Broken: A Novel
By Daniel Clay
4/5
()
Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this ebook
Until that fateful afternoon, Skunk Cunningham had been a normal little girl, playing on the curb in front of her house. Rick Buckley had been a normal geeky teenager, hosing off his brand-new car. Bob Oswald had been a normal sociopathic single father of five slutty daughters, charging furiously down the sidewalk. Then Bob was beating Rick to a bloody pulp, right there in the Buckleys' driveway, and life on Drummond Square was never the same again.
Inspired by Harper Lee's classic To Kill a Mockingbird, Clay's brilliantly observed and darkly funny novel follows the sudden unraveling of a suburban community after a single act of thoughtless cruelty.
Daniel Clay
Daniel Clay is thirty-eight years old and married with no children. He lives in Hampshire in the UK. ‘Swap’ is his second novel.
Read more from Daniel Clay
Chip Carving: Techniques for Carving Beautiful Patterns by Hand Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBroken: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Prophecies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Seventh Direction Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Broken
Related ebooks
Island: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I Know This Much Is True: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sophie's Choice Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Dispossessed: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This I Know Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Exile Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Monster Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Magdalen Girls Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Willa’s Grove Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Time Machine Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSomeone to Watch Over Me: Stories By Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Memory of Water: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Orphan #8: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Hummingbird: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The House Girl: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Bees: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Metamorphosis Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Agoraphobics in Love: An eShort Story Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Before You Go: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5To Caroline—Love, Auntie: A Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
General Fiction For You
A Man Called Ove: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Unhoneymooners Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Life of Pi: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Priory of the Orange Tree Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Fellowship Of The Ring: Being the First Part of The Lord of the Rings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The City of Dreaming Books Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Dark Tower I: The Gunslinger Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dante's Divine Comedy: Inferno Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Shantaram: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Cabin at the End of the World: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Alchemist Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beartown: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5My Sister's Keeper: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ocean at the End of the Lane: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beyond Good and Evil Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Silmarillion Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Meditations: Complete and Unabridged Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cloud Cuckoo Land: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Everything's Fine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5It Ends with Us: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Canterbury Tales Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5You: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Labyrinth of Dreaming Books: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ulysses: With linked Table of Contents Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Jackal, Jackal: Tales of the Dark and Fantastic Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Anonymous Sex Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Persuasion Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Nettle & Bone Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Broken
15 ratings5 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I loved reading To Kill a Mockingbird back in high school, and I could sense that inspiration in the book from the very first chapter. This was before I even noticed that on the back cover, it is said that the book was inspired by that classic. Although Broken does not deal with some of the same issues of race and prejudice, it does touch on other important issues. About poverty, about love, about irrational actions, about cruelty. I loved this book to say the least. It gives such an insightful and scary portrayal of what can go on in the world that you makes you really question where you live and the people you live around. This does not mean that I'm going to be paranoid about my neighbour across the street. But it really does make you question people you don't know. The world today just isn't as safe as it once was.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5As the author himself admits, this novel is a deliberate homage to To Kill a Mockingbird (set in contemporary England), but there's more to it than that. The title refers not just to the character known as "Broken Buckley," whose dalliance with a trashy neighborhood girl sets in motion a series of brutal events, but to all the characters who occupy this bleak landscape, all of whom have been broken in one way or another by the unfortunate circumstances of their lives. Some are morally broken, some have had their spirits broken, and the main character, 11-year-old Skunk, who narrates parts of the story from deep within a coma, has been physically and mentally broken by the unspeakable horror she witnessed and endured. The mystery of exactly what happened to Skunk makes this a gripping and suspenseful, if disturbing, read. The things that can help broken people carry on and heal themselves are also revealed, offering a glimmer of hope in a imperfect world.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5An interesting look at how one act of violence can lead to others and how violence can affect more than just the original people involved.A thought it sounded like an interesting concept, and although some parts were really interesting, the book fell short for me.The writing skipped around a bit, which made the book a bit confusing for me. The end was not very clear so that even now as I write the review, I am not sure what happened to Skunk.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Awesome novel.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This is an extraordinary novel with a huge variety of characters and events which all interweave to lead to the main event of the story: Skunk is a young girl in a coma and she's telling you her story of how it happened.The most remarkable thing is the picture Daniel Clay paints of the 'family from hell'. This is not Skunk's family but a family who live near her and whose actions create havoc and lead to tragedy. You can't help but wonder if it isn't just an extreme caricature. And yet, deep down, part of you knows it isn't. That there are families like that and their actions can ripple out to affect many people.That's partly what makes this novel so thought provoking - it's a worrying reflection of modern society in some ways. It is also thought provoking because you realise the huge ramifications of some 'wrong place, wrong time' moments, a wrong word, a misguided act.Thankfully, not all is gloomy. Clay paints a picture of some very vicious characters but he also manages to show that there are many good people and that fundamentally most of us are decent, if not misguided.