Friday, June 21, 2002
Title: Bigot Hall
Author: Steve Aylett
Publisher: Indigo
Bigot Hall is a big house built on the outskirts of a small village, designed and built by the head of the strange family that live there. Hints are made that there is more to the house than a design, which hasn't been approved - built on land that was bought with forged money and with some kind of purpose. Part of the house is given over to a foundry run by nuns, who are referred to but never encountered. The rest of the house is taken up by the one family and a couple of lodgers. With this the book follows the son of the man who built the house, never named but mainly referred to as "laughing boy". Each chapter being his experiences/encounters with the various members of his family or things in general which have shaped him.
The family ranges from his Uncle Snapper who is homicidally incompetent or Nanny Jack who gets buried on a regular basis but keeps coming back and then there is his incestuous relationship with his sister Adrienne. In terms of events we get accounts of the time he ran away to the circus only to find it a horrifying experience or when the neighbours came round for a visit unannounced and wouldn't take the hint that they weren't welcome. Secrets and spectres stalk the rest of the book, punctuated by Aylett's regular witticisms that keep the book rolling along in an amusing fashion.
Bigot Hall on the whole is less out there than the likes of Aylett's Beerlight books or the Inflatable Volunteer, but definitely displays his style from beginning to end.
RVWR: PTR
June 2002
