Introducing our Book of the Month for January 2012


The Radleys by Matt Haig







From Amazon.com


Just about everyone knows a family like the Radleys. Many of us grew up next door to one. They are a modern family, averagely content, averagely dysfunctional, living in a staid and quiet suburban English town. Peter is an overworked doctor whose wife, Helen, has become increasingly remote and uncommunicative. Rowan, their teenage son, is being bullied at school, and their anaemic daughter, Clara, has recently become a vegan. They are typical, that is, save for one devastating exception: Peter and Helen are vampires and have—for seventeen years—been abstaining by choice from a life of chasing blood in the hope that their children could live normal lives.



Hardcover: 384 pages
Publisher: Free Press (December 28, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1439194017
ASIN: B0057D90EC



Author Website



Book opens for discussion 25th January 2012


Happy Reading

Book is now open for discussion....


Spoilers will apply so if you haven't read the book - be warned !!!




This is the UK cover which is very different from the US version





Here are my thoughts...which I posted on my blog last week....HERE


The Radleys appear to be a normal happy family, but underneath this veneer of respectability lies a dark secret which is about to come crashing to the surface. Peter and Helen Radley have done all they can to protect their children, Rowan and Clara, from experiencing the dark and daring world of the paranormal, but secrets run deep, and the threat of exposure is never far from the surface.

Covering a whole range of topics, from sibling rivalry and school time bullying, through to marital disharmony and the threat of infidelity, this story just about covers every emotion. There are some genuinely funny moments where I laughed out loud, but equally, there are some truly dark dilemmas which seek not only to question morality, but also to ponder on the principles of goodness and decency. Ultimately, this is a novel about rites of passage, not just within families but within the wider community, and demonstrates how the intricacies of relationships can be flimsy, and yet strengthened by a common purpose.

The author’s skill as a story teller is unmistakable, Matt Haig has the distinct ability to engage, entertain and amuse in equal measure, and yet his true talent lies in making the book just a little bit different. It’s refreshingly diverse to have a paranormal book that doesn’t feature too heavily on the dark and dirty alpha male, and yet should the story ever continue, Rowan certainly has potential.




So what did you make of this story.....


Did the author manage to convince you that people like the Radley's exist - was the story believeable?
Despite their obvious differences, are The Radleys like every other family?
How do you feel the issues around morality were covered - is life easier, or harder for them?
Were Peter and Helen "good parents"?
Uncle Will is portrayed as the complete opposite to his brother Peter, and yet did you notice that in some ways they are very much alike?
When the book ended , did you feel that the conclusion was the right one - do you think that the story could continue?

Please share your thoughts...


Look forward to discussing this with you all

I'm a little less than halfway through and I read almost all of that yesterday. i hope to get through most of the rest today. I am enjoying it so far. It moves fast and I'm finding it a bit deeper and more serious than I was expecting, which is a good thing. For some reason, I thought it was mostly comic, but although there are some funny moments, it's certainly not all that way.

For some reason, Rowan reminded me a lot of Harry Potter. The whole misunderstood teenage misfit who has strange things happening to his body and the unrecognized internal power he has while simultaneously being bullied about by mere mortals.

But the character that intriqued me the most was Helen. At first, I thought that she was in love with Will but went through with her marriage to Peter, the stable one. It was interesting to find out later that Will mind controlled her to go with him against her will and she suffered the guilt of that throughout her life which inhibited her ability to fully commit and love Peter. Her coldness at the beginning made a little more sense and also her path of abstinence was also a self-punishing method of life along with her lies. Especially, since it was evident that blood could be purchased on the open market for those who didn't want to go au natural. I liked the symbolism of her painting the white fences continuously as an expression of the life she was creating for herself. Fenced in and locked up tight.

The one part that ruined the story a little for me in the end was Eve's story. I just couldn't believe that her father would bring her into that fate and support it given what happened to his wife. It made a story that was otherwise believable, sort of comic.

Will's another character that I found interesting. The bad boy who is so madly in love with his brother's wife that he had to turn her and mind control her just to have his way. Good riddance to him, I say.

I read this book a year ago, and really loved it at the time. By now, I'm a little fuzzy on some of the details, but thought I'd share what I wrote about it right after finishing it:

I hesitate to label this as a vampire book. I could just as easily describe it as a tale of suburban disaffection and disappointment. In fact, I was frequently reminded of "Little Children" by Tom Perotta when reading this book. Middle class family, parents trying desperately to give their children a normal life in a small town, by erasing all their own passions and idiosyncracies and focusing on fitting in. And yet... the Radleys are a family of abstaining vampires, existing without drinking blood, following the code set forth in the Abstainer's Handbook, which emphasizes above all else the imperative of ignoring one's instincts, squashing one's imagination, and keeping a tight lid on all emotion. The parents raise their children with no knowledge of the family secret, and as always happens, secrets have a way of coming out. The Radleys is well-written, funny and tragic, and quite enjoyable to read. Whether you choose to read it as a black-and-white vampire story or as a metaphor for the dull-edged pressures of life in today's society, either way, The Radleys is well worth the time.

I finished this last night, past my bedtime which is why I didn't post anything then. I ended up liking it.

I agree with Pauline that I was a little surprised that Eve's father would bring her into that life, but on the other hand, he had lost his wife and had a choice of either also losing his daughter, or getting her a different sort of life and chose the latter. So maybe.

For a decent amount of it I kept being reminded of Freedom by Jonathan Franzen because of the parents and their various temptations/affairs and the dysfunctional family. I was kind of glad that there was some successful resistance in the end (Peter didn't go into the club to meet Lorna and Helen chose family over Will despite the physical/magical love for her convertor). I was also glad to learn that Helen only went with Will because he brain-washed her (well blood-minded her) and not because she actually felt attraction for him. It made me like her more than I had earlier when it seemed like she betrayed Peter by her own choice.

I agree that the painted fences symbolized being penned in, but it also shows the wistfulness for the normal suburban life with the house and the white picket fence. So, I think it had dual meanings. They were trying so hard to fit in to that "ideal" life, but that required trapping themselves in the falsehoods and hiding their true selves.

Every time I've heard about this book, I found myself thinking of Boo Radley from To Kill a Mockingbird. Not sure there is any actual link, but he was also mostly hidden away in a house and was seen as creepy by the children just as Rowan and Clara are seen as sort of creepy by their peers.

The Radleys is not my typical type of read, but I did enjoy it. The characters were easy to relate to and hate as well. There was a struggle between self-denial and pure selfishness in all of them. The Radley's are decent, good people who are tempted and find control more challenging than they expected. One line that stayed with me is Rowan telling Clara not to worry because "Look at everyone. Everyone represses everything. Do you think any of these 'normal' human beings really do exactly what they want to do all the time? 'Course not. It's just the same. We're middle-class and we're British. Repression is in our veins." Rowan is right for the most part, but not only the British deal with issues of repression. This is a universal condition.

I was disgusted with Will for several reasons, but the attack on Eve was the last straw. As Pauline said "GOOD RIDANCE!" I was disappointed in Peter for drinking the vials of Lorna's blood and in Helen for allowing Will to drink her blood towards the end of the book. I understand that she found it difficult to resist him and was trying to strenghten herself to kill him, but she gave him what she wouldn't give her husband. I felt it was a double betrayal.

That being said, I admired Helen for coming clean with Peter in the last scene. Yet, it becomes evident that Peter knew all along that she had been with his brother. She thinks back to Will's comment about Peter being "quite the blood snob." There is no way he would not have tasted/sensed Will's blood mixed with hers. Yet, he loved Helen so deeply and fully that he did not hold her accountable. He just wanted to know that she loved him. Once Will's hold on her is gone, Helen is free to love Peter unconditionally.

What really bothered me the most though, was that Rowan kills Will, his biological father. It seemed somewhat Oedipal to me with Rowan unknowingly drinking his mother's blood (THE ETERNAL 1992) and then killing his father with the axe. Will was asking for it one way or another with his reckless behaviour, but I was hoping it would be Copeland or Eve who would find a way to kill him. Also, what happened to Glenny and Geoff while all the slashing and attacking was taking place? I guess they were waiting out the night until they achieved what they wanted.

The ending resolved itself well enough for me and left the story open for a sequel with couples Rowan and Eve, and Clara and Raphael Child. I would be interested in reading more about the Radley's mishaps if Matt Haig decides to continue with this so humanly emotional and dysfunctional family.

Am am pleased that you all found something to enjoy within the story _

For me this is just a story about families, and the dynamics which seek to work beneath the surface - the vampirism gives it a genre within paranormal boundaries, but the theme of family conflict would have worked on any level - be it secrets of abuse, drink, drugs, or relationships.

The weakest link for me was Will - he was needed to inject the necessary evil into the plot, and was of course the catalyst which got the story up and running, but I felt he could have been better handled...he was certainly despicable, but was also rather weak for such an evil person.

The only bit I was truly uneasy with was Peter's temptation surrounding Lorna's blood samples - I felt he had let himself down when he gave into temptation so easily...

The idea of Karen painting fences just reiterated the need for enclosure within their secret world "They are trapped. That's why she paints them.They are trapped by the smiling empty faces and all this misinformed gossip"

I think cleverly, the author Matt Haig tapped into middle England suburbia - which I suppose appealed to me more, as I could imagine that world very well, and as I live only 20 miles from Manchester, I'll be on the look out for the Black Narcissus next time I go shopping on Deansgate !!

I've also been to Thirsk -it's an old fashioned market town which also has a very pretty race course...

There is a village in Yorkshire called Bishopsthorpe, which I guess the author used as inspiration - it looks rather pretty, but then as with all places you never really know what goes on behind closed doors.........

I liked The Radleys and gave it a four.
I hadn't read any vampire books, other than Twilight, before and I didn't know that blood was exchanged. I found the excerpts from The Abstainer's Handbook interesting to read.
There were some laugh out loud moments, as Sassenach said. I thought it was funny that garlic was truly a problem. I was surprised that they ate at all--Twilight's influence again.
I was also surprised that they could fly. People would see them and doesn't Eve's father see them too?
It was interesting to know that the police realized they existed and this relationship between vampires and police reminded me a bit of the relationship with people and aliens in Men in Black.
I loved Rowan and how he finally enjoyed being who he is.

The theme of extremes was what I got from it. That extremes are unhealting and people need to balance what is important. People can not always deny who they are and keep putting up appearances just so people will accept them.
The twist with Rowan was something else. How didn't Peter know? Was he blood minded too?
Poor Helen, I understood her at the end. I didn't like her much either. I didn't think she would be able to stand up to Will either. Too powerful and wicked he was.
The "Eve" incident was spiteful and vengeful. Wicked Will. It shows how immature "evil" really is.
I wonder if Rowan and Eve would have gotten together if Will had he not interfered. The plot twist made it so Rowan could save Eve from death.
Good read. Thanks, Sass.

[quote="sassenach"]
For me this is just a story about families, and the dynamics which seek to work beneath the surface - the vampirism gives it a genre within paranormal boundaries, but the theme of family conflict would have worked on any level - be it secrets of abuse, drink, drugs, or relationships.

The weakest link for me was Will - he was needed to inject the necessary evil into the plot, and was of course the catalyst which got the story up and running, but I felt he could have been better handled...he was certainly despicable, but was also rather weak for such an evil person.
/quote]

I agree on the story line. Will to me, without the vampirism, was like any addict but one that loathed himself for it. It was almost like he wanted to end his life but wanted someone else to do it for him like a suicidal coward. He provoked everyone and wanted to see which one he could push over the edge and make it happen. In this, he would have the ultimate revenge by turning his guilt onto another person.

Jayne mentioned that Peter must have known. That may be why he continually asked Helen if she still loved him. They were married, had two children, were working through this abstinence thing together and yet continually he would ask her if she loved him. It was a little pathetic after a while. But in the end, when we learn about what happened to Helen, then it all made a lot of sense. She had been passionately in love with Peter and then Will used his powers to have her do something she would forever feel guilt and shame over. I felt like this was one of the reasons that she changed her painting subjects from sensual subjects to still lifes. It sort of represented what she was to what she became. In his own way, Will was obsessively in love with her and had a power that he could unfairly use. Whether it was rooted in jealousy or sibling rivalry was beside the point. He could make happen what another man could only wish to happen. These are also traits of addictive personalities.