WIGZ Book Club
Contents
Book Choice for October 2011
A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon
ISBN-10: 0099506920 ISBN-13: 978-0099506928
Synopsis
George Hall is an unobtrusive man. A little distant, perhaps, a little
cautious, not quite at ease with the emotional demands of fatherhood, or
manly bonhomie. He does not understand the modern obsession with talking
about everything. “The secret of contentment, George felt, lay in ignoring
many things completely.” Some things in life, however, cannot be ignored.
At 61, George is settling down to a comfortable retirement, building a shed
in his garden, reading historical novels and listening to a bit of light
jazz. Then his tempestuous daughter, Katie, announces that she is getting
re-married, to the deeply inappropriate Ray. Her family is not pleased – as
her brother Jamie observes, Ray has "strangler’s hands." Katie can’t decide
if she loves Ray, or loves the wonderful way he has with her son Jacob, and
her mother Jean is a bit put out by all the planning and arguing the wedding
has occasioned, which get in the way of her quite fulfilling late-life
affair with one of her husband’s ex-colleagues. And the tidy and pleasant
life Jamie has created crumbles when he fails to invite his lover, Tony, to
the dreaded nuptials.
Unnoticed in the uproar, George discovers a sinister lesion on his hip, and
quietly begins to lose his mind.
The way these damaged people fall apart – and come together – as a family is
the true subject of Haddon’s disturbing yet amusing portrait of a dignified
man trying to go insane politely.
About the Author
Mark Haddon was born in Northampton in 1962. He graduated from Oxford
University in 1981, returning later to study for an M.Sc. in English
Literature at Edinburgh University. He then undertook a variety of jobs,
including work with children and adults with mental and physical
disabilities. He also worked as an illustrator for magazines and a
cartoonist for New Statesman, The Spectator, Private Eye, the Sunday
Telegraph and The Guardian (for which he co-wrote a cartoon strip).
His first book for children, Gilbert's Gobstopper, appeared in 1987 and was
followed by many other books and picture books for children, many of which
he also illustrated. These include the 'Agent Z' series and the 'Baby
Dinosaurs' series. From 1996 he also worked on television projects, and
created and wrote several episodes for Microsoap, winning two BAFTAs and a
Royal Television Society Award for this work.
In 2003 his novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, was
published and has been hugely successful. It is the first book to have been
published simultaneously in two imprints - one for children and one for
adults. It has won a string of prestigious awards, including the 2003
Whitbread Book of the Year. His second novel, A Spot of Bother, was
published in 2006 and shortlisted for the 2006 Costa Novel Award.