Customer Reviews

The House of Special Purpose

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The last days of the Tsar and what happened in "the house of special purpose" in Ekaterinburg are something every schoolboy ought to know. So there should be few surprises here. But Boyne is a clever storyteller. This time he has the narrator giving two accounts of his life - one that runs forwards and the other backwards in time until they connect at the book's dramatic dénouement. A little long winded to start, the book picks up pace and by the end is hard to put down as the reader races through to confirm the outcome he has been hinting at all along. There is just enough history to set the scene for a rather "light" but nonetheless interesting account of the early days of the Russian Revolution. This is really a romantic novel so the characters and events are somewhat thinly sketched and are there to play the parts Boyne has cast for them. This all makes for a mechanical structure to the book, but as with The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, Boyne helps his reader see something new in his retelling of another 20th century tragedy. It's fictional of course so readers shouldn't stress over the odd slip or improbability as it is also a good read.