The Pier Falls and Other Stories is not an easy read, but Haddon’s remarkable talent makes it worth it. Throughout the tale, Haddon pauses on characters just long enough to provide what feels like the full measure of their existence. Haddon does this over and over in this unrelentingly intense and frequently jaw-dropping collection. There are moments in this collection when the darkness feels almost wilful, as if Haddon is daring readers to keep going, right to the sticky end. “The Pier Falls” describes, in prose that verges on the cold and clinical, the collapse of a popular waterfront pier on the coast of England that results in dozens of deaths: “Six more people are poured, scrabbling, down the half-crater of shattered wood into the sea.

Source: thestar July 03, 2016 03:56 UTC