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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.914
EAN num: 9780312420192
ISBN number: 0312420196
Label: Picador
Manufacturer: Picador
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 224
Printing Date: February 09, 2002
Publishing house: Picador
Sale Popularity Level: 1096476
Studio: Picador
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Out walking with his wife, Lauren, beside the river Tyne, Tom Seymour instinctively risks his life to save a young man who they happen to notice just before he jumps into the icy current. Tom's spontaneous act saves the life of someone whose past, as well as his future, he feels a sense of responsibility towards. Recently released from prison, and living under an assumed name, Danny Miller was tried for murder as a ten-year-old on the basis of Tom's testimony, and assessment of him as a psychologist and an expert witness. When Danny asks Tom to help him sort out his life—beginning with his past—Tom is drawn into a lonely, soul-searching reinvestigation of the child murderer's case.
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Rated by buyers -
I have loved this engrossing novel ever since reading the book one year ago (hurrah for Pat Barker). The audiobook format offers new possibilities of enjoying it when hands are busy but brains are not. And, of course James Wilby's voice adds a lot of pleasure. I was going to give it 5 stars, but the only thing spoiling the picture is the audiocassette format - a CD would have been easier to use.
Rated by buyers -
The only other Pat Barker novels I've read were those of the Regeneration trilogy, and it's easy to recognize her style in "Border Crossing", once again the reader is taken into the intimate relationship between a psychologist and his patient. This one does not have the same scope as the trilogy, really just a novella or extra long short story with only 216 pages, a page turning psychological thriller that's easy to read in a night..
One day while walking by a river Tom witnesses an accident and rescues a man from drowning. Coincidentally this man turns out to be Danny, a child murderer now released who once was evaluated by Tom to judge if he was fit to stand trial in an adult court. Tom decides to begin therapy sessions with Danny to help him understand his past, and more questions are raised than answered. Readers that like nice clear cut endings might be disappointed with this, what is good and what is evil are very ambiguous in this story; and certainly will give pause for thought about child criminals, especially children who kill.
I gave this a 4 star rating because of the plot line involving his wife - while interesting this was somewhat disconnected from the story. The ending has been left wide open for a sequel and I wouldn't mind hearing what becomes of Danny Miller.
Rated by buyers 
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I will admit that I listened to this Audio Book on drive to and from Las Angeles to Los Vegas. I thought it a good chance to be introduced to Pat Barker who seems to get such rave reviews. This is basically a two person character study in the guise of a psychological thriller that is not all that thrilling. I found the store interesting enough and the writing crisp, but the
secondary plot of Tom Seymour and his wife seems lost as she walks out of his life just when he is consumed with this former child patient who returns to extract his revenge. Or does he? I will give this a marginal thumbs up because the two main characters are well written and vivid, with Danny Miller the tormented child murderer an excellent character. But in the end I did not find this very satisfying to listen to and doubt I would have finished it if I had picked it up as a book.
Rated by buyers 
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When child psychologist Tom Seymour pulls a would-be suicide from a river, he recognises the young man as Danny Miller, the child whom Tom's assessment had helped imprison for the brutal murder of an old woman thirteen years ago. Now out of prison and supposedly starting a new life, Danny has hunted Tom down in the hope that he might be able to help him understand the killing. With his own life troubled and his marriage collapsing, Tom succumbs to the temptation to travel into Danny's past.
The problem is that what he finds there is not particularly riveting, and certainly not unusual enough to account for an act which society regards with horror as completely beyond the boundaries of "normality". Unlike, say, Peter Shaffer's "Equus", when Danny finally remembers the murder there is little depth, no sense of climax, no sense of a mystery unravelled, not even much horror. The novel sets up the idea of a journey into the mind of an outcast, the child who kills, but never lives up to what it promises.
The second problem is the characterisation. Danny Miller is a pale reworking of Billy Prior, Barker's brilliant creation in "Regeneration", complete with Prior's unpleasant father, manipulative charm and "wintry smile", but nowhere near as interesting (especially once you recognise him as Prior). Tom isn't even a shadow of "Regeneration"'s Dr Rivers, and there is even less substance to the supporting cast, his wife, his colleagues, and the people whose lives Danny has passed through. Although there are hints that there will be trouble between Tom and Danny, since Danny seems to blame Tom for his imprisonment and is renowned for getting people who deal with him to "cross the invisible line", the relationship barely develops, again being a lack-lustre echo of the intense but still professional relationship between Rivers and Prior.
Barker is capable of extraordinary writing, as evidenced in her superb "Regeneration" trilogy, a remarkable exploration of people who kill and what it does to their psyches. It's a pity that she seems to have been rewriting it ever since.
Rated by buyers 
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Pat Barker has won many awards for her fiction & here it's easy to see why. It's the story of a psychiatrist who accidentally meets a young man he once evaluated...evaluated to say whether he could stand trial. The patient has grown up and wants to talk about his childhood. Meanwhile, the therapist's personal life is falling to pieces. American bestsellers in the genre of your choice are fun reads. Reading a book by an excellent storyteller and writer like Barker points up just how flimsy, vapid, and bland many of those NYT bestsellers are. She has an amazing facillity with language and story construction. Her World War 2 "Regeneration" trilogy won all the awards and got press (mostly in Britain) but try this page turner or "Blow Your House Down." I had to read the latter in one sitting!
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