“I had been making the rounds of the Sacrifice Poles the day we heard my brother had escaped. I already knew something was going to happen; the Factory told me.” 'The Wasp Factory' takes the reader on a slow and horrifying journey through the mind of a child psychopath. Frank is just sixteen years old, but has already killed his younger brother Paul, his friend Blyth, and his little cousin Esmerelda. We're told this from the outset of the novel, but we don't know how or why he killed them - this suspense is what will pull you into the book. In fact, at times 'The Wasp Factory' does just feel like a long series of hooks and reveals, in an attempt to pull us deeper and deeper into the mystery. Frank constantly alludes to names and events, 'the Factory' or 'the reason why my brother went mad', but doesn't expand on them until later in the book. It's a very basic literary technique, and can occasionally feel like an easy p