The Immaculate Heart by Andrew Raymond Drennan

This book, his second published work, is something of a leap forward for Andrew Raymond Drennan, with his prose in particular significantly more confident than in his debut novel, Cancer Party. It’s the story of Maggie, a 14 year old girl whose best friend is a rather sweet 81 year old man called Bertrand.

In Bertrand’s past is a pretty intriguing story of lost love, which intrigues Maggie, who is fascinated by love, since she’s adopted and her family largely ignore her after the death of her favoured, and non-adopted sister. The book proceeds using a structure often used by Iain Banks – the story in the present is intercut with the story from the past, and both come to a simultaneous conclusion.

As in Cancer Party some of the scenes here seem designed to shock, but lose some impact because of this apparent design. There is also a twist ending which fails badly, because it actually makes the story less compelling. But until that point, it is compelling, more for the storytelling skill of the author than the actual story he tells. The ending is a let down, but there’s a lot to enjoy here along the way. [Keir Hind]