I just finished A Spot of Bother, by Mark Haddon, and I enjoyed it. I should put a caveat on my enjoyment by pointing out that, although told with heart and wit, this is not a happy story. But then again, few of us live ideal lives, so this snapshot of a family, teetering on the brink of collapsing in on themselves, felt real to me.
Part of what I enjoyed about this and Haddon's previous novel (which I liked even more than this one, and recommend very highly) is it is unabashedly British. I am not exactly sure what "knackered" means, but in context it made sense to me, and added to the context of the story. Made the whole novel a little more gray, a little foggier. Brilliant!
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knack·ered –adjective British Slang. exhausted; very tired: He is really knackered after work.
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[Origin: 1885–90; knacker to tire (attenuation of earlier sense “to kill”; cf. knacker
Thanks for the help with my English. In the book, the reference I remember was to Jamie's pants; he is climbing over a fence, and is rather dirty, and I believe he is trying to decide whether to continue over the fence and get dirtier. He ultimately decides to go for it since his pants were "knackered" anyway. Maybe "worn out" would be a good way of looking at it?
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