Loved the picture painted of the Canadian landscape, characters always interesting and carried the story very well.

While I enjoyed this novel, I couldn't honestly say I loved it, but I'm not sure why. Maybe it was just a bit too macho for me - too full of taciturn old men unable to communicate except through fists or a gun, only willing to show affection in the time honoured hard man way of taking the piss. Not that these characters weren't well drawn - they were, but they didn't seem to develop between the two time frames in which the book was set - in the now they were every bit as stubborn and short sighted as they were in the past. You suspect these old guys could hold a grudge for millennia.
All in all, not a bad read by any means, but just not destined to be my favorite thing.

This is another of the debut Waterstones Eleven authors predicted for great things this year, please see my previous post HERE. The premise definitely sounded interesting, a man is searching for the father he has never known on the dying request of his grandfather who raised him from a baby. For some reason not known to the reader yet, Alan’s grandfather Cecil West and father Jack, have not spoken or seen each other for many years. Cecil hopes that by reaching out to his son at the end of his life he will dissolve the feud between them, and also allow his grandson to get to know his previously absent father. As expected however, there are many underlying and complicated issues present, not only between Cecil and his son, but tensions that have been festering for a while, involving an ex-soldier called Archer and his daughter Linnea, who becomes an integral part of the plot for all the men concerned.

Unfortunately, I’m finding it quite difficult to formulate my opinions on this novel. On the one hand, it is an excellent piece of writing, with a storyline that is both clever enough to hook you in, and intriguing enough to keep you reading. If I were perfectly honest though, I’d probably come to the conclusion that despite these factors, the book wasn’t quite my sort of thing. I thought it was interesting in the way that the author explored the different sort of relationships i.e. father to son, husband to wife, and between good friends, and what happens in each of this cases if the relationship goes sour, and feel the author accomplished this tremendously. The whole style of writing in general though was incredibly “blokey,” (sorry to sound sexist, but that’s how it made me feel!), and just wasn’t for me personally. I like to think that I read quite a wide range of material, and am neither prudish nor squeamish, but the balance of gun/car/fight talk tended to slant into overkill, and didn’t appeal to me. But to end on a positive note, the talent of the writing should not be under-estimated, and if you enjoy a story which analyses the fragility of human relationships this is definitely the book for you.

Please see my full review at http://www.bibliobeth.wordpress.com

Wilson's writing is still gorgeous, but where his short story collection may be one of my favourite books ever, Ballistics is a bit of a slog. I so wanted to love this book, but in the end, it didn't quite earn the itime investment required, as much as I enjoyed chunks of it.