Asking For It

This was simultaneously an easy read in that it was really gripping and one of the most harrowing novels I've ever read. I thought it fell apart a bit in the second half and suffered a little bit from an overdose of repetition but the no-holds-barred approach O Neill adopted to such a difficult topic made up for this with sheer unputdown-ability. She compliments the content of this novel with a very authentic (and frustrating) depiction of contemporary Ireland, the attention to detail O Neill employed in making the dialogue and social logic of her characters has to be commended. Reading this with the discourse surrounding the current trial of the rugby players swirling around me made me even more angry about it all. We have to do better as a country in confronting rape culture - the fact that this novel is barely fiction is sobering proof of that.