Still, though I can't say I LOVED it, all the right buttons were punched. When even Janie's school counselor turns out to be a dream killer, we learn that Iris is the only one who truly believes in her.įrom the breezy title, I was expecting a lot of humor from this book but it turned out to be a rather harrowing read. It's Iris and her girls against the world and perhaps this pitiful combination of abuse and neglect is just what they need to grow up strong and unafraid. she.drank a full bottle of vodka and fell into a disturbed, twitchy sleep.Īnd yet, there is a deep affection between Iris and Janie, and later, Janie's half-sister, Tiny. I honestly felt like slapping her myself on occasion.

Her poor choices have consequences as she ricochets from an abusive man right into the arms of a loser for whom she constantly uproots her family to follow all over the UK. There is no question that Iris loves her young daughter, Janie, but she has a funny way of showing it. I'd kick him in the balls when he hits her, but she told me the hits hurt more if there's someone watching. 'But yeh stop him, don't yeh? From hitting yer ma?' Here's a conversation children should never have to have: And Janie Ryan, born and bred for combat, is ready to win. Told in an arrestingly original-and cry-out-loud funny-voice, it launches itself headlong into the middle of one of life's great fights, between the pull of the past and the freedom of the future. It is also the story of an irresistible, irrepressible heroine, a dysfunctional family you can't help but adore, the absurdities of the eighties and the fierce bonds that tie people together no matter what. Tony Hogan tells the story of a Scottish childhood of sordid council flats and B&Bs, screeching women, feckless men, fags and booze and drugs, the dole queue and bread and marge sandwiches. In the hospital, her family eyed her suspiciously, so close she could smell whether they'd had booze or food for breakfast.

Her violet-eyed Grandma had predicted she'd be sly, while blowing Benson and Hedges smoke rings over her Ma's swollen belly.

When Janie Ryan is born, she's just the latest in a long line of Ryan women, Aberdeen fishwives to the marrow, always ready to fight.

Lowborn by Kerry Hudson