It took me over a month to read this book, which I feel like it some sort of accomplishment because it's less than 200 pages.

The list of things I liked is pretty short. I did actually enjoy the writing style. Banks has an interesting way of constructing sentences and making points that I quite liked overall. But I have heard that some of his other books might perhaps be more to my taste when it comes to the story, so perhaps liking hist writing style is a good sign. He's an author I'll try again, but I don't understand the appeal of this particular book.

I also really enjoyed Eric's character and his backstory. I actually thought Eric was much more interesting than Frank and had the story followed him, I would have cared infinitely more. My favorite parts of the book were when they were delving into Eric's history and who he was as a person. Unlike Frank, it actually felt like Eric had quite a bit of depth to him.

So getting down to the (much longer) list of things I didn't like. First the animal abuse. There was a lot of it. I didn't know going in that there would be a lot of graphic animal abuse and I find it unpleasant to read. Not everyone does, I get that, but it does take away enjoyment from any book that makes me read graphic descriptions of it. It doesn't cause pain in an interesting way, I just really don't like reading it. I probably wouldn't have picked this book up had I known that going in.

I also just found the main character rather boring. Frank is a psychopath. Kind of. Maybe. Who knows! But he's murdered a fair few children and kills animals for sport, so I guess we can go with that. That was pretty much it for his character. A main character doesn't have to be the most interesting person around, but when a book is essentially just a character study, I kind of want to care about the main character, good or bad. Boring doesn't cut it.

I was kind of set to give this three stars just because it was boring and not for me until I got to the ending which made me cringe so hard. I was really not a fan. I can't really talk about it without spoilers because I guess it would ruin the book? That's what I've been told, but it came out of nowhere so much that I'm not entirely sure it matters. It felt like a random ending slapped on instead of something that was built to and made sense with the rest of the book.

Overall my thoughts were a lot of sexism, a good bit of transphobia, and a boring cringey story that I'll probably forget very quickly. I don't understand the hype. I'm not offended by the violence, it was just boring and pointless? This whole book felt boring and pointless, and I feel bad because a friend recommended this to me as one of his favorite authors. But hopefully I will enjoy another Banks book more.