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Title: The Woman Who Walked Into Doors
Review: Roddy Doyle has long excelled at tales of the Irish working (or not-working) class. Here he takes a somewhat different approach, telling his story from the perspective of Paula Spencer, an alcoholic, battered wife and mother entering early middle age. I can't speak from experience -- I'm all man, baby -- but I think Doyle pulls off Paula's voice convincingly. He doesn't beat the reader over the head with pathos, trying to force us to pity Paula. Paula is matter-of-fact about her life: the good times, the bad times, the triumphs and the tragedies. "I want to tell the truth," she says. "Like it happened. Plain and simple." She's not emotionless. It's just the way she lives, it's just the way things are. And that tone makes her story all the more affecting. "The Woman Who Walked Into Doors" is a quick and easy read, but Doyle packs a lot of power into his deceptively simple prose, and Paula Spencer stays with the reader well beyond the final page.
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