I finished this the other day. I meant to read it last year when I decided to join a reading group but I had a falling out with some friends which prevented me from participating in the group.
I can't say that I liked the book. It's about Frank Cauldhame, a 16 year old boy who has killed his brother, cousin, and another child. It's a Holden Caulfieldesque coming-of-age story that isn't as good. Maybe that's why the author chose a similar last name for his protagonist. However, this book would never be found in the same breath as The Catcher in the Rye.
The book is very graphic. It describes Frank's methods of killing as well as his torture of the animals that live on his island. He builds a "factory" from an old clock that serves as his crystal ball into killing the animals. Most of the book is spent waiting for his crazy brother Eric to arrive after escaping from a mental institution. In actually, Frank is just an experiment gone awry and is crazy as well. Toward the end the book gets better and takes a weird twist but even that doesn't redeem it from the bottom of my bookshelf.
Some publication in Britain rated this one of the 100 best books of the century, but I would firmly disagree. Maybe some of Iain Banks' later novels are better. I will probably never find out.
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