ManBookering discussion

Discussing His Bloody Project by Graeme Macrae Burnet.

USA friends- this one is currently $5.99 on Kindle, even though the physical version doesn't seem to be available yet in the states... odd. But thought I'd let y'all know in case you wanted to pick it up.

And just £1.99 on Kindle in UK - buy now!

Shawn (ThatOneEnglishGradStudent) wrote: "Maxwell wrote: "USA friends- this one is currently $5.99 on Kindle, even though the physical version doesn't seem to be available yet in the states... odd. But thought I'd let y'all know in case yo..."

Let's buddy read it if you want! I'll DM you on Twitter.

I just bought this one too! I really try to stick with library books but I can't resist a good bargain.

Just bought this one on Amazon! I can't wait to start it and talk about it with all of you :) I haven't been active in this group at all, but I'm hoping to change that with this year's MB selection :)

Starting with this one just because it was the cheapest for Kindle. Looking forward to reading it and hearing everyone else's thoughts

Thank you Maxwell. Just € 5,49 at Amazon from Holland (including 21% VAT ;-). Maybe a positive effect from the Brexit ?

This book looks fascinating! Can't wait to read it soon!

I'm almost halfway through, and absolutely love it so far. It's well-written and deals with a lot of social and cultural issues (I like that combination) and the characters are developed nicely. I will very likely recommend this book for possible adoption to the professor I work with who teaches our Law & Literature course.

I hope all of us Americans who wanted this book got it yesterday -- I checked the Amazon store and it has been taken down. Not available in the Kindle US store at all, and only available in hard copy from third party sellers.
Anyway, I finished this book yesterday. I absolutely loved it, five stars. This book scratches a lot of particular itches for me in fiction: well-written, highly engrossing, good character development, historical fiction, involvement of social issues and law, possibly unreliable narrator(s), and telling the story through a collection of "documents" rather than just standard text. One of my favorites of the year. I am not sure it is weird, experimental, or challenging enough to be shortlisted, but it makes my own personal shortlist :)

I finished this earlier today and really enjoyed it. It is very convincing and I had to spend a bit of time on the internet checking it really is a work of fiction! It being set in a real place and one of the characters being a real person adds to the sense of truth about it, but the writing is key to making you think you are reading a set of historical documents rather than a work of fiction.

I found this article which is an interview with the author. I don't think there are any spoilers in it, but it might be best to leave it until after you have finished the book: http://www.whatson-north.co.uk/Whats-...

This was the book that held the most appeal for me, too, when I first saw the longlist, and I was not disappointed. I loved it! I am very glad I bought the Kindle version that day, though, as it has now disappeared from Amazon's Canadian website also. It is just the kind of book I most enjoy with its Victorian setting, and the subtlety of the characterisation, which leaves so much to the reader's perceptions and interpretations to fill in the gaps, and work out what we are not being told. Definitely a highlight of my reading so far this year. My thanks to the Booker Judges for selecting this one, as I cannot imagine that I would have ever come across it otherwise.

This is very much just for those who have read the book - don't look at this unless you have finished reading:(view spoiler)[ what about the theory that Jetta is actually the murderer and our "hero" is covering for her? Just a thought. (hide spoiler)]

Just finished it! What a cool story. It's not like anything I've really seen on a Man Booker longlist before. I will say the first 2/3 or so were fine but not my favorite, but the last 1/3 was amazing.

And Neil...wow. That didn't even cross my mind. Interesting!

Maxwell wrote: "And Neil...wow. That didn't even cross my mind. Interesting!"

To be honest, for a large part of the book, I thought I had out-smarted the author by guessing his twist. Then it turned out that I was completely wrong! (view spoiler)[It was the injuries to the daughter that were not described by Roderick but mentioned by the doctor that really made me think Jetta had done the murders as a revenge attack for the abuse she received. I thought Roderick came over as the classic case of someone who has agreed to take the fall for someone else. (hide spoiler)]

Neil wrote: "Maxwell wrote: "And Neil...wow. That didn't even cross my mind. Interesting!"

To be honest, for a large part of the book, I thought I had out-smarted the author by guessing his twist. Then it turn..."

But, on reflection, you have to work way too hard to make my theory hold together, so I think it is best to ignore it.

Wow, this was a great read! The various 'documents' give the reader plenty to think about. Was Roderick crazy? Did he want to avenge his sister or is father or was there something else going on?
I especially liked that these questions were not answered but left for the reader to decide.

I've just finished this and i've given it 5 stars which I shall probably change to 4 tomorrow because I was never thinking 5 stars until towards the end. But I ask myself why not 5 stars? Probably because it has a genre feel to it, with it's functional (but also articulate) prose. But i thoroughly enjoyed this and it is more clever than you first realise with a real depth and an interesting narrative. I particularly liked the social commentary.

20% of Scottish land is owned by 20 people
50% is owned by less than 500

(view spoiler)[
Ok here is my theory. It was witnessing the rape of his sister that flipped him. Jetta was the one person in the world he loved. Giving his feelings for Jetta I think his rather dispassionate account and reaction to this event does not make sense. It is the first point in his narrative that may be dishonest (either with the reader or with himself). I think it's at this moment that the seed of revenge is planted. He takes revenge out on Lachlan by molesting his daughter. He puts Flora on the table, skirts raised - this was not to stop people tripping over her body as he claimed (which is absurd) but so that he could witness Lachlan on first discovering her.
(hide spoiler)]

I didn't love this as much as others here did - think I may be enjoying all of the theories here more than the book itself!

I didn't dislike it at all but not something I'd consider prize winning. It reminded me a lot of The Suspicions of Mr Whicher which was massively hyped when it first came out in the UK.

Alan: (view spoiler)[I also thought about the posibility that Roderick did this to Flora to hurt Lachlan Broad. The motive suggested by the psychiatrist didn`t feel right to me and I also thought it was odd that Roderick didn`t react more to the rape of his sister. He described it in his memoir as he didn`t fully understand what was happening between the two on the table. Doesn`t that seem a bit strange considering his intelligens and his actions described by the neighbours outside their daughters window? This is a fun book to discuss and it gives me something to think about that I at first trusted Roderick`s memoirs even though I knew they were exactly that, a personal memoir. (hide spoiler)]

Justine - I am with you on this book. I just could not connect with it. Even after reading many insightful reviews on here I remain unmoved by the writing and the story but at least I made it to the end and I agree it is not terrible but just dull.

I read it and feel it was good storytelling but not literature. Gave it 4 stars but would be surprised if it made it past the long list.

My four star review:

Almost, but not quite a 5 - I thought the final section (the trial) dragged a bit, and the 'surprise' alternate motive for the murders could easily be discerned from early on. However, so far this is by far the most accomplished and my favorite of the Booker longlist nominees that I have read so far (#6 of the 13), so I am hopeful it makes the shortlist. I love books which transport me to another time and place (2014's nominee 'The Wake' was another recent Booker favorite), and Burnet expertly conjures 1869 Scotland in both language and detail. That said, I don't feel this has the weight and gravitas I expect from a Booker winner, so am hopeful one of the final 7 strikes me as even more worthy.

(view spoiler)[ It is interesting to me that both here, and also in my other Booker group, people refer to Jetta's liaison with Lachlan as rape - to me it was CLEARLY consensual - go back are re-read it (p 64-66) - she not only doesn't resist, but her reaction to Roddy's intrusion leads credence to that interpretation. (hide spoiler)]

Reading this one now, it sounds like provincial Scotland in the 19th century was not a fun place to be!

Having now finished this book, I find I quite enjoyed it, and while at first glance it may not have the literary depth of previous Man Booker winners, I think on further reflection it provides quite the social commentary.

I don't know what to think yet regarding all the theorizing going on above (I'll have to give it some more thought!) but I quite liked how Burnett highlighted the failings of the justice system with regard to the peasants, as well as the attitudes concerning the existence of a "criminal class".

I'm with Justine and Trudy (upthread) I enjoyed this discussion considerably more than the book itself, in fact the thread does it more credit than it deserves.

For me this doesn't belong close to a Booker shortlist, it's too straightforward and unoriginal albeit very nicely done.

*Spoiler: I have given a brief overview of the book along with my review so please don’t read if you don’t like to know about the plot before you read. Happy reading.

His Bloody Project by Graeme Macrae Burnet
This novel reads like a memoir but is a fictional account completed with a very impressive amount of research. It is 1859 in the Scottish Highlands (small Highland hamlet of Culduie) and seventeen-year-old Roderick Macrae has just murdered three people. . .the constable, the constable’s adolescent daughter and his four-year old son. Arrested and awaiting trial his advocate (lawyer) asked him to write account of the murders as he remembered. His narrative makes up about a third of the novel where you learn about Roderick’s long standing abuse at the hands of both his father and the constable. The other parts are written in an epistolary style from medical and police reports. The question becomes his motive as to whether he was sane when the murders were committed. In reading this I was reminded of Buriel Rights by Hannah Kent which I loved but is not for everyone. 5 stars

I'm not sure if anyone has read or heard the following, but I wanted to share a brief interview with the judges (Amanda Foreman (Chair) and Abdulrazak Gurnah) on why books on the longlist made the longlist.

Graeme Macrae Burnet (UK) - His Bloody Project (Contraband)
“This book plunges the reader into a remote Scottish world, where Victorian anthology distorts the profoundly human plight of its complex protagonist.”
Gurnah: What attracted me about the book was the way it is able to kind of anatomize, I mean by that to give such a detailed rendering or to make such a detailed narrative of the way a people in a small place, a small village in the far north of Scotland, how they rub on each other, how the antagonisms, and I suppose also the affections, but certainly the antagonisms come through more strongly, live on from generation to generation and are passed on. It’s a book about cruelties, some of them small cruelties, but some of them really quite impossible to imagine in the sense of the bullying, the oppressions of poverty and of, I suppose, authority as well. It’s a small, small community novel which shows the true ugliness of what goes on in small places when one has power and the other doesn’t.

This one was a surprise. I was really intrigued by Graeme Macrae Burnet's very cleverly constructed historical crime novel. In its core this is the story of a seventeen years old Roderick Macrae, who had killed three people in a small Scottish village in 1869. But it is also about class, prejudice, law, psychology, science and the all important question: Who do you believe? And why?

In some instances I felt a little bit reminded of "Burial Rites" (rural setting, class questions, 19th century, crime), but of course these are widely different books, especially concerning their use of language and the ways your are supposed to connect to the protagonist. (Also Burial Rites focusses on the question of gender and expectations for women.)

Regarding the theories:
(view spoiler)[First of all I liked the way this book was constructed: First the reader is made to like Roderick, then the psychologist is shown as a pretty unpleasent person with horrible theories (about the criminal class etc.) and then there is the trial... Already at the end of Rodericks own report I was a bit annoyed - I hate when I am supossed to feel sympathetic for a male character who is violent towards a woman. And I was really surprised about the later twist which focussed back onto the violence against Flora. If one would like to this book could also be read questioning how class, poverty, powerlessness, violence is also gendered in specific ways. The ending is so open and so many theories seem possible. But I do not think Roderick took the blame for Jette. For once, why should he do so after she had already killed herself (and did she clean herself up before killing herself?). Also one raped woman violating another woman seems not to realistic. Going back I think it is not impossible to read Roderick as being frustrated and angry with Flora and thus actually violating her. He pretends to not have understood at all what had happend to Jetta, but Flora was found in the exact same position. Also the story of the neighbours having found Roderick lurking around their house watching their daughters... (hide spoiler)] I really believe this book would be a great pick for book clubs. It really offers such a great potential to discuss!

So clever - I love it. Very convincing, I had to keep reminding myself that I couldn't Google for more information about the case, because it wasn't real.
Anything else I want to say is probably a spoiler, so ...

I really liked this one! So far of the ones I've read it's my favourite! For me it was partly the formatting of the book that made it for me, but also the fact that it's left up to the reader to question as to what actually happened as all we're given is unreliable sources.

I really enjoyed this book and hope it makes it to the short list. The format and structure were very interesting and I enjoyed the different versions of what happened and of what was believed to have happened according to the evidence was intriguing. Roddy's response to his actions - of accepting the fate of his circumstances by freely admitting to the murders but completely without remorse were not the actions of a sane person. Relentless bullying by his father, Flora and Broad and Broad's raping(?) of his sister lead to Roddy's response - to remove the causes. What was hard to fathom was the lack of any comment on his sister's situation by Roddy in his record or by witnesses during the trial.

I liked it. I liked how the murder and Roddy's psyche were tackled from different viewpoints, some interesting facts about the time period and an all round solid story.

I doubt if it will win the Booker though.

I loved this book!