When The Ghost Road ended ambiguously, I was upset. But then I decided I loved the author's choice to represent all the soldiers, living and dead, by leaving that one character's survival unresolved.
Union Street didn't have a pressing discovery tantalizing the reader at the end. Instead she bookended the story with the old woman's point of view of the same scene we saw first with the little girl. And they both saw the same things - very poetic.
So now I just finished Blow Your House Down. And again Pat Barker has ramped up the expectations, created this tension. Jean's action and her doubts: OMG! And then Maggie's unease and her doubts about Bill... HER Bill! Her scared & sad point of view almost made me suspect Bill too, just because the whole situation was uncanny.
Pat Barker is amazing. I'm probably going to read everything she's written.