The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks

Frank - no ordinary sixteen-year-old - lives with his father outside a remote Scottish village. Their life is, to say the least, unconventional. Frank's mother abandoned them years ago: his elder brother Eric is confined to a psychiatric hospital; and his father measures out his eccentricities on an imperial scale. Frank has turned to strange acts of violence to vent his frustrations. In the bizarre daily rituals there is some solace. But when news comes of Eric's escape from the hospital Frank has to prepare the ground for his brother's inevitable return - an event that explodes the mysteries of the past and changes Frank utterly.

Paperback, 184 pages

Published September 10th 1998 by Simon & Schuster (first published 1984) 

 

Normally with a short book as this one I fly right through. But I took my time reading through this one. 

At first there was a chapter in which our main character Frank takes some of his boredom and anger 

out on some rabbits. By blowing them up. Literally. I am not much of a hunter, I myself only have 

with fish. So I had to step away from the book and come back to it. 

But in my opinion that was the worse part of it for me. By putting that chapter early on in the book it 

prepared me for what might come later. There are some more events in the later parts of the book, but none

that I felt as graphic as reading about the  and process that went through the MC's actions in the

rabbit chapter.  

 I approached the book as a coming of age novel. It really only takes place over a month or so of time. But 

throughout the story Frank tells of us his childhood, his friends, family and experiences he has been through.

I'm not going to lie that it wasn't a difficult read. The characters in the book are pretty broken down by

this point in their lives. 

Frank lives alone with his father. And his older brother Eric is away in a mental hospital. We find out early

on that Eric has escaped and on his way home. That leads to some troubling memories of their pasts, in 

which Eric and his father deal with it in different ways. Every day that Eric gets closer to the house we 

find out more about Frank and his childhood. 

 

Overall the book was difficult for me to just read all the way through. I took it a chapter at a time, let

it soak in. When I finished it I realized that it's amazing how much people can endure in life. Our

different reactions to situations and how far love can go when it comes to family (or not go).  I am 

glad this book came to my attention and it will stick with me for years.

this is not like a lifetime movie story, it's rough, it's borderline horror in places.