When Frank drops dead abruptly at Heathrow, his estranged daughter Jem travels to his home in France to arrange his effects. She learns that Frank has a son she knew nothing about. With no other living relatives, she soon resolves to make contact with the son, throwing his family into chaos.
The Frank Business has just the kind of writing I enjoy, close observation of a small canvas, casting a wry eye over characters who are in conflict with themselves as much as the people around them. The author plays gleefully with our expectations too.
When we see Frank’s last night, he seems an amiable character. He is an artist, living alone in a farmhouse in Provence, listening to Radio 4 on his laptop as he paints a Christmas card for the neighbours who insist on sharing the day with him, a kindness he could do without. For Brits of a certain age and class, this is the dream life, and it seems natural to include Frank in that warm embrace. But as the novel progresses a rather more complicated picture emerges.
Similarly, Frank’s son is part of an outwardly successful and happy family, working in the media and the arts and enjoying a comfortable London life. Even when they bicker they are witty and stylish. Jem’s bombshell forces issues to the surface that might otherwise have been comfortably avoided.
The author has a lovely, arch voice. She deftly combines humour and some very dark and difficult episodes as the characters confront the past and their relationships. Then suddenly it all goes wrong. The ending is rushed, key events take place off camera, and those complex and contrary characters suddenly fall into an implausibly neat ending.
I realise there’s an injustice here. It’s the end that stays with us. If the middle portion of the book had been baggy but she’d pulled it back in the final chapters, all would be forgiven. But for me, she has raised some very interesting questions and then shied away from answering them.
There is so much that’s great about this book, I would still recommend it. For myself, I want to forget how it ended and remember the good times.
I received a copy of The Frank Business from the publisher via Netgalley.
View The Frank Business on Goodreads
Enjoyed this? For a book that shares this book’s strengths and has a pleasing structure, take a look at my review of Inside the Bone Box by Anthony Ferner
Kate Vane 
Interesting question, Kate. Hope you manage to forget the ending — I read it a few weeks ago and already have!
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Of course, now I’ve made a fuss about it, I probably never will…
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Interesting – I always think that endings matter more than they are given credit for, mostly because it’s the part you’ve just read before you go to review! A great ending can turn a mediocre book into one you remember as being good. I hate those ‘everything tied up too neatly’ endings, too. I’d rather leave a few ends hanging.
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Yes. I know literary fiction isn’t about plot as much as, say, crime fiction, but a good ending should make you reflect on the whole book and its themes.
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I”m one for messy-bur-believable endings too. But it feels to me as though many crime readers can be very particular about their reasons for reading and, often, they’re yearning for that satin-bow-tied conclusion: I wonder how many crime writers feel pulled towards a tidier conclusion to satisfy those readers? But I do know exactly what you mean.
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I think at the grittier end of crime fiction it’s more open – obviously you want to know whodunnit and why, but good doesn’t always win out (or you’re not even sure who is good!).
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That rings true for me. One example I thought of, afterwards, though, and not particularly gritty, was the ending of one of Tana French’s novels (won’t say which, to avoid spoilers). Good didn’t win out and many readers complained. Grey makes for much more interesting storytelling than black-and-white, doesn’t it?
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It’s what I always aim for!
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