Andorra [Hardcover]

Peter Cameron (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1997

Leaving the United States after a personal tragedy, a man finds himself in the small country of Andorra, which is bizarrely influenced by his imagination and begins to reflect his past. By the author of The Weekend. Tour.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Andorra, the tiny storybook nation snug in the Pyrenees between France and Spain is the setting for Peter Cameron's third book, a lyrical tale that begins as a charming story of manners and romantic relations in the tiny township of La Plata, but develops into a darker (though still comic) story of deception and psychological intrigue. The author's earlier invocations of Proust and Austen give way to impulses akin to Kafka or Camus. When should you stop trusting your narrator's memories and figure out what is really going on in this place? All is not what it seems, as the dark past of several characters returns to dim the brightness of the present surroundings. The hyper-reality of the charming mountain town Cameron creates is the ideal setting for this engaging tale, told in perfect measure, tightly stitched, with no extra bits hanging loosely.

From Publishers Weekly

Concealing a dark fable about the transcendent power of the imagination within a slyly ironic tale about a man of refinement and vague intention traveling to a tiny European nation, Cameron's third novel (after The Weekend) displays his gift for language and narrative hijinks in fullest flower. The narrator, Alexander Fox, "compelled by circumstances to begin my life again in some new place," arrives by train in La Plata, the sun-splashed, oddly desolate, Monte Carlo-like capital of Andorra. He quickly becomes the cynosure of two contrasting La Plata families: that of neurotic Australian Ricky Dent, always accompanied by her large dog, Dino, who falls in love with Fox?as does her husband, a troubled bisexual composer also named Ricky Dent; and that of kayaking La Plata doyenne Sophonsobia Quay, whose uncle Roderick leases his home to Fox, and who seeks to marry Fox off to her waifish daughter, Jean. We gradually learn that Fox, a former bookseller and architect, is fleeing a tragedy involving the death of his American wife and daughter. When he is implicated in a series of murders in Andorra and his passport is confiscated by the police, he is forced to flee the country. Fox, whose evasive speech and manners begin to follow a foxy pattern of self-delusion and caprice, is an extremely unreliable narrator. His Andorra, unlike the actual nation, is on the ocean. La Plata, a paradisial yet haunted landscape of dopplegangers and repetitions, increasingly appears to be little more than a projection of his own inner life. There's a delicate poignancy to this novel and to Cameron's surprising conclusion, as the glittering world of Andorra, which proves a consolation for the terrible reality of Fox's true circumstances, dissolves like a fantastic sandcastle in the face of real life.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 263 pages
• Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux (T); 1st edition (January 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374105057
• ISBN-13: 978-0374105051
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,543,712 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars sublime, January 1, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Andorra (Paperback)

This is a stunning book, and one I don't really recognize in most of the editorial or customer reviews posted here. By purposefully misnaming the book Andorra, the author seems to be telling us that the plot details are secondary...instead the focus is on is the attempts of the main character to maintain strict control over his new life, measuring everything and everyone around him. We slowly come to understand why he has done this, as we see the simplest of encounters cause his life to spin out of control. It's a testament to Cameron's writing that this doesn't quickly get tiring; instead the result is striking, with wonderful insights coming from each encounter. The writing is nimble and spare. A wonderful book...I found myself wanting to reread it as soon as I had finished it.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars a little masterpiece., April 18, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Andorra (Hardcover)

Andorra is the first book of Peter Cameron's that I have read. It was like Camus and Kafka meet Agatha Christie. In Camus' The Stranger the narrator is sensuous (Noone communicates heat or the feeling of sand on the skin like Camus) yet profoundly insensitive to emotions, "Mother died today, or was it yesterday...". The narrator of Andorra, Alex Fox, is similarly sensuous and emotionally off. The descriptions of this Andorra through the senses are eloquent word paintings. Such images are lasting, but Alex seems to be misreading his characters all along, a little like the narrator, butler in The Remains of the Day.

Once the police take Alex's passport with very little explanation, one feels like the bureaucratic labrynth of The Trial is about to descend. And it does.

At the end, I wanted to reread the book to pick up all those clues I'd missed while I was enjoying the experience.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Andorra: a dreamy mountain paradise, September 18, 2003

By 

Peggy Vincent "author and reader" (Oakland, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Andorra (Paperback)

Alexander Fox, seeking escape from personal tragedy, settles into the sunny, dreamy mountain paradise of Andorra. But in this haunting novel, something strangely mysterious, almost sinister, lurks in what otherwise appears to be heaven on earth. This book crosses from one genre to another, then back again, and it's difficult to pin down. Is it a mystery? Perhaps, but sometimes it feels like a comedy of manners. Is it a meditation on grief? Maybe, but then it seems to segue into a romance.
Keep reading; it's worth it.