Deconstructing Frank in The Wasp Factory

Advantages: Dark, thought provoking page turner - exceedingly well written
Disadvantages: Dark. Very dark. Disturbing. Scenes of animal and child cruelty

...Seventeen year old Frank is a killer. He kills birds, mice and other small animals. Fortunately, he doesn't kill people any more - it was just a passing phase, when he killed Blythe, Paul and Esmeralda (not all at once, mind you). Frank's brother Eric is also deeply unhinged, with a penchant for burning dogs, and his father isn't entirely playing with a full deck either. The Wasp Factory is a strange book. The plot, such as it is, follows Frank on his isolated Scottish Island as he prepares for the imminent arrival of his half-brother Eric, who has escaped from a secure mental institution. However, that's not really the main point of this rather short novel (I read it in around a day). The book is narrated by Frank, who is a deeply unreliable narrator. Indeed, every 'fact' we learn should be treated with suspicion, since everyone has...

mattygroves 31.08.2009 · Read review
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Review of The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks

The Wasp Factory!

Advantages: Great gothic horror
Disadvantages: Bit short

...It was released in 1984 - author - Iain Banks It is in first person perspective, it is a narrative told by seventeen-year-old Frank Cauldhame, describing his childhood and all that remains of it. Frank observes many religious rituals of his own invention. As the novel develops, his brother's escape from a mental hospital and impending return lead on to a violent ending and a twist that undermines all that Frank believed about himself. The eponymous Wasp Factory is a clock face salvaged from the local dump. Behind each numeral is a trap, which leads to a different ritual death (for example burning, crushing, or drowning in Frank's own urine) for the wasp that Frank puts into the hole at the centre. He uses the death "chosen" by the wasp to divine the future. There are also the Sacrifice Poles, upon which hang the bodies and heads...

damob123 15.08.2007 · Read review
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Review of The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks

The Wasp Factory

Advantages: Good Read
Disadvantages: Has nasty bits in it

...The Wasp Factory is only for those who enjoy a bit of gore, insanity and weirdness. I discovered it when for my A-level English class I was told to chose from a variety of books that came under the horror genre. The Wasp Factory was one of the books we were given and I automatically felt it would be a good read because the title sounded quite bizarre and little did I know how amazing, yet tragic, this novel would be. As you read through you may get a little confused with the main character, Frank, and his life and why he acts in such a strange way. However, I found I could not put this book down and ended up reading it within a day. The way he acts so crazily in his everyday life and the way he addresses you as a reader makes you really want to know why he is so different. As the story unfolds it reveals to you why he has turned...

bornlippy15 25.01.2007 · Read review
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Review of The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks

The Wasp Factory

Advantages: Superb novel.
Disadvantages: You'll either love it or hate.

...'The Wasp Factory' by Iain Banks made me fall in love with reading books. Y'know those kind of books that you just don't want to put down? Well, this sums up 'The Wasp Factory'. I have a pretty dry sense of humour so I love Banks' style of writing. It's one of the most amusing books I have ever read...in fact, it's probably the best. Banks' psychological approach of an insecure young boy is a rather complex piece of writing, but is very well done and will leave you wondering which of the characters is the most psychotic. A word of warning though...If you're easily disturbed I'd steer clear of reading 'The Wasp Factory'....

MINX18851 24.09.2000 · Read review
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Review of The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks

Wasp Factory, Iain Banks

Advantages: Very clever, lots of suspense, very vivid imagery from text
Disadvantages: very thought provoking at times

...Wasp Factory Weird but wonderful, and a lot of the time disturbing! Banks really exploits the power of words to create such vivid imagery of sadistic gothic horror. There is a very clever twist to the ending but all the way through it is seemingly full of clues and deceptions. If you're pretty sensitive to the torture of living things and damaged innocence, then, maybe you better not buy or attempt to read this book. From a literary perspective Banks is damn good, especially since this is his first novel. That is probably why it's one of the set books for 'A' level students. Aside from that, the story is told through the eyes of a young Scottish lad, his memories, his experiences and his seemingly innocent and evil deeds. A lot of the times you'll be reading this and thinking, Why?? And most importantly How?? You'd probably think...

maav12 11.06.2005 · Read review
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Review of The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks

12 ways for a wasp to meet its maker.

Advantages: A really interesting and obscure read.
Disadvantages: 'Sick' in parts and thus unsuitable for some.

...The Wasp Factory. ********************* I spotted Iain Bank's the Wasp Factory on a friend's bookshelf at the end of last year. It was the title that intrigued me more than anything. The book is described on the front as a 'gothic horror novel' and the back page reads: Enter - if you can bear it - the extraordinary private world of Frank, just sixteen, and unconventional, to say the least. 'Two years after I killed Blyth I murdered my young brother Paul, for quite different and more fundamental reasons than I'd disposed of Blyth, and then a year after that I did for my young cousin Esmerelda, more or less on a whim. That's my score to date. Three. I haven't killed anybody for years, and don't intend to ever again.' 'It was just a stage I was going through.' I borrowed the book and I just finished it last week. Here...

nickyturnill 16.01.2006 · Read review
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Review of The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks

The Wasps- ARISTOPHANES

Advantages: Quite easy to understand for a modern audience
Disadvantages: may require some athenian legal system knowledge

...Wasps was performed in 422 BC at the Lenaia and won second prize. Wasps are basically about Cleon's control over the Athenian jury system. In the play Wasps the two main characters are Procleon and Anticleon, father and son. Procleon has an obsession with sitting on juries and Anticleon his son, wants to cure his addiction and tries locking im his house, but Procleon tries to escape many times, one of which he pretends he is going to sell his donkey at the market but hides underneath the donkey, like Odysseus under the Cyclops's ram, we would expect Anticleon to recognise this straight away, but the joke is delayed to fit in the joke about Odysseus this is an example of incongruity. The father and son have a debate (the agon) and Anticleon decides to set up a court in their house and have a trial about a dog who has stolen Sicilian...

louisacrompton 02.01.2007 · Read review
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Review of The Wasps - Aristophanes

Wasps for tea?

Advantages: Answer lots of your unanswered questions
Disadvantages: Leaves you asking a whole lot more

..."does anything eat wasps? along with the next obvious question "why would they bother?" I then saw the New Scientist logo in the top left hand corner, and very nearly put the book back, thinking that it would be too scientific for me. However, I turned the book over and read the blurb on the back. The very next question that this book posed was "How long can I live on beer alone?" and within minutes I was in the queue to buy this book! ~~ About the Book ~~ In the introduction the book explains that these are the best questions from the last eleven years of the Last Word column. It also provides a link to the magazine so that you can ask your own questions or indeed answer someone else's. www.newscientist.com/lastword.ns This book is divided into 8 sections: 1 Our bodies 2 Plants and animals 3 Domestic Science 4 Our universe...

ciaomeister1 19.03.2006 · Read review
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Review of Does Anything Eat Wasps? And 101 Other Questions - New Scientist

Shock Your Granny

Advantages: Funny, rude, vital.
Disadvantages: Lost its context, some may find it offensive.

...Frank, a physically deformed young man in his mid-teens, lives with his father - an eccentric man to say the least - on a remote Scottish island. Frank is not your run-of-the mill adolescent; he announces from the outset that he is a three times familial murderer with the throwaway line, "it was just a stage I was going through". Frank's distasteful personal habits and strange, obsessive daily routines are gruesome yet hilarious in the darkest kind of way. As his father hides away in his study, up to no good, Frank embarks upon military campaigns against rabbits and sacrifices wasps in his own warped version of the Delphi Oracle, The Wasp Factory. Tension rises as Frank waits for Eric, his older brother. Eric is a charming chap who has taken to setting fire to dogs. He has escaped from a secure mental hospital and is on his way home...

jillmurphy 09.04.2004 · Read review
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Review of The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks

Bzz...

Advantages: Twisted, black humour, very weird and very funny
Disadvantages: The twist isn't special, and it's not suitable for kids!

..."Sick". "Disturbing". "Disgusting". Just glancing through some of the other reviews of Iain Banks's debut novel, The Wasp Factory, these seem to be the most commonly used words. But I think they've missed out the most important one: FUNNY. The Wasp Factory is described on the front cover as "a gothic horror", and sure, it does contain a lot of gore, violence and killing. However, when I read this book I found it funny more than anything. It's black humour, certainly, probably as black as it gets, and definitely quite shocking in parts. But there was nothing "scary" or particularly disturbing about it, at least not to me anyway! Maybe I'm just a freak? The story is written from the perspective of Frank Cauldhame, a 16 year old boy who lives on a remote Scottish island with his dad. Frank doesn't officially exist. His...

l-m-n-o-p 20.06.2006 · Read review
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Review of The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks