Rating: 
Summary: The final chapter of Regeneration Trilogy
Review: THE GHOST ROAD is the final volume of Pat Barker's Regeneration trilogy, and the winner of the 1995 Booker Prize. Throughout the trilogy Barker performs a phenomenal job of detailing the psychological consequences of trench warfare during the Great War. Set in London and France, THE GHOST ROAD focuses on the principle characters of Billy Prior and the renowned Dr. Rivers and their personal relationships with each other and the First World War. The reader is provided a glimpse into the terrible conditions of trench fighting, and how the medical establishment viewed shell-shock as a medical diagnosis and how it was treated. Through the poetry of Owen, Sassoon, etc, the world can begin to understand the personal horrors they have witnessed of a war that many did not understand. Based loosely on historical events and characters, Barker has created a perspective of modern warfare that does not contain the quintessential happy ending.I believe each volume of the Regeneration Trilogy should be read in chronological order (REGENERATION, THE EYE IN THE DOOR, AND THE GHOST ROAD) to fully appreciate the merits of each volume. Although the plot is re-summarized at the beginning of each book, the main characters are continually being developed throughout. I just finished reading GHOST ROAD, and I have to admit that it's not my favorite of the three. I don't understand how this volume was awarded the Booker Prize when I believe REGENERATION is the strongest of the bunch. I also enjoyed THE EYE IN THE DOOR because of the exploration of societal issues during The First War, especially scape-goating of homosexuals and pacifists. Overall, this trilogy is a wonderful glimpse into the atmosphere of Britain during the First World War.
Rating: 
Summary: Unhappy Viewers
Review: The ghost road is written by a woman who thinks she knows the details of a man's life in WW1. This can be added to the long list of [bad] books that have won the booker prize. First of all, it is written in size 30 font or something to make it look like its a real novel. All 3 novels of this "trilogy" could be put together to make one good book. It could be called "The regeneration of the eye in the ghost road" (which is all 3 trilogy novels put together.... The Eye in the Door.... Regeneration.... and The Ghost Road) It is basically about a doctor(William Rivers) who cares for his patient(Billy Prior). Billy blacked out during the war, so was naturally sent to the psychologist, where he "recovered". His time spent with the dr. didnt really do anything since after he left to rejoin his men in the frontline, he showed signs that werent right....(homo-feelings towards fellow soldiers) How to kill a fictional character? Do what any other "great" novel does, kill the protagonist and leave a blank and unsatisfied ending. Why not do it to this book? It was done in Hamlet. Overall, I didnt enjoy this book mainly because pat barker of all people wouldnt know about WW1 anymore than high school history students, and above all, a woman talking about male sexuality like she knows. And the grand daddy of them all...... air raids in London. LOL
Rating: 
Summary: A wonderful but shattering culmination to the trilogy
Review: This book shouldn't be read without its two predecessor volumes, which introduce and develop the two central characters, one based on fact (Rivers), one totally fictional (Prior). The sense of impending doom grows inexorably as the plot unfolds, but the ending nevertheless has power to shock.
Rating:
Summary: Don't let your prejudice cloud your judgement
Review: This is good book contrasting two societies and their relationship to war. An officer, recovered from shell shock returns to the front while the psychiatrist who treated him reminisces about an anthropological expedition to Melanesia before the war. Contrary to some of the other reviewers of this book I didn't find that it dwelt on the horrors of war or on homosexuality. There are a few short sections dealing with battle and one gory episode. A couple of vitriolic reviews have dwelt on the homosexuality in the book. There are three or four homosexual encounters in the book and if it is likely to upset you the way its upset these reviewers perhaps you shouldn't read it. However these episodes are a minor part of the book and it shouldn't discourage anyone without excessive hang-ups from reading it. Our "Top 50" reviewer was clearly skimming the book by the end looking for something else to criticise and he has totally reversed the context and attitudes of the characters to the quotation he gives. His contention that the warring nations in World War I were well led also seems to be a misreading of the histories he quotes. You don't have to be of the left to deplore the losses inflicted by Haig on his own side. The Ghost Road tells an old story in a new and interesting way and I recommend it anyone interested in good literature.
Rating:
Summary: Don't let your prejudice cloud your judgement
Review: This is good book contrasting two societies and their relationship to war. An officer, recovered from shell shock returns to the front while the psychiatrist who treated him reminisces about an anthropological expedition to Melanesia before the war. Contrary to some of the other reviewers of this book I didn't find that it dwelt on the horrors of war or on homosexuality. There are a few short sections dealing with battle and one gory episode. A couple of vitriolic reviews have dwelt on the homosexuality in the book. There are three or four homosexual encounters in the book and if it is likely to upset you the way its upset these reviewers perhaps you shouldn't read it. However these episodes are a minor part of the book and it shouldn't discourage anyone without excessive hang-ups from reading it. Our "Top 50" reviewer was clearly skimming the book by the end looking for something else to criticise and he has totally reversed the context and attitudes of the characters to the quotation he gives. His contention that the warring nations in World War I were well led also seems to be a misreading of the histories he quotes. You don't have to be of the left to deplore the losses inflicted by Haig on his own side. The Ghost Road tells an old story in a new and interesting way and I recommend it anyone interested in good literature.
Rating:
Summary: The End
Review: This was a people perishing from the absence of war. "The Ghost Road" ends the 3-book cycle written by Pat Barker of her study of World War I, the men who were part of history in the form of Dr. Rivers and Siegfried Sassoon, and some fictional like William Prior. This also marks the book that added The Booker Prize to her list of achievements. This work differs from the first 2 as a good portion consists of the flashbacks of Dr. Rivers. These are experienced while he is suffering from Influenza, and the fever induced memories the illness recalls. No one comment can summarize his experiences as an Anthropologist living among a tribe that he studied, but the one I mention above does justice, if incomplete. This is an anti war trilogy of books, so to find one of the main players reliving his past while tortured by his present, witnessing his society's destruction by war, as another was destroyed from the lack of it, is interesting counterpoint to say the least. Like the second volume, Billy Prior lays a prominent role in this final installment as well. He remains an interesting character, but his obsessions, which at time are in conflict, became a bit tiresome. His personal life that once offered a continually more complex and disturbed man began to be repetitive. Ms. Barker brings her work to a close as late as the 3rd of November in Prior's journal, and implies some of what is read is even later. By resolving some lives, and leaving others to continue to deal with the madness they will never escape, and doing this in the last week of the war, is acutely cruel. It is also appropriate as when the fighting ended on the 11th day of the 11th month at 11 in the morning, the weapons may have stopped, but the damage had only begun. The War did not end for those who survived, and a second war was to appear in the lifetime of many of those we met. And perhaps that was one of the points she wished to make, nothing was accomplished, millions died, countless numbers who lived were permanently damaged. And the final Treaty Of Versailles ensured it would all happen once again. Dr. Rivers helped men only to send them back to the cause of their terror. Other soldiers returned to the front to meet what fate had to offer. But futility was the result, for what did Dr. Rivers have to show that he was productive, that he as a Doctor had healed? And how did the patients that were in his charge benefit from his care and the decisions that followed from it. A tremendous piece of writing.
Rating:
Summary: Boring, over-the-top carnality, cliched, gross book.
Review: What the heck does Pat Barker know about World War One? Only what she's read in her 'Eye Witness Picture Guide To The Great War.' She knows nothing. Really nothing. She talks about 'air raids' in London!!!! This is the FIRST World War. The novel also relies on a device in which every single gross human smell, bodily movement, and act is described in gory, septic detail. The novel/writer is obssesed with semen; the bodily fluid is one of the main characters. Barker probably thinks this gives the story 'gritty credibility'. The cliches are unbearable: she's writing from a man's point of view and thinks that she's the first one to discover the male sex-drive. The worst crud is when one iof the characters has these flashbacks to when he lived in an 'African Village'. I live in Africa, Barker obviously doesn't. This is my favourite cliche from Ghost road( I don't have the book with me but it goes something like this) 'The Natives refused to have their photographs taken because they believed it would rob them of their souls.' HOW ORIGINAL. Didn't this win the Booker or something? What the heck is the Booker Prize anyway? I've heard the prize described as 'the Emporer's New Clothes of literature.'
Rating:
Summary: A mesmerizing trip into the dark, gritty soul of humanity
Review: Whilst it took me a while to get into, it was well worth the perseverence. Barker goes deep into the human psyche and into the grim reality of war and ritual violence. The very complex characters of Prior and Rivers are so excellantly developed you dont want it to end as it races towards its conclusion. More satisfying than "The eye in the door". A classic!.
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