankly, I don't care; this book has rendered me numb and disheartened...and perhaps a little bit angry.

Dull (boring), 17 Oct 2008
This is one of the most boring books I've ever read. The constant (about 3 times in every paragraph) use of brackets is really off putting (the author constantly points out the obvious) and hugely irritating and pointless (she uses these to include information that has no need to be in brackets). I trawled through it hoping that something may happen in line with the back cover description to no avail (it didn't happen).

Many times throughout the book I had to put it down out of sheer frustration it made me so angry. I would have binned it long before the 800 and odd page finale if I wasn't on holiday with no book shops to hand. Don't buy it. The only positive point was one chapter in which a repressed, stuffy character is forced to join a dinner party with a group of middle class couples - this is the only part of the book that I enjoyed. So thats about 25 pages out of 800+ that I liked - not much bang for your buck.

what a drivel, 15 Oct 2008
Shortlisted for Man Booker Prize?? Please! Makes you question the opinions of the Guardian and Observer reviewers. I wasted hours of my time, lost count of the use of SCOWL after about 30, "scowling" comes up on every other page - you call that good writing? The book is so frustrating it made me write my first review on the Internet ever.

Magnificent, 28 Sep 2008
I'm not going to go into long plot explanations - others have done it already far better than I could. I just want to say that this is a magnificent novel. I've not read any Nicola Barker before, and I was just blown away by the sheer audacity and exuberance of her prose. Yes, this book is long, but within a few pages I was completely gripped, barely able to put it down as it built up an exquisite dramatic tension. Barker develops, layer by layer, scene by scene, an almost anarchic assortment of characters, throws them together and shows us the unpredictable results. It's an almost cinematic approach to novel-writing, and makes for a demanding read - you work hard to piece together the clues scattered in her narrative - but it's totally engaging and thoroughly rewarding.

Not for a long time have I come across a writer with such a playful feel for language. Her observations, too, are startlingly fresh and apt. Yes, the novel does rely heavily on coincidence, but then so did Thomas Hardy. I don't think her aim is to be 'realistic'. We're drawn into a more magical and mysterious version of the 'real' world, and leave the novel both entranced and enriched by the experience.

Stunning, 29 Aug 2008
There is a huge amount that is exceptionally good in here, as some other reviewers have stated. However, it certainly is not just humour and history: the book is very poetic and has an extraordinarily poignant and, I think, topical ending. A truly brilliant achievement that is way up there with "Wide Open".

Big, but not clever..., 26 Aug 2008
Prior to reading Darkmans, I knew of Barker by reputation - and by the awards she has recieved and/or been nominated for - but was not familiar with her actual works. If Darkmans is anything to go by, I'd been lucky until now, and certainly won't be seeking to get any better acquainted with this particular author. By its rear-cover blurb, intriguing cover design and faintly irritating title, Darkmans looked and sounded intriguing - and the sheer level of critical praise that's apparantly been heaped upon it made it a must-read...
...But both the blurb and the acclaim must be for a different book. Darkmans is appalling. The plot is virtually non-existent, and what little of it is in evidence is unravelled sporadically and nonsensically via a neverending slew of dull, lifeless exchanges between some of the most laughably implausible and unlikeable characters ever committed to print. Which would be forgivable if Barker's prose and dialogue was anywhere near as clever as she thinks it is - but it's not. The dialogue is clumsy and inept (and bears precisely zero resemblance to actual human interaction) and the writing on the whole is crippled by a comically pointless reliance on parenthesis, equally inane use of spacing - mostly in order to interject monosyllabic thought processes - and a general misuse of grammar, punctuation and meaning that makes reading this book an experience of unparralleled frustration. It's odd that the author has gone to such lengths to remove any entertainment value from this novel, or indeed anything that would make this a pleasurable reading experience. The only use I can see for this book, is of a prime example of how not to write.
I must confess, I gave up on it about halfway through (making this one of only three or four books I have ever given up on), so maybe I'm missing some grand revelation or point that would have made sense of it all. Frankly, I don't care; this book has rendered me numb and disheartened...and perhaps a little bit angry.



Clearly brilliant characters, 18 May 2008
"Another of Nicola Barker's amazing novels which just capture the ways and words of her characters so clearly. Narrated by 28yr old Adair, he works at the GLC and is drawn to watch the spectacle that was David Blaine suspended in a glass box by the Thames in 2003, and meets some interesting people there too. He is cocky and arrogant, but does try to think about things, and close to the start of the book comes out with this amazing simile describing the spectacle and egg-throwing attendant public - I quote:
"it's like the embankment is a toilet and Blaine is just the scented rim-block dangling in his disposable plastic container from the bowl at the top."
You can picture it exactly can't you!
During Blaine's self-imposed imprisonment, Adie meets, falls for and is confused by Aphra a gourmet cook, has many philosophical discussions with his landlord Solomon, and ultimately finds himself - in a sort of I can see clearly now the Blaine has gone kind of way (excuse my awful pun).
This novel just draws you in and doesn't let go."


Another excellent Barker novel., 25 Mar 2008
There can't be that many novels that have stellar reviews from both the Times Literary Supplement and Heat Magazine, but Clear by Nicola Barker is just such a one.

I seem to be reading her books in reverse order. I started last year with Darkmans, which came to my attention when it made the shortlist of the 2007 Booker Prize (I still say it woz robbed, btw), and now thanks to Palimpsest and its book group I have found myself reading her previous novel, Clear, which was seemingly longlisted for the 2004 Booker. At this rate, I'll be gobbling up everything of hers I can find because both of her books so far have been a dream.

So what is Clear all about then? Well, here's the blurb:

"On 5th September 2003, New York illusionist David Blaine entered a small perspex box beside the River Thames and began starving himself. Forty-four days later he left the box. The end. The real show, of course, was on the sidelines: the crowds, the chaos, the hype and most enjoyably, the hypocrisy. Through the eyes and exploits of Adair Graham MacKenney, bitter, shameless and irreverent, we see this world for what it is: a place of illusion, delusion, celebrity and hunger. And, naturally, lust. With her Tupperware and awful shoes, Adair finds himself unaccountably drawn to the reluctant Aphra. But when has futility ever stopped anyone? Just think of the guy in the perspex box. Wickedly comic, caustic and uncommonly astute, this outrageous peep show of a novel gives us our contemporary world laid bare."

So there's the background - David Blaine in his clear perspex box dangling above the Thames. Adair is a bit of a fashion victim, achingly cool in his Boxfresh jacket and pristine "classic" trainers. However, for him Blaine's stunt seems to precipitate a genuine growth within his personality, whether it is fighting with his flatmate's girlfriend about whether or not Blaine was influenced by Kafka and Primo Levi, or getting to know workmate Bly through lunchtime strolls past Blaine in his box, or being entranced by the enigmatic Aphra and her endless supply of bizarre second-hand shoes.

I found an interview with Barker about the book where she states that "as a writer (and as a person) I've always celebrated the outsider, the stranger, the interloper, the freak. The main aim of all my fiction is to render the unlovable, lovable." She certainly achieved that for me. She lays out modern life and obsessions in front of you and points out their ridiculousness, but still manages to make it really not seem so awful after all. The novel is written in the first person, with Adair as our narrator, and Barker's real skill is in her dialogue, both internal and external (an aside: internal dialogue? is that not just internal monologue? *shrugs* Anyway...) because everything she writes is just utterly believable. Everything fits, Adair's reactions, realizations, fits of temper, they all fit. All the characters are superbly drawn in fact. And they are all trying to find their way in this crazy modern world we all find ourselves in, desperately searching for meaning for themselves by way of looking for an explanation for Blaine's actions.

This is a quirky novel, and its idiosyncratic narration will clearly not be for everyone, but it is laugh-out-loud funny in places and is wonderful on a number of levels - story, the underlying implications, the language, the satire. Which is probably why it clearly (ho ho ho) appeals to everyone from Heat readers to TLS subscribers.


A very funny well written novel, 15 Feb 2006
This novel was on my reading list for a Innovative Contemporary Novel module, and I wasn't sure what to make it of from the blurb. However, after the first chapter I was completely drawn in and found it absolutely hilarious! I love the fact that Barker writes from a man's point of view, and how the whole thing is structured around David Blaine's above the below. Her use of writing is also very refreshing, and I strongly recommend this book. I gave it 4 stars as I don't think it is a good as other books I have read, but it is by no means bad or confusing as other reviewers have said.

Sorry - I just don't get it, 30 Aug 2005
The first 25 pages of this book made me think that it was going to be one of those "hey, look at me", barely readable, tricksy, oddly-structured stabs at "modern literature" written more for the author (and his/her peers) than for the reader, where the author is concerned more with showing off his/her mastery of technique than with producing something people might actually want to read.

Had I not enjoyed Nicola Barker's "Reversed forecast" (which I can heartily recommend to anyone interested in reading a writer on top form), I would probably not have bothered finishing this one. As it is, I felt very little wiser at the end than I had at the start.

While her ear for dialogue and the spoken word is as acute as ever, I'm afraid I just don't get it, but maybe that's partly because I don't understand the references to "Shane" and the Kafka short story.

Is the point that we all bring our own unique combination of experiences, prejudices, hopes and fears to bear on the judgements we make and that those therefore determine how we all respond differently to the same stimulus?

Through the Looking Glass, 20 Jul 2005
Clear is the best novel I've read this year. Ms. Barker has reignited my belief that good writing lives . . . and that novels can be innovative, literate, surprising and accessible.

The book's main theme is that even when we think we are seeing, our perceptions of appearances are deceiving us.

What can be more transparent than an illusionist, David Blaine, who sits suspended in a Perspex box above the Thames while he fasts for 44 days? That central image becomes the fulcrum for this insightful, witty novel about modern conceits.

You soon get a hint that the book is in part about writing when the narrator, Adair Graham MacKenny, opens the narration with ribald praise for the language in Jack Schaefer's Shane. Later, Blaine's very illusion is discussed in terms of a Kafka story. Unlike snobbish novelists, Ms. Barker shares everything you need to know to share her point.

As the story develops, you find yourself in the middle of an enigma wrapped in several mysteries, one Aphra by name, who sits every night watching Blaine in the wee hours while others sleep, who keeps dozens of containers of gourmet food which alternative with regurgitated remnants of such food, and wears outrageous shoes. Aphra's shoe fetish nicely matches Adair's foot fetish, and Adair finds himself in enraptured pursuit. As the mysteries about Aphra are gradually resolved, you begin to appreciate Ms. Barker's point about not knowing what we are seeing. In one powerful passage on page 311, she reveals all in describing Blaine's magic:

"He's like a mirror in which people can see the very best and the very worst of themselves."

Clear goes on to make the point that we all use other people in the same way. It's clear!

Wide Open, Nicola Barker's fifth book and winner of the International Impac Dublin Literary Award 2000, has taken all the elements of her first book, Love Your Enemies, and made them into a shimmering, simmering heart-break story. Written seven years ago, when she was 27, Love Your Enemies' ten short stories were enticingly strange, full of ugly truths, askew beauty. The locations were unglamorous and the characters ordinary, and damaged by life. Barker's writing was full of humour, an acidic wit that stripped away all sentimentality, but left a sheen of sadness.

Wide Open is set on the Isle Of Sheppey, "a strange place, flat and empty like the moon." On the island is a nudist beach, a nature reserve, a wild boar farm and not much else. The landscape is bare, but the characters in are brim-full. There's Luke, who specialises in dot-to-dot pornography, and lippy Lily, just 17 and full of outrageous anger. Jim and Nathan end up on Sheppey too, as well as the mysterious figure of Ronnie who is "plain as a boiled sweet" but whose eyes are "deep, complex, dark ringed".

Each one is drifting in turbulent, emotional currents, fighting the rip tide of a past, bleak with secrets and fear. "Hell wasn't black after all. It was an endless, hollow, grey colour and it felt slippery. Nathan could find no finger holds. Even though his hands were still small. He was 8 years old and there was nothing to cling onto." As an adult Nathan works in a Lost Property department, an irony that is almost brutal in its compassion.

Wide Open lays bare the damage done, the awful connection between the characters, which stretches back to childhood. It is beautifully written, crisp, darkly funny and, for all its weighty themes, light as joy to read. --Eithne Farry

Dull (boring), 17 Oct 2008
This is one of the most boring books I've ever read. The constant (about 3 times in every paragraph) use of brackets is really off putting (the author constantly points out the obvious) and hugely irritating and pointless (she uses these to include information that has no need to be in brackets). I trawled through it hoping that something may happen in line with the back cover description to no avail (it didn't happen).

Many times throughout the book I had to put it down out of sheer frustration it made me so angry. I would have binned it long before the 800 and odd page finale if I wasn't on holiday with no book shops to hand. Don't buy it. The only positive point was one chapter in which a repressed, stuffy character is forced to join a dinner party with a group of middle class couples - this is the only part of the book that I enjoyed. So thats about 25 pages out of 800+ that I liked - not much bang for your buck.

what a drivel, 15 Oct 2008
Shortlisted for Man Booker Prize?? Please! Makes you question the opinions of the Guardian and Observer reviewers. I wasted hours of my time, lost count of the use of SCOWL after about 30, "scowling" comes up on every other page - you call that good writing? The book is so frustrating it made me write my first review on the Internet ever.

Magnificent, 28 Sep 2008
I'm not going to go into long plot explanations - others have done it already far better than I could. I just want to say that this is a magnificent novel. I've not read any Nicola Barker before, and I was just blown away by the sheer audacity and exuberance of her prose. Yes, this book is long, but within a few pages I was completely gripped, barely able to put it down as it built up an exquisite dramatic tension. Barker develops, layer by layer, scene by scene, an almost anarchic assortment of characters, throws them together and shows us the unpredictable results. It's an almost cinematic approach to novel-writing, and makes for a demanding read - you work hard to piece together the clues scattered in her narrative - but it's totally engaging and thoroughly rewarding.

Not for a long time have I come across a writer with such a playful feel for language. Her observations, too, are startlingly fresh and apt. Yes, the novel does rely heavily on coincidence, but then so did Thomas Hardy. I don't think her aim is to be 'realistic'. We're drawn into a more magical and mysterious version of the 'real' world, and leave the novel both entranced and enriched by the experience.

Stunning, 29 Aug 2008
There is a huge amount that is exceptionally good in here, as some other reviewers have stated. However, it certainly is not just humour and history: the book is very poetic and has an extraordinarily poignant and, I think, topical ending. A truly brilliant achievement that is way up there with "Wide Open".

Big, but not clever..., 26 Aug 2008
Prior to reading Darkmans, I knew of Barker by reputation - and by the awards she has recieved and/or been nominated for - but was not familiar with her actual works. If Darkmans is anything to go by, I'd been lucky until now, and certainly won't be seeking to get any better acquainted with this particular author. By its rear-cover blurb, intriguing cover design and faintly irritating title, Darkmans looked and sounded intriguing - and the sheer level of critical praise that's apparantly been heaped upon it made it a must-read...
...But both the blurb and the acclaim must be for a different book. Darkmans is appalling. The plot is virtually non-existent, and what little of it is in evidence is unravelled sporadically and nonsensically via a neverending slew of dull, lifeless exchanges between some of the most laughably implausible and unlikeable characters ever committed to print. Which would be forgivable if Barker's prose and dialogue was anywhere near as clever as she thinks it is - but it's not. The dialogue is clumsy and inept (and bears precisely zero resemblance to actual human interaction) and the writing on the whole is crippled by a comically pointless reliance on parenthesis, equally inane use of spacing - mostly in order to interject monosyllabic thought processes - and a general misuse of grammar, punctuation and meaning that makes reading this book an experience of unparralleled frustration. It's odd that the author has gone to such lengths to remove any entertainment value from this novel, or indeed anything that would make this a pleasurable reading experience. The only use I can see for this book, is of a prime example of how not to write.
I must confess, I gave up on it about halfway through (making this one of only three or four books I have ever given up on), so maybe I'm missing some grand revelation or point that would have made sense of it all. Frankly, I don't care; this book has rendered me numb and disheartened...and perhaps a little bit angry.



Clearly brilliant characters, 18 May 2008
"Another of Nicola Barker's amazing novels which just capture the ways and words of her characters so clearly. Narrated by 28yr old Adair, he works at the GLC and is drawn to watch the spectacle that was David Blaine suspended in a glass box by the Thames in 2003, and meets some interesting people there too. He is cocky and arrogant, but does try to think about things, and close to the start of the book comes out with this amazing simile describing the spectacle and egg-throwing attendant public - I quote:
"it's like the embankment is a toilet and Blaine is just the scented rim-block dangling in his disposable plastic container from the bowl at the top."
You can picture it exactly can't you!
During Blaine's self-imposed imprisonment, Adie meets, falls for and is confused by Aphra a gourmet cook, has many philosophical discussions with his landlord Solomon, and ultimately finds himself - in a sort of I can see clearly now the Blaine has gone kind of way (excuse my awful pun).
This novel just draws you in and doesn't let go."


Another excellent Barker novel., 25 Mar 2008
There can't be that many novels that have stellar reviews from both the Times Literary Supplement and Heat Magazine, but Clear by Nicola Barker is just such a one.

I seem to be reading her books in reverse order. I started last year with Darkmans, which came to my attention when it made the shortlist of the 2007 Booker Prize (I still say it woz robbed, btw), and now thanks to Palimpsest and its book group I have found myself reading her previous novel, Clear, which was seemingly longlisted for the 2004 Booker. At this rate, I'll be gobbling up everything of hers I can find because both of her books so far have been a dream.

So what is Clear all about then? Well, here's the blurb:

"On 5th September 2003, New York illusionist David Blaine entered a small perspex box beside the River Thames and began starving himself. Forty-four days later he left the box. The end. The real show, of course, was on the sidelines: the crowds, the chaos, the hype and most enjoyably, the hypocrisy. Through the eyes and exploits of Adair Graham MacKenney, bitter, shameless and irreverent, we see this world for what it is: a place of illusion, delusion, celebrity and hunger. And, naturally, lust. With her Tupperware and awful shoes, Adair finds himself unaccountably drawn to the reluctant Aphra. But when has futility ever stopped anyone? Just think of the guy in the perspex box. Wickedly comic, caustic and uncommonly astute, this outrageous peep show of a novel gives us our contemporary world laid bare."

So there's the background - David Blaine in his clear perspex box dangling above the Thames. Adair is a bit of a fashion victim, achingly cool in his Boxfresh jacket and pristine "classic" trainers. However, for him Blaine's stunt seems to precipitate a genuine growth within his personality, whether it is fighting with his flatmate's girlfriend about whether or not Blaine was influenced by Kafka and Primo Levi, or getting to know workmate Bly through lunchtime strolls past Blaine in his box, or being entranced by the enigmatic Aphra and her endless supply of bizarre second-hand shoes.

I found an interview with Barker about the book where she states that "as a writer (and as a person) I've always celebrated the outsider, the stranger, the interloper, the freak. The main aim of all my fiction is to render the unlovable, lovable." She certainly achieved that for me. She lays out modern life and obsessions in front of you and points out their ridiculousness, but still manages to make it really not seem so awful after all. The novel is written in the first person, with Adair as our narrator, and Barker's real skill is in her dialogue, both internal and external (an aside: internal dialogue? is that not just internal monologue? *shrugs* Anyway...) because everything she writes is just utterly believable. Everything fits, Adair's reactions, realizations, fits of temper, they all fit. All the characters are superbly drawn in fact. And they are all trying to find their way in this crazy modern world we all find ourselves in, desperately searching for meaning for themselves by way of looking for an explanation for Blaine's actions.

This is a quirky novel, and its idiosyncratic narration will clearly not be for everyone, but it is laugh-out-loud funny in places and is wonderful on a number of levels - story, the underlying implications, the language, the satire. Which is probably why it clearly (ho ho ho) appeals to everyone from Heat readers to TLS subscribers.


A very funny well written novel, 15 Feb 2006
This novel was on my reading list for a Innovative Contemporary Novel module, and I wasn't sure what to make it of from the blurb. However, after the first chapter I was completely drawn in and found it absolutely hilarious! I love the fact that Barker writes from a man's point of view, and how the whole thing is structured around David Blaine's above the below. Her use of writing is also very refreshing, and I strongly recommend this book. I gave it 4 stars as I don't think it is a good as other books I have read, but it is by no means bad or confusing as other reviewers have said.

Sorry - I just don't get it, 30 Aug 2005
The first 25 pages of this book made me think that it was going to be one of those "hey, look at me", barely readable, tricksy, oddly-structured stabs at "modern literature" written more for the author (and his/her peers) than for the reader, where the author is concerned more with showing off his/her mastery of technique than with producing something people might actually want to read.

Had I not enjoyed Nicola Barker's "Reversed forecast" (which I can heartily recommend to anyone interested in reading a writer on top form), I would probably not have bothered finishing this one. As it is, I felt very little wiser at the end than I had at the start.

While her ear for dialogue and the spoken word is as acute as ever, I'm afraid I just don't get it, but maybe that's partly because I don't understand the references to "Shane" and the Kafka short story.

Is the point that we all bring our own unique combination of experiences, prejudices, hopes and fears to bear on the judgements we make and that those therefore determine how we all respond differently to the same stimulus?

Through the Looking Glass, 20 Jul 2005
Clear is the best novel I've read this year. Ms. Barker has reignited my belief that good writing lives . . . and that novels can be innovative, literate, surprising and accessible.

The book's main theme is that even when we think we are seeing, our perceptions of appearances are deceiving us.

What can be more transparent than an illusionist, David Blaine, who sits suspended in a Perspex box above the Thames while he fasts for 44 days? That central image becomes the fulcrum for this insightful, witty novel about modern conceits.

You soon get a hint that the book is in part about writing when the narrator, Adair Graham MacKenny, opens the narration with ribald praise for the language in Jack Schaefer's Shane. Later, Blaine's very illusion is discussed in terms of a Kafka story. Unlike snobbish novelists, Ms. Barker shares everything you need to know to share her point.

As the story develops, you find yourself in the middle of an enigma wrapped in several mysteries, one Aphra by name, who sits every night watching Blaine in the wee hours while others sleep, who keeps dozens of containers of gourmet food which alternative with regurgitated remnants of such food, and wears outrageous shoes. Aphra's shoe fetish nicely matches Adair's foot fetish, and Adair finds himself in enraptured pursuit. As the mysteries about Aphra are gradually resolved, you begin to appreciate Ms. Barker's point about not knowing what we are seeing. In one powerful passage on page 311, she reveals all in describing Blaine's magic:

"He's like a mirror in which people can see the very best and the very worst of themselves."

Clear goes on to make the point that we all use other people in the same way. It's clear!

deeply dark exploration into another world, 19 May 2008
Once started, I could not put it down. It is not a book where you can find comfort in identifying with any of the characters. None of them are particularly likeable, but then that is not the point in this book. How am I to know the deeper inner reaches of the psyche of someone who's life experiences are so far removed from anything that most of us experience in our childhood? To explore this terrain, we have to leave the roadmap behind, this is uncharted territory.
Some of the descriptive narrative sometimes make me think that the author has some form of expanded consiousness, as I experience it in the healing field. Her descriptions of the energetic exchanges between some of the characters are so close to the images often described in the energetics, that I really think that this book is a fascinating tale and highly recommend it to all my friends.

wide open, 07 Feb 2008

Finished Wide Open yesterday and am left, as with most Nicola Barkers, feeling as if I have woken from a deliciously entertaining dream packed with unlikely scenarios and surreal twists.

We start off by meeting Ronny, a bloke who drives on the motorway every day for three weeks and spots a lanky guy waving from a bridge overlooking the road. One day, Ronny stops to find out what the guy wants. And straight away, within the first couple of pages, we're plunged into weird Barker territory, rich with coincidences and inexplicable events. Because it turns out the guy on the bridge and Ronny have a close acquaintance in common. Furthermore, the bridge man is also called Ronny and a number of other strange similarities also come to light.

Just as you're left wondering 'hold on a minute', the novel moves on to Sheppey. The two Ronnies are now friends, the bridge bloke has persuaded the other one to change his name to the bridge bloke's original name, thus setting the contrived scene for a case of mistaken identity.

Also in Sheppey are various quirky individuals. There's Lily, an angry, nightmare adolescent and her mother Sara, a boar farmer. There's fat Luke who, despite his fishy scent and rolls of flab, exerts a strange sexual attractiveness. Then there's Nathan, a gentle soul from Lost Property in Baker Street tube station, who's linked to several of the other characters and Connie, an angelic optician trying to enable execution of her late father's will.

As with most Barkers, the story is hugely funny and unexpected. The weirdo characters are involved in plenty of strange plot twists and, as in most Barkers, the dialogue is hilarious in parts.

But the total sum of the book is less than its constituent parts. Although I kept reading avidly, I ended up with the familiar 'eh?' type feeling so many Barkers instill. The numerous coincidences require total suspension of disbelief and the ending is unexpectedly harrowing and bizarre. Bridge Ronny remains an elusive, mysterious person whose motivations are unclear - if he has a mental health problem it's nothing recognisable, and the traumatic ending belies the gentle quirkiness we're seduced into believing of him.

I'll continue to read Nicola Barker because she makes me laugh and her irreverent style is always refreshing. But she'll never emerge as one of my favourite novelists simply because there are too many loose ends in her books that she neglects to explain. It's as if her wackiness is an excuse to slip through vastly implausible facts. I like my reality to be realistic, and that means disappointment at Barker's trademark numerous incredible coincidences and reliance on elements of the supernatural.

****0

Excellent, clever, gripping. Best book I've ever read..., 25 Apr 2006
...And I've read a lot. I'm not easily pleased, but this book is absolutely brilliantly written. I can't believe Nicola Barker is not more well known. I have leant my copy of this book to three people so far, and they have all come back saying how much they loved it. It is great writing that is unpretentious in its excellence. The story is quirky and fascinating and deeply moving, and the characterisation is spot-on. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. It really is one of the best books I have ever read - and certainly the best book by any living British author.

A work of "cornball perversion," staggering originality., 15 Sep 2005
Barker herself once described this as a novel of "cornball perversion," and no one who reads it will ever dispute that. Filled with the weirdest group of gonzo characters ever assembled, it includes Ronny, a homeless man whose real name is Jim; Jim, a hairless man whose real name is Ronny and who works spraying weed killer along the roads; Luke, a photographer of pornography who smells like fish; and Lily, a violent and rebellious teenager who suffers from a clotting disorder and worships The Head. And if these characters were not already bizarre enough, Barker also opens the Pandora's box of their not-in-the-textbook psyches to the reader--showing them to be even more off-the-wall than we had ever dreamed.

Providing fertile ground for all the aberrations to flourish, the author sets the characters in a remote seaside resort/nudist colony during the off-season, with additional forays to a nearby boar farm, the Lost and Found Department of the London Underground, and a bat cave in Sumatra, where a character we know only from her letters is searching for a hairy hominid with no big toes. Obviously, not your granny's novel.

Wide Open is like nothing you've ever read before-absolutely original, sometimes wacky, sometimes poignant, sometimes violent, and always fascinating. The fluidity of Barker's prose keeps the reader zipping along, despite the fact that we can't always tell when she's putting us on, aren't always sure what's going on, and often suspect there are deep themes here if only we could catch our breaths long enough to figure them out. This is an absolutely exhilarating wild ride if the reader is willing to be "wide open." Mary Whipple

A cast of bizarre characters with emotional depth, 07 Aug 2002
I think I've just finished a different book to the other reviewers! In the very first sentence the author sets up such a bizarre sequence of events that you are compelled to carry on reading. The characters are unattractive certainly, but they are also bizarre and therefore interesting, and the central identity issue lends all of the characters an amorphous quality. I guess this book will appeal to 'literary' readers who like their imagery, metaphor, etc. It is not at all without emotional depth, though I can understand that the ending might prove unsatisfactory. I had a 'it wasn't supposed to end like this' feeling!

Behindlings, the fifth novel from Nicola Barker, is a welcome return, both in mood and in geography, to the gothic terrain of her Impac Prize winner Wide Open. Set in parochial Canvey Island, Essex, this book has more in common with the television comedy The League of Gentlemen and the cult film The Wicker Man than a work of contemporary literary fiction. It is inventive, funny, unnerving and often magnificently strange.

Barker's Canvey (once dubbed "Candy Island" by Daniel Defoe) is, with its Wimpy Bar, dreary pubs and long-cherished grudges, rumours and secrets, a quintessentially English small town. Its emotionally damaged population is augmented by the "Behindlings" of the title, a gaggle of oddballs who follow, or more precisely obsessively stalk, the novel's enigmatic central character, Wesley. The architect of a chocolate company-funded treasure hunt, author of a pseudo-Nietzschean walking guide and the man behind the daring theft of an antique pond, he is a rather malevolent Pied Piper. Part Alvin Toffler-quoting, peripatetic environmental visionary, part immoral (and maybe downright evil) fraudster; he's also notorious for feeding the fingers on his right hand to an eagle owl "in an act of penance" for accidentally killing his brother.

Would-be-prizewinners and cranks are not the only ones drawn into his orbit. Josephine Bean, a local nurse and environmental campaigner; Katherine Turpin, a lascivious beansprout farmer maligned in his walking book; Arthur Young, a former employee of the treasure hunt's sponsors and Ted, the island's estate agent and closet seamstress, all seem to have a few reasons of their own for keeping an eye on Wesley.

Barker has always had a penchant for the surreal, and occasionally here both plot and characterisation can get swamped in flights of absurdist imagination. She is perhaps, too fond of the elaborate simile. The clackety, clackety of the "like a" and "as a" of her prose style is, from time to time, a little exasperating. Despite this, her narrative is so alluringly, so charmingly odd, bristling with puzzles and etymological games and full of wonderfully, devilishly comic touches, that it's easy to ignore its minor flaws. --Travis Elborough

Dull (boring), 17 Oct 2008
This is one of the most boring books I've ever read. The constant (about 3 times in every paragraph) use of brackets is really off putting (the author constantly points out the obvious) and hugely irritating and pointless (she uses these to include information that has no need to be in brackets). I trawled through it hoping that something may happen in line with the back cover description to no avail (it didn't happen).

Many times throughout the book I had to put it down out of sheer frustration it made me so angry. I would have binned it long before the 800 and odd page finale if I wasn't on holiday with no book shops to hand. Don't buy it. The only positive point was one chapter in which a repressed, stuffy character is forced to join a dinner party with a group of middle class couples - this is the only part of the book that I enjoyed. So thats about 25 pages out of 800+ that I liked - not much bang for your buck.

what a drivel, 15 Oct 2008
Shortlisted for Man Booker Prize?? Please! Makes you question the opinions of the Guardian and Observer reviewers. I wasted hours of my time, lost count of the use of SCOWL after about 30, "scowling" comes up on every other page - you call that good writing? The book is so frustrating it made me write my first review on the Internet ever.

Magnificent, 28 Sep 2008
I'm not going to go into long plot explanations - others have done it already far better than I could. I just want to say that this is a magnificent novel. I've not read any Nicola Barker before, and I was just blown away by the sheer audacity and exuberance of her prose. Yes, this book is long, but within a few pages I was completely gripped, barely able to put it down as it built up an exquisite dramatic tension. Barker develops, layer by layer, scene by scene, an almost anarchic assortment of characters, throws them together and shows us the unpredictable results. It's an almost cinematic approach to novel-writing, and makes for a demanding read - you work hard to piece together the clues scattered in her narrative - but it's totally engaging and thoroughly rewarding.

Not for a long time have I come across a writer with such a playful feel for language. Her observations, too, are startlingly fresh and apt. Yes, the novel does rely heavily on coincidence, but then so did Thomas Hardy. I don't think her aim is to be 'realistic'. We're drawn into a more magical and mysterious version of the 'real' world, and leave the novel both entranced and enriched by the experience.

Stunning, 29 Aug 2008
There is a huge amount that is exceptionally good in here, as some other reviewers have stated. However, it certainly is not just humour and history: the book is very poetic and has an extraordinarily poignant and, I think, topical ending. A truly brilliant achievement that is way up there with "Wide Open".

Big, but not clever..., 26 Aug 2008
Prior to reading Darkmans, I knew of Barker by reputation - and by the awards she has recieved and/or been nominated for - but was not familiar with her actual works. If Darkmans is anything to go by, I'd been lucky until now, and certainly won't be seeking to get any better acquainted with this particular author. By its rear-cover blurb, intriguing cover design and faintly irritating title, Darkmans looked and sounded intriguing - and the sheer level of critical praise that's apparantly been heaped upon it made it a must-read...
...But both the blurb and the acclaim must be for a different book. Darkmans is appalling. The plot is virtually non-existent, and what little of it is in evidence is unravelled sporadically and nonsensically via a neverending slew of dull, lifeless exchanges between some of the most laughably implausible and unlikeable characters ever committed to print. Which would be forgivable if Barker's prose and dialogue was anywhere near as clever as she thinks it is - but it's not. The dialogue is clumsy and inept (and bears precisely zero resemblance to actual human interaction) and the writing on the whole is crippled by a comically pointless reliance on parenthesis, equally inane use of spacing - mostly in order to interject monosyllabic thought processes - and a general misuse of grammar, punctuation and meaning that makes reading this book an experience of unparralleled frustration. It's odd that the author has gone to such lengths to remove any entertainment value from this novel, or indeed anything that would make this a pleasurable reading experience. The only use I can see for this book, is of a prime example of how not to write.
I must confess, I gave up on it about halfway through (making this one of only three or four books I have ever given up on), so maybe I'm missing some grand revelation or point that would have made sense of it all. Frankly, I don't care; this book has rendered me numb and disheartened...and perhaps a little bit angry.



Clearly brilliant characters, 18 May 2008
"Another of Nicola Barker's amazing novels which just capture the ways and words of her characters so clearly. Narrated by 28yr old Adair, he works at the GLC and is drawn to watch the spectacle that was David Blaine suspended in a glass box by the Thames in 2003, and meets some interesting people there too. He is cocky and arrogant, but does try to think about things, and close to the start of the book comes out with this amazing simile describing the spectacle and egg-throwing attendant public - I quote:
"it's like the embankment is a toilet and Blaine is just the scented rim-block dangling in his disposable plastic container from the bowl at the top."
You can picture it exactly can't you!
During Blaine's self-imposed imprisonment, Adie meets, falls for and is confused by Aphra a gourmet cook, has many philosophical discussions with his landlord Solomon, and ultimately finds himself - in a sort of I can see clearly now the Blaine has gone kind of way (excuse my awful pun).
This novel just draws you in and doesn't let go."


Another excellent Barker novel., 25 Mar 2008
There can't be that many novels that have stellar reviews from both the Times Literary Supplement and Heat Magazine, but Clear by Nicola Barker is just such a one.

I seem to be reading her books in reverse order. I started last year with Darkmans, which came to my attention when it made the shortlist of the 2007 Booker Prize (I still say it woz robbed, btw), and now thanks to Palimpsest and its book group I have found myself reading her previous novel, Clear, which was seemingly longlisted for the 2004 Booker. At this rate, I'll be gobbling up everything of hers I can find because both of her books so far have been a dream.

So what is Clear all about then? Well, here's the blurb:

"On 5th September 2003, New York illusionist David Blaine entered a small perspex box beside the River Thames and began starving himself. Forty-four days later he left the box. The end. The real show, of course, was on the sidelines: the crowds, the chaos, the hype and most enjoyably, the hypocrisy. Through the eyes and exploits of Adair Graham MacKenney, bitter, shameless and irreverent, we see this world for what it is: a place of illusion, delusion, celebrity and hunger. And, naturally, lust. With her Tupperware and awful shoes, Adair finds himself unaccountably drawn to the reluctant Aphra. But when has futility ever stopped anyone? Just think of the guy in the perspex box. Wickedly comic, caustic and uncommonly astute, this outrageous peep show of a novel gives us our contemporary world laid bare."

So there's the background - David Blaine in his clear perspex box dangling above the Thames. Adair is a bit of a fashion victim, achingly cool in his Boxfresh jacket and pristine "classic" trainers. However, for him Blaine's stunt seems to precipitate a genuine growth within his personality, whether it is fighting with his flatmate's girlfriend about whether or not Blaine was influenced by Kafka and Primo Levi, or getting to know workmate Bly through lunchtime strolls past Blaine in his box, or being entranced by the enigmatic Aphra and her endless supply of bizarre second-hand shoes.

I found an interview with Barker about the book where she states that "as a writer (and as a person) I've always celebrated the outsider, the stranger, the interloper, the freak. The main aim of all my fiction is to render the unlovable, lovable." She certainly achieved that for me. She lays out modern life and obsessions in front of you and points out their ridiculousness, but still manages to make it really not seem so awful after all. The novel is written in the first person, with Adair as our narrator, and Barker's real skill is in her dialogue, both internal and external (an aside: internal dialogue? is that not just internal monologue? *shrugs* Anyway...) because everything she writes is just utterly believable. Everything fits, Adair's reactions, realizations, fits of temper, they all fit. All the characters are superbly drawn in fact. And they are all trying to find their way in this crazy modern world we all find ourselves in, desperately searching for meaning for themselves by way of looking for an explanation for Blaine's actions.

This is a quirky novel, and its idiosyncratic narration will clearly not be for everyone, but it is laugh-out-loud funny in places and is wonderful on a number of levels - story, the underlying implications, the language, the satire. Which is probably why it clearly (ho ho ho) appeals to everyone from Heat readers to TLS subscribers.


A very funny well written novel, 15 Feb 2006
This novel was on my reading list for a Innovative Contemporary Novel module, and I wasn't sure what to make it of from the blurb. However, after the first chapter I was completely drawn in and found it absolutely hilarious! I love the fact that Barker writes from a man's point of view, and how the whole thing is structured around David Blaine's above the below. Her use of writing is also very refreshing, and I strongly recommend this book. I gave it 4 stars as I don't think it is a good as other books I have read, but it is by no means bad or confusing as other reviewers have said.

Sorry - I just don't get it, 30 Aug 2005
The first 25 pages of this book made me think that it was going to be one of those "hey, look at me", barely readable, tricksy, oddly-structured stabs at "modern literature" written more for the author (and his/her peers) than for the reader, where the author is concerned more with showing off his/her mastery of technique than with producing something people might actually want to read.

Had I not enjoyed Nicola Barker's "Reversed forecast" (which I can heartily recommend to anyone interested in reading a writer on top form), I would probably not have bothered finishing this one. As it is, I felt very little wiser at the end than I had at the start.

While her ear for dialogue and the spoken word is as acute as ever, I'm afraid I just don't get it, but maybe that's partly because I don't understand the references to "Shane" and the Kafka short story.

Is the point that we all bring our own unique combination of experiences, prejudices, hopes and fears to bear on the judgements we make and that those therefore determine how we all respond differently to the same stimulus?

Through the Looking Glass, 20 Jul 2005
Clear is the best novel I've read this year. Ms. Barker has reignited my belief that good writing lives . . . and that novels can be innovative, literate, surprising and accessible.

The book's main theme is that even when we think we are seeing, our perceptions of appearances are deceiving us.

What can be more transparent than an illusionist, David Blaine, who sits suspended in a Perspex box above the Thames while he fasts for 44 days? That central image becomes the fulcrum for this insightful, witty novel about modern conceits.

You soon get a hint that the book is in part about writing when the narrator, Adair Graham MacKenny, opens the narration with ribald praise for the language in Jack Schaefer's Shane. Later, Blaine's very illusion is discussed in terms of a Kafka story. Unlike snobbish novelists, Ms. Barker shares everything you need to know to share her point.

As the story develops, you find yourself in the middle of an enigma wrapped in several mysteries, one Aphra by name, who sits every night watching Blaine in the wee hours while others sleep, who keeps dozens of containers of gourmet food which alternative with regurgitated remnants of such food, and wears outrageous shoes. Aphra's shoe fetish nicely matches Adair's foot fetish, and Adair finds himself in enraptured pursuit. As the mysteries about Aphra are gradually resolved, you begin to appreciate Ms. Barker's point about not knowing what we are seeing. In one powerful passage on page 311, she reveals all in describing Blaine's magic:

"He's like a mirror in which people can see the very best and the very worst of themselves."

Clear goes on to make the point that we all use other people in the same way. It's clear!

deeply dark exploration into another world, 19 May 2008
Once started, I could not put it down. It is not a book where you can find comfort in identifying with any of the characters. None of them are particularly likeable, but then that is not the point in this book. How am I to know the deeper inner reaches of the psyche of someone who's life experiences are so far removed from anything that most of us experience in our childhood? To explore this terrain, we have to leave the roadmap behind, this is uncharted territory.
Some of the descriptive narrative sometimes make me think that the author has some form of expanded consiousness, as I experience it in the healing field. Her descriptions of the energetic exchanges between some of the characters are so close to the images often described in the energetics, that I really think that this book is a fascinating tale and highly recommend it to all my friends.

wide open, 07 Feb 2008

Finished Wide Open yesterday and am left, as with most Nicola Barkers, feeling as if I have woken from a deliciously entertaining dream packed with unlikely scenarios and surreal twists.

We start off by meeting Ronny, a bloke who drives on the motorway every day for three weeks and spots a lanky guy waving from a bridge overlooking the road. One day, Ronny stops to find out what the guy wants. And straight away, within the first couple of pages, we're plunged into weird Barker territory, rich with coincidences and inexplicable events. Because it turns out the guy on the bridge and Ronny have a close acquaintance in common. Furthermore, the bridge man is also called Ronny and a number of other strange similarities also come to light.

Just as you're left wondering 'hold on a minute', the novel moves on to Sheppey. The two Ronnies are now friends, the bridge bloke has persuaded the other one to change his name to the bridge bloke's original name, thus setting the contrived scene for a case of mistaken identity.

Also in Sheppey are various quirky individuals. There's Lily, an angry, nightmare adolescent and her mother Sara, a boar farmer. There's fat Luke who, despite his fishy scent and rolls of flab, exerts a strange sexual attractiveness. Then there's Nathan, a gentle soul from Lost Property in Baker Street tube station, who's linked to several of the other characters and Connie, an angelic optician trying to enable execution of her late father's will.

As with most Barkers, the story is hugely funny and unexpected. The weirdo characters are involved in plenty of strange plot twists and, as in most Barkers, the dialogue is hilarious in parts.

But the total sum of the book is less than its constituent parts. Although I kept reading avidly, I ended up with the familiar 'eh?' type feeling so many Barkers instill. The numerous coincidences require total suspension of disbelief and the ending is unexpectedly harrowing and bizarre. Bridge Ronny remains an elusive, mysterious person whose motivations are unclear - if he has a mental health problem it's nothing recognisable, and the traumatic ending belies the gentle quirkiness we're seduced into believing of him.

I'll continue to read Nicola Barker because she makes me laugh and her irreverent style is always refreshing. But she'll never emerge as one of my favourite novelists simply because there are too many loose ends in her books that she neglects to explain. It's as if her wackiness is an excuse to slip through vastly implausible facts. I like my reality to be realistic, and that means disappointment at Barker's trademark numerous incredible coincidences and reliance on elements of the supernatural.

****0

Excellent, clever, gripping. Best book I've ever read..., 25 Apr 2006
...And I've read a lot. I'm not easily pleased, but this book is absolutely brilliantly written. I can't believe Nicola Barker is not more well known. I have leant my copy of this book to three people so far, and they have all come back saying how much they loved it. It is great writing that is unpretentious in its excellence. The story is quirky and fascinating and deeply moving, and the characterisation is spot-on. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. It really is one of the best books I have ever read - and certainly the best book by any living British author.

A work of "cornball perversion," staggering originality., 15 Sep 2005
Barker herself once described this as a novel of "cornball perversion," and no one who reads it will ever dispute that. Filled with the weirdest group of gonzo characters ever assembled, it includes Ronny, a homeless man whose real name is Jim; Jim, a hairless man whose real name is Ronny and who works spraying weed killer along the roads; Luke, a photographer of pornography who smells like fish; and Lily, a violent and rebellious teenager who suffers from a clotting disorder and worships The Head. And if these characters were not already bizarre enough, Barker also opens the Pandora's box of their not-in-the-textbook psyches to the reader--showing them to be even more off-the-wall than we had ever dreamed.

Providing fertile ground for all the aberrations to flourish, the author sets the characters in a remote seaside resort/nudist colony during the off-season, with additional forays to a nearby boar farm, the Lost and Found Department of the London Underground, and a bat cave in Sumatra, where a character we know only from her letters is searching for a hairy hominid with no big toes. Obviously, not your granny's novel.

Wide Open is like nothing you've ever read before-absolutely original, sometimes wacky, sometimes poignant, sometimes violent, and always fascinating. The fluidity of Barker's prose keeps the reader zipping along, despite the fact that we can't always tell when she's putting us on, aren't always sure what's going on, and often suspect there are deep themes here if only we could catch our breaths long enough to figure them out. This is an absolutely exhilarating wild ride if the reader is willing to be "wide open." Mary Whipple

A cast of bizarre characters with emotional depth, 07 Aug 2002
I think I've just finished a different book to the other reviewers! In the very first sentence the author sets up such a bizarre sequence of events that you are compelled to carry on reading. The characters are unattractive certainly, but they are also bizarre and therefore interesting, and the central identity issue lends all of the characters an amorphous quality. I guess this book will appeal to 'literary' readers who like their imagery, metaphor, etc. It is not at all without emotional depth, though I can understand that the ending might prove unsatisfactory. I had a 'it wasn't supposed to end like this' feeling!

Follow you, follow me, 13 Jul 2008
I'm not one of the "I paid good money for this so I'm going to grit my teeth and finish it whether I like it or not," school of readers. I have enough of the finish-your-greens mentality to persevere with an author to around the half way mark, but if she or he hasn't hooked me by then, back it goes on the shelf.

Disappointingly, Behindlings ended up between other tomes, unfinished. I had high hopes, having read other reviews praising the authors wit and energy and now, flicking through and trying to pin down the problem, I think it is a matter of style as a replacement for substance. Barker seems to be trying to position herself as a cooler, more allusive version of Tom Sharpe - the surrealist characters, the absurd situations, the occasional political overtones - but the trouble with this is that it ends up like Charlie Chaplin trying to be funny without falling over or getting a pie in his face. Overblown humour which tries for subtlety, stops being funny.

Add to this Barker's liking for italics to create meaningfulness, where a well chosen adjective would have done the work and to use the dreaded three dots...because she can't think what her character is going to say next and putting clauses in brackets (because otherwise her sentences would become far too long) and you have a style which is choppy enough to induce a case of seasickness in even hardened sailors like me.

For the record, Behindlings concerns a man called Wesley, who has, due to some earlier transgression, fed most of his fingers to an eagle owl. He is dealing with his shady past, by creating a shady future and is observed in his misdealing, by a group of followers. This bunch of misfits are thrown scraps by Wesley in the form of obscure clues which are leading them to some hinted at but never defined prize. There are other people: a wronged woman that Wesley knows, a man who is covered in sawdust, a man who walks a lot. The whole thing is set on Canvey Island and if the above sounds vague, that's because it is.

The overall effect is a little like a bad dream - not the Grand Guignol beast-in-the-cupboard variety - but the slightly queasy shouldn't-have-eaten-that-cheese type where one is condemned to walking endlessly through dim office corridors, or to having a job interview where none of the questions make sense.


A tedious trek around Canvey Island, 03 Aug 2004
If you enjoyed the dark humour of "The Three Button Trick and Other Stories", it is easy to be taken in my all the good reviews on the cover of the "Behindlings". I cannot recommend this book to you, as you will be sure to be disappointed. It is a shame that so many reviewers did not have the guts to write a single critical remark - I can only explain their enthusiasm for this book by speculating that the author bought each of them an expensive lunch.

This novel is tedious to read because the characters lack of motivation stifles plot development. The book comprises of a series of awkward or drunken interactions between characters, a bit like "Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf?", except without any wit or biting humour. I recommend that the author take some time to read "Games people play" to she can get some ideas about character motivation and put a bit more life into her characters.

The author hints the tone of the novel is dark and the humour black by means of setting it in the working class suburb of Canvey Island, but if she were to transpose the location to Southend, Romford or (god forbid) Brentford, you would recognise the tone of this book as being smug and middle class.

wonderfully weird, 02 Mar 2004
I came to "Behindlings" via "Five Miles From Outer Hope", which was probably a good thing. Even though "Five Miles" is equally quirky, it is easier to get to grips with. "Behindlings" throws you in at the deep end, in the middle of an off-beat narrative made even more complicated by Barker's flamboyant use of adjectives and metaphors.

When I did get into the groove, I was really happy to have made the effort, because this is word-wizardry at its best. It's totally bonkers, of course, but it doesn't try too hard, not being weird for the sake of it. Planet Barker is England, but seen through the bottle in a Smirnoff ad. Everything about a backwater south coast town is lovingly depicted - the seaside bars in their ramshackle glory, the roundabouts, the industrial no man's land, the suburban bungalows - yes, it's all there, but slightly skewered.

That's the magic of Nicola Barker's writing: it takes the everyday world and makes it astonishing. The same goes for the characters. She almost revels in their ordinariness - the hapless real estate agent, the perfumed librarian - but then makes them do strange and wonderful things.

The world she creates is so unmistakably her own, but at the same time welcoming; there is no knowing coolness or trendiness aimed at alienating or provoking for the sake of it. It's as English as a cup of tea and as weird as outer space. Actually, it feels like home.

A blow-your-mind read, 04 Jun 2003
What an outstanding book!

Barker is clearly a genius. She writes such astonishing prose that constantly surprises with its leaps and bounds of imagination. Her ear for dialogue - the pauses and non-sequiturs - makes her troop of characters vivid with inner life and a wonderful weirdness. Astute, colourful, obscenely brillaint writing.

Dull (boring), 17 Oct 2008
This is one of the most boring books I've ever read. The constant (about 3 times in every paragraph) use of brackets is really off putting (the author constantly points out the obvious) and hugely irritating and pointless (she uses these to include information that has no need to be in brackets). I trawled through it hoping that something may happen in line with the back cover description to no avail (it didn't happen).

Many times throughout the book I had to put it down out of sheer frustration it made me so angry. I would have binned it long before the 800 and odd page finale if I wasn't on holiday with no book shops to hand. Don't buy it. The only positive point was one chapter in which a repressed, stuffy character is forced to join a dinner party with a group of middle class couples - this is the only part of the book that I enjoyed. So thats about 25 pages out of 800+ that I liked - not much bang for your buck.

what a drivel, 15 Oct 2008
Shortlisted for Man Booker Prize?? Please! Makes you question the opinions of the Guardian and Observer reviewers. I wasted hours of my time, lost count of the use of SCOWL after about 30, "scowling" comes up on every other page - you call that good writing? The book is so frustrating it made me write my first review on the Internet ever.

Magnificent, 28 Sep 2008
I'm not going to go into long plot explanations - others have done it already far better than I could. I just want to say that this is a magnificent novel. I've not read any Nicola Barker before, and I was just blown away by the sheer audacity and exuberance of her prose. Yes, this book is long, but within a few pages I was completely gripped, barely able to put it down as it built up an exquisite dramatic tension. Barker develops, layer by layer, scene by scene, an almost anarchic assortment of characters, throws them together and shows us the unpredictable results. It's an almost cinematic approach to novel-writing, and makes for a demanding read - you work hard to piece together the clues scattered in her narrative - but it's totally engaging and thoroughly rewarding.

Not for a long time have I come across a writer with such a playful feel for language. Her observations, too, are startlingly fresh and apt. Yes, the novel does rely heavily on coincidence, but then so did Thomas Hardy. I don't think her aim is to be 'realistic'. We're drawn into a more magical and mysterious version of the 'real' world, and leave the novel both entranced and enriched by the experience.

Stunning, 29 Aug 2008
There is a huge amount that is exceptionally good in here, as some other reviewers have stated. However, it certainly is not just humour and history: the book is very poetic and has an extraordinarily poignant and, I think, topical ending. A truly brilliant achievement that is way up there with "Wide Open".

Big, but not clever..., 26 Aug 2008
Prior to reading Darkmans, I knew of Barker by reputation - and by the awards she has recieved and/or been nominated for - but was not familiar with her actual works. If Darkmans is anything to go by, I'd been lucky until now, and certainly won't be seeking to get any better acquainted with this particular author. By its rear-cover blurb, intriguing cover design and faintly irritating title, Darkmans looked and sounded intriguing - and the sheer level of critical praise that's apparantly been heaped upon it made it a must-read...
...But both the blurb and the acclaim must be for a different book. Darkmans is appalling. The plot is virtually non-existent, and what little of it is in evidence is unravelled sporadically and nonsensically via a neverending slew of dull, lifeless exchanges between some of the most laughably implausible and unlikeable characters ever committed to print. Which would be forgivable if Barker's prose and dialogue was anywhere near as clever as she thinks it is - but it's not. The dialogue is clumsy and inept (and bears precisely zero resemblance to actual human interaction) and the writing on the whole is crippled by a comically pointless reliance on parenthesis, equally inane use of spacing - mostly in order to interject monosyllabic thought processes - and a general misuse of grammar, punctuation and meaning that makes reading this book an experience of unparralleled frustration. It's odd that the author has gone to such lengths to remove any entertainment value from this novel, or indeed anything that would make this a pleasurable reading experience. The only use I can see for this book, is of a prime example of how not to write.
I must confess, I gave up on it about halfway through (making this one of only three or four books I have ever given up on), so maybe I'm missing some grand revelation or point that would have made sense of it all. Frankly, I don't care; this book has rendered me numb and disheartened...and perhaps a little bit angry.



Clearly brilliant characters, 18 May 2008
"Another of Nicola Barker's amazing novels which just capture the ways and words of her characters so clearly. Narrated by 28yr old Adair, he works at the GLC and is drawn to watch the spectacle that was David Blaine suspended in a glass box by the Thames in 2003, and meets some interesting people there too. He is cocky and arrogant, but does try to think about things, and close to the start of the book comes out with this amazing simile describing the spectacle and egg-throwing attendant public - I quote:
"it's like the embankment is a toilet and Blaine is just the scented rim-block dangling in his disposable plastic container from the bowl at the top."
You can picture it exactly can't you!
During Blaine's self-imposed imprisonment, Adie meets, falls for and is confused by Aphra a gourmet cook, has many philosophical discussions with his landlord Solomon, and ultimately finds himself - in a sort of I can see clearly now the Blaine has gone kind of way (excuse my awful pun).
This novel just draws you in and doesn't let go."


Another excellent Barker novel., 25 Mar 2008
There can't be that many novels that have stellar reviews from both the Times Literary Supplement and Heat Magazine, but Clear by Nicola Barker is just such a one.

I seem to be reading her books in reverse order. I started last year with Darkmans, which came to my attention when it made the shortlist of the 2007 Booker Prize (I still say it woz robbed, btw), and now thanks to Palimpsest and its book group I have found myself reading her previous novel, Clear, which was seemingly longlisted for the 2004 Booker. At this rate, I'll be gobbling up everything of hers I can find because both of her books so far have been a dream.

So what is Clear all about then? Well, here's the blurb:

"On 5th September 2003, New York illusionist David Blaine entered a small perspex box beside the River Thames and began starving himself. Forty-four days later he left the box. The end. The real show, of course, was on the sidelines: the crowds, the chaos, the hype and most enjoyably, the hypocrisy. Through the eyes and exploits of Adair Graham MacKenney, bitter, shameless and irreverent, we see this world for what it is: a place of illusion, delusion, celebrity and hunger. And, naturally, lust. With her Tupperware and awful shoes, Adair finds himself unaccountably drawn to the reluctant Aphra. But when has futility ever stopped anyone? Just think of the guy in the perspex box. Wickedly comic, caustic and uncommonly astute, this outrageous peep show of a novel gives us our contemporary world laid bare."

So there's the background - David Blaine in his clear perspex box dangling above the Thames. Adair is a bit of a fashion victim, achingly cool in his Boxfresh jacket and pristine "classic" trainers. However, for him Blaine's stunt seems to precipitate a genuine growth within his personality, whether it is fighting with his flatmate's girlfriend about whether or not Blaine was influenced by Kafka and Primo Levi, or getting to know workmate Bly through lunchtime strolls past Blaine in his box, or being entranced by the enigmatic Aphra and her endless supply of bizarre second-hand shoes.

I found an interview with Barker about the book where she states that "as a writer (and as a person) I've always celebrated the outsider, the stranger, the interloper, the freak. The main aim of all my fiction is to render the unlovable, lovable." She certainly achieved that for me. She lays out modern life and obsessions in front of you and points out their ridiculousness, but still manages to make it really not seem so awful after all. The novel is written in the first person, with Adair as our narrator, and Barker's real skill is in her dialogue, both internal and external (an aside: internal dialogue? is that not just internal monologue? *shrugs* Anyway...) because everything she writes is just utterly believable. Everything fits, Adair's reactions, realizations, fits of temper, they all fit. All the characters are superbly drawn in fact. And they are all trying to find their way in this crazy modern world we all find ourselves in, desperately searching for meaning for themselves by way of looking for an explanation for Blaine's actions.

This is a quirky novel, and its idiosyncratic narration will clearly not be for everyone, but it is laugh-out-loud funny in places and is wonderful on a number of levels - story, the underlying implications, the language, the satire. Which is probably why it clearly (ho ho ho) appeals to everyone from Heat readers to TLS subscribers.


A very funny well written novel, 15 Feb 2006
This novel was on my reading list for a Innovative Contemporary Novel module, and I wasn't sure what to make it of from the blurb. However, after the first chapter I was completely drawn in and found it absolutely hilarious! I love the fact that Barker writes from a man's point of view, and how the whole thing is structured around David Blaine's above the below. Her use of writing is also very refreshing, and I strongly recommend this book. I gave it 4 stars as I don't think it is a good as other books I have read, but it is by no means bad or confusing as other reviewers have said.

Sorry - I just don't get it, 30 Aug 2005
The first 25 pages of this book made me think that it was going to be one of those "hey, look at me", barely readable, tricksy, oddly-structured stabs at "modern literature" written more for the author (and his/her peers) than for the reader, where the author is concerned more with showing off his/her mastery of technique than with producing something people might actually want to read.

Had I not enjoyed Nicola Barker's "Reversed forecast" (which I can heartily recommend to anyone interested in reading a writer on top form), I would probably not have bothered finishing this one. As it is, I felt very little wiser at the end than I had at the start.

While her ear for dialogue and the spoken word is as acute as ever, I'm afraid I just don't get it, but maybe that's partly because I don't understand the references to "Shane" and the Kafka short story.

Is the point that we all bring our own unique combination of experiences, prejudices, hopes and fears to bear on the judgements we make and that those therefore determine how we all respond differently to the same stimulus?

Through the Looking Glass, 20 Jul 2005
Clear is the best novel I've read this year. Ms. Barker has reignited my belief that good writing lives . . . and that novels can be innovative, literate, surprising and accessible.

The book's main theme is that even when we think we are seeing, our perceptions of appearances are deceiving us.

What can be more transparent than an illusionist, David Blaine, who sits suspended in a Perspex box above the Thames while he fasts for 44 days? That central image becomes the fulcrum for this insightful, witty novel about modern conceits.

You soon get a hint that the book is in part about writing when the narrator, Adair Graham MacKenny, opens the narration with ribald praise for the language in Jack Schaefer's Shane. Later, Blaine's very illusion is discussed in terms of a Kafka story. Unlike snobbish novelists, Ms. Barker shares everything you need to know to share her point.

As the story develops, you find yourself in the middle of an enigma wrapped in several mysteries, one Aphra by name, who sits every night watching Blaine in the wee hours while others sleep, who keeps dozens of containers of gourmet food which alternative with regurgitated remnants of such food, and wears outrageous shoes. Aphra's shoe fetish nicely matches Adair's foot fetish, and Adair finds himself in enraptured pursuit. As the mysteries about Aphra are gradually resolved, you begin to appreciate Ms. Barker's point about not knowing what we are seeing. In one powerful passage on page 311, she reveals all in describing Blaine's magic:

"He's like a mirror in which people can see the very best and the very worst of themselves."

Clear goes on to make the point that we all use other people in the same way. It's clear!

deeply dark exploration into another world, 19 May 2008
Once started, I could not put it down. It is not a book where you can find comfort in identifying with any of the characters. None of them are particularly likeable, but then that is not the point in this book. How am I to know the deeper inner reaches of the psyche of someone who's life experiences are so far removed from anything that most of us experience in our childhood? To explore this terrain, we have to leave the roadmap behind, this is uncharted territory.
Some of the descriptive narrative sometimes make me think that the author has some form of expanded consiousness, as I experience it in the healing field. Her descriptions of the energetic exchanges between some of the characters are so close to the images often described in the energetics, that I really think that this book is a fascinating tale and highly recommend it to all my friends.

wide open, 07 Feb 2008

Finished Wide Open yesterday and am left, as with most Nicola Barkers, feeling as if I have woken from a deliciously entertaining dream packed with unlikely scenarios and surreal twists.

We start off by meeting Ronny, a bloke who drives on the motorway every day for three weeks and spots a lanky guy waving from a bridge overlooking the road. One day, Ronny stops to find out what the guy wants. And straight away, within the first couple of pages, we're plunged into weird Barker territory, rich with coincidences and inexplicable events. Because it turns out the guy on the bridge and Ronny have a close acquaintance in common. Furthermore, the bridge man is also called Ronny and a number of other strange similarities also come to light.

Just as you're left wondering 'hold on a minute', the novel moves on to Sheppey. The two Ronnies are now friends, the bridge bloke has persuaded the other one to change his name to the bridge bloke's original name, thus setting the contrived scene for a case of mistaken identity.

Also in Sheppey are various quirky individuals. There's Lily, an angry, nightmare adolescent and her mother Sara, a boar farmer. There's fat Luke who, despite his fishy scent and rolls of flab, exerts a strange sexual attractiveness. Then there's Nathan, a gentle soul from Lost Property in Baker Street tube station, who's linked to several of the other characters and Connie, an angelic optician trying to enable execution of her late father's will.

As with most Barkers, the story is hugely funny and unexpected. The weirdo characters are involved in plenty of strange plot twists and, as in most Barkers, the dialogue is hilarious in parts.

But the total sum of the book is less than its constituent parts. Although I kept reading avidly, I ended up with the familiar 'eh?' type feeling so many Barkers instill. The numerous coincidences require total suspension of disbelief and the ending is unexpectedly harrowing and bizarre. Bridge Ronny remains an elusive, mysterious person whose motivations are unclear - if he has a mental health problem it's nothing recognisable, and the traumatic ending belies the gentle quirkiness we're seduced into believing of him.

I'll continue to read Nicola Barker because she makes me laugh and her irreverent style is always refreshing. But she'll never emerge as one of my favourite novelists simply because there are too many loose ends in her books that she neglects to explain. It's as if her wackiness is an excuse to slip through vastly implausible facts. I like my reality to be realistic, and that means disappointment at Barker's trademark numerous incredible coincidences and reliance on elements of the supernatural.

****0

Excellent, clever, gripping. Best book I've ever read..., 25 Apr 2006
...And I've read a lot. I'm not easily pleased, but this book is absolutely brilliantly written. I can't believe Nicola Barker is not more well known. I have leant my copy of this book to three people so far, and they have all come back saying how much they loved it. It is great writing that is unpretentious in its excellence. The story is quirky and fascinating and deeply moving, and the characterisation is spot-on. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. It really is one of the best books I have ever read - and certainly the best book by any living British author.

A work of "cornball perversion," staggering originality., 15 Sep 2005
Barker herself once described this as a novel of "cornball perversion," and no one who reads it will ever dispute that. Filled with the weirdest group of gonzo characters ever assembled, it includes Ronny, a homeless man whose real name is Jim; Jim, a hairless man whose real name is Ronny and who works spraying weed killer along the roads; Luke, a photographer of pornography who smells like fish; and Lily, a violent and rebellious teenager who suffers from a clotting disorder and worships The Head. And if these characters were not already bizarre enough, Barker also opens the Pandora's box of their not-in-the-textbook psyches to the reader--showing them to be even more off-the-wall than we had ever dreamed.

Providing fertile ground for all the aberrations to flourish, the author sets the characters in a remote seaside resort/nudist colony during the off-season, with additional forays to a nearby boar farm, the Lost and Found Department of the London Underground, and a bat cave in Sumatra, where a character we know only from her letters is searching for a hairy hominid with no big toes. Obviously, not your granny's novel.

Wide Open is like nothing you've ever read before-absolutely original, sometimes wacky, sometimes poignant, sometimes violent, and always fascinating. The fluidity of Barker's prose keeps the reader zipping along, despite the fact that we can't always tell when she's putting us on, aren't always sure what's going on, and often suspect there are deep themes here if only we could catch our breaths long enough to figure them out. This is an absolutely exhilarating wild ride if the reader is willing to be "wide open." Mary Whipple

A cast of bizarre characters with emotional depth, 07 Aug 2002
I think I've just finished a different book to the other reviewers! In the very first sentence the author sets up such a bizarre sequence of events that you are compelled to carry on reading. The characters are unattractive certainly, but they are also bizarre and therefore interesting, and the central identity issue lends all of the characters an amorphous quality. I guess this book will appeal to 'literary' readers who like their imagery, metaphor, etc. It is not at all without emotional depth, though I can understand that the ending might prove unsatisfactory. I had a 'it wasn't supposed to end like this' feeling!

Follow you, follow me, 13 Jul 2008
I'm not one of the "I paid good money for this so I'm going to grit my teeth and finish it whether I like it or not," school of readers. I have enough of the finish-your-greens mentality to persevere with an author to around the half way mark, but if she or he hasn't hooked me by then, back it goes on the shelf.

Disappointingly, Behindlings ended up between other tomes, unfinished. I had high hopes, having read other reviews praising the authors wit and energy and now, flicking through and trying to pin down the problem, I think it is a matter of style as a replacement for substance. Barker seems to be trying to position herself as a cooler, more allusive version of Tom Sharpe - the surrealist characters, the absurd situations, the occasional political overtones - but the trouble with this is that it ends up like Charlie Chaplin trying to be funny without falling over or getting a pie in his face. Overblown humour which tries for subtlety, stops being funny.

Add to this Barker's liking for italics to create meaningfulness, where a well chosen adjective would have done the work and to use the dreaded three dots...because she can't think what her character is going to say next and putting clauses in brackets (because otherwise her sentences would become far too long) and you have a style which is choppy enough to induce a case of seasickness in even hardened sailors like me.

For the record, Behindlings concerns a man called Wesley, who has, due to some earlier transgression, fed most of his fingers to an eagle owl. He is dealing with his shady past, by creating a shady future and is observed in his misdealing, by a group of followers. This bunch of misfits are thrown scraps by Wesley in the form of obscure clues which are leading them to some hinted at but never defined prize. There are other people: a wronged woman that Wesley knows, a man who is covered in sawdust, a man who walks a lot. The whole thing is set on Canvey Island and if the above sounds vague, that's because it is.

The overall effect is a little like a bad dream - not the Grand Guignol beast-in-the-cupboard variety - but the slightly queasy shouldn't-have-eaten-that-cheese type where one is condemned to walking endlessly through dim office corridors, or to having a job interview where none of the questions make sense.


A tedious trek around Canvey Island, 03 Aug 2004
If you enjoyed the dark humour of "The Three Button Trick and Other Stories", it is easy to be taken in my all the good reviews on the cover of the "Behindlings". I cannot recommend this book to you, as you will be sure to be disappointed. It is a shame that so many reviewers did not have the guts to write a single critical remark - I can only explain their enthusiasm for this book by speculating that the author bought each of them an expensive lunch.

This novel is tedious to read because the characters lack of motivation stifles plot development. The book comprises of a series of awkward or drunken interactions between characters, a bit like "Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf?", except without any wit or biting humour. I recommend that the author take some time to read "Games people play" to she can get some ideas about character motivation and put a bit more life into her characters.

The author hints the tone of the novel is dark and the humour black by means of setting it in the working class suburb of Canvey Island, but if she were to transpose the location to Southend, Romford or (god forbid) Brentford, you would recognise the tone of this book as being smug and middle class.

wonderfully weird, 02 Mar 2004
I came to "Behindlings" via "Five Miles From Outer Hope", which was probably a good thing. Even though "Five Miles" is equally quirky, it is easier to get to grips with. "Behindlings" throws you in at the deep end, in the middle of an off-beat narrative made even more complicated by Barker's flamboyant use of adjectives and metaphors.

When I did get into the groove, I was really happy to have made the effort, because this is word-wizardry at its best. It's totally bonkers, of course, but it doesn't try too hard, not being weird for the sake of it. Planet Barker is England, but seen through the bottle in a Smirnoff ad. Everything about a backwater south coast town is lovingly depicted - the seaside bars in their ramshackle glory, the roundabouts, the industrial no man's land, the suburban bungalows - yes, it's all there, but slightly skewered.

That's the magic of Nicola Barker's writing: it takes the everyday world and makes it astonishing. The same goes for the characters. She almost revels in their ordinariness - the hapless real estate agent, the perfumed librarian - but then makes them do strange and wonderful things.

The world she creates is so unmistakably her own, but at the same time welcoming; there is no knowing coolness or trendiness aimed at alienating or provoking for the sake of it. It's as English as a cup of tea and as weird as outer space. Actually, it feels like home.

A blow-your-mind read, 04 Jun 2003
What an outstanding book!

Barker is clearly a genius. She writes such astonishing prose that constantly surprises with its leaps and bounds of imagination. Her ear for dialogue - the pauses and non-sequiturs - makes her troop of characters vivid with inner life and a wonderful weirdness. Astute, colourful, obscenely brillaint writing.

A two-for-one ticket to Barkerland, 23 Feb 2004
Nicola Barker is, for me, simply the most interesting novelist working in Britain today: here's a rather nifty re-packaging of two relatively short early novels.

"Reversed Forecast" is apparently a betting term, and gambling is one of the themes of her first novel. The reader is immediately plunged into the now familiar Barkerland: she was only 28 when this was published, but her utterly individual voice is already here; it could be summed up as darkly surreal, Monty Pythonish irony leavened by a surprising human touch (her characters are almost all oddballs, often losers; but she obviously cares about them, and she makes the reader care too). The central character, Ruby, is a likeable soul who experiences fewer difficulties with the business of living than most of Barker's creations: much of the plot concerns her unexpected acquisition of a racing greyhound. The rest of the novel's cast are decidedly odder: Sylvia, who has the bizarre ability to unwittingly attract flocks of birds of all kinds, and who is crippled by the allergic condition Bird Fanciers' Lung; anarchist Vincent; Stephen, who has a thing about Meryl Streep. The plot is (as ever with Barker) complex; but after a variety of darkly tinged mayhem, the ending is upbeat.

"Small Holdings" is shorter and more comic, though still with Barker's characteristic shadowy undercurrents. It involves the lives of a company of gardening contractors as they lose the franchise for the upkeep of a North London park. There's painfully shy Phil, our narrator; manager Doug, quietly going utterly off the rails, who blames the ills of the universe on the failings of the London postcode system; half-blind truck driver Nancy, with whom Phil is in love; fat, cherub-faced Ray... oh yes, and Phil's arch-enemy and tormentor, a female ex-museum curator with only one leg called Saleem. Barker does some utterly extraordinary things with this unlikely cast, and the book contains some remarkable set pieces: Doug's greenhouse-smashing tractor rampage; Nancy's Big Night Out; Saleem's near-seduction of Phil.

Both books are shorter and more anarchic than her later offerings, and to some extent feel like an initial working-out of themes she returns to in her later, meatier books. However, as an introduction to her offbeat world, this is a very attractive package.

the usual bunch of unstable characters - fun to watch, 06 Oct 2001
Similar in format to Wide Open. Set in London, mostly in characters flats, Barker introduces her usual cast of "never quite made its". Almost none of the characters have a whole picnic at their disposal and it is an enjoyable time turning the pages to see how their lives interact. Well written, it is like looking through a pane of glass at various lives I am pleased to say I missed.

Nicola Barker's teen queen heroine, Medve, has no truck with the niceties of polite expression. Medve is six foot three and living with her family in a crumbling art deco hotel on a small island, off the coast of England. She is "single-minded, oestrogen-fuelled and cunning", with a foul mouth and scattershot approach to story telling. Medve means bear in Hungarian and she gives the novel all the bite, ferocity and feral charm of her namesake.

Five Miles From Outer Hope is a compact book but, as usual, Nicola Barker manages to compress an awful lot in under 200 pages. Her work is darkly comic--weird, furtive and slightly rude. Her characters are unlikely, sometimes unlikeable, but they pack a huge punch. Medve is a roiling mass of hormones, her sister, Christobel, has swapped her "lovely breasts ... tiny chocolate-button-tipped conches, soft as a moth's wing, pale as a priest's kiss" for "tits like torpedoes"; brother Feely, age four, is obsessed by the melancholy death of Shiro Chan, Queen of the Deer of Nara, and plump pre-pubescent Patch, the youngest girl, is knowledgeable and secretive. Into this family affair comes 19-year-old La Roux, a deserter from the South African army (The Sauce) with ginger hair, "very bad skin and even worse instincts". Medve and La Roux embark on a barbed flirtation,full of simmering sexuality and bad intentions, which ends in the very destructive "Operation Vagina" involving crochet knickers and a "five inch, red-coloured, jelly-textured, thirty-seven-scraggy-legged centipede." Things are never the same again.

Nicola Barker's superb sixth book is sly and subversive --Eithne Farry

Dull (boring), 17 Oct 2008
This is one of the most boring books I've ever read. The constant (about 3 times in every paragraph) use of brackets is really off putting (the author constantly points out the obvious) and hugely irritating and pointless (she uses these to include information that has no