The Bus On Thursday by Shirley Barrett

This book is what I can only describe as strange.  It seems to settle uneasily across a couple of genres and not really fit within either.  First off you have the tale of how Eleanor deals with her diagnosis of Breast Cancer and subsequent tenuous remission.  Then you have her tale of mental decline in the aftermath of her treatment, increasing isolation from friends and family and ultimate decision to take a teaching job in a remote township.  The locale she moves to is peculiar to say the least with it's mad-monk priest and bizarre inhabitants.  Finally there is an almost horror story aspect to the ending.  All mashed up together it makes for peculiar reading.

The story itself is told in blog posts so we only get one perspective on everything that happens.  Unfortunately for Eleanor, as a narrator, she transcends unreliable and moves in to the realms of truly deluded very rapidly.  It is clear to the reader that she has suffered major psychological trauma along with physical trauma and that the help provided her she seems willing to brush off.  The real problem, for me, was trying to figure out what was really happening in her life and what were delusions.

I enjoyed the format of the story as it allowed the author to pare the story back to just one view point, one experience related by the sufferer (and suffer Eleanor does).  Unfortunately there is something inherently distasteful about Eleanor, something selfish and self-serving that maybe she is entitled to after such a traumatising diagnosis so young but that still sits uneasily with me.  It doesn't help that rather than make decisions she just acts and this leads her to engage in behaviour that is rash and damaging (throwing away her tamoxifen, stopping her anti-depressants, getting involved with a handsome local).  It also doesn't help that she is so judgmental about the local townsfolk.  Yes, they are a weird bunch when seen through her eyes but as she clearly cannot be trusted to tell the truth maybe they aren't that bad.

Ultimately I'm not sure how much I enjoyed this book.  It did make me squirm but it gave me the chills that a good horror story gives you so that's a point in it's favour.  To be honest I think this one will take a couple of read throughs to get the nuances and to even begin to understand the author's plot trajectory.  I'm also not a huge fan of a cliffhanger ending and this sort of has that feel to it but it does leave you hanging in the middle of a sentence which annoyed me; I understand the "literary" device but it seems out of place here.

THIS IS AN HONEST REVIEW OF A FREE COPY OF THE BOOK SUPPLIED VIA THE PUBLISHER.