Customer Reviews
Much, much better... - By: bloodsimple, 22 Sep 2007 
I previously reviewed David Peace's first novel in this quartet, & found it wanting. This is a much more solid effort.
In the main, this improvement is the result of focusing on a clear & available plot - the miners' strike of 1984. This gives the book a trajectory, pace, & hook that was missing from the first book. Peace has also toned down the cod Yorkshirisms & made this a more readable book as a result.
Problems still remain. Once again, many of his characters are interchangeable (e.g. Neil Fontaine & the Mechanic), & there is no single character drawn with sufficient depth or power to hold the story together. His drawings of real-life individuals such as Arthur Scargill read like a cop-out to me, as if Peace was wary of offending the still-alive, or fearful of a law suit.
Overalll, though, the whole piece hangs together well, & is more convincing in evoking a mood & a time.
Scab! Scab! Scab! - By: Anthony P. Bohan, 01 Nov 2006 
I came to this book after reading Peace's brilliant "The Damned United" & found it another very powerful piece of writing. I am old enough to remember the miner's strike & the huge divisions it caused throughout the country. Peace has managed to convey this with the number of plots & sub plots that run through the book. Some of these do not quite work, however, what does come across & what Peace describes with great clarity is the anger & the sense of the inevitablity of the strike's conclusion. Anyone who feels nostalgic for the Thatcher years should read this book.
Diamond hard and incredibly powerful - By: , 09 Feb 2005 
Quite simply this is one of the most forceful & relentless slabs of prose I've ever encountered - & although I may not have succeeded in making it sound like it, that's a definite compliment. People may gripe about the echoes of Ellroy (which I personallly feel are less of a big deal than they're made out to be), but Ellroy never made me well with tears at the same time as his writing made me feel like I'd been punched in the throat. Astonishing, in a word.
disappointed - By: , 12 Jul 2004 Firstly, I hate to put a book down & give up so i persevered. Secondly, I wanted to know more about the miners strike, as a young child I had no recollection of it. But I'm afraid the multiple plot lines got pretty confusing & appeared never to be tied up, leaving the reader (myself) wondering what the point of such characters as Malcolm were. Characters such as Neil & the Mechanic were never reallly developed & should have been left out. The miners dialogue & the Jew & Terry's stories made GB84 interesting & insightful but he should have left it there. Perhaps my reading habits aren't mature or diverse enough to appreciate alll the separate complex plot lines, but a perfect example of a good book written in the style of multiple plot lines was Arundhati Roys 'The God of Smalll Things' which succeeded & flourished whereas 'GB84' is ruined by sticking to this formula. I wouldn't recommend anyone reading this because it is disjointed & alot of hard work, without a particularly great reward at the end. This book is lucky to get 3 stars.
David Peace 1 James Ellroy 0 - By: Adam Peter Maguire, 08 Jun 2004 I read David Peace's GB84 as it came out. I am currently reading James Ellroy's American Tabloid. Of the two Peaces' is by far the more compelling. GB84 is one of the angriest books that I've ever read whereas American tabloid comes across as just that, tabloid styled conspiracy gossip for the bloodthirsty masses, vaguely titillating & nothing else, basta. If you've watched the Sopranos, then you've seen it alll. On the other hand there is absolutely nothing titillating about the description of the two poor buggers beaten awake in their little tent & then left spat on & bleeding at the side of the road by the mechanic & his government sponsored goons (in GB84) only sorrow only the deepest regret. GB84 is an amazing read; the tabloid is at best a B movie in search of its Jimmy Cagney.
