This is definitely a moral wrapped in a gripping novel, but it’s a point well taken. It’s set in England during the Margaret Thatcher years. The protagonist, Alice, is a young woman who believes that the country is hopelessly corrupt, and that the only answer is armed struggle leading to revolution. She has a lot of unexamined faith in Marx, Lenin and the IRA.

Alice is incredibly sensitive and perceptive when it comes to people, and she’s an amazing and resourceful organizer. Most of the novel is dedicated to her work reclaiming an abandoned house, ably handling the bureaucracy involved (even though she mostly despises the people she deals with), deftly manipulating the police, and bringing the occupants into a cohesive group – even the ones who are there mainly because it’s cheap housing.

But they are there for a reason, to smash the state, and so the question is – now what? There are forays to try to connect with other revolutionary movements in other countries, but they are not perceived as serious. So they try to get serious. But they operate with the vague belief that random violence and publicity are enough to bring down this system they hate. And that’s when they self-destruct, taking a bunch of other people with them.