| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Poignant but Minor,
By
This review is from: Another World (Hardcover)
As a big fan of Pat Barker's Regeneration trilogy, I couldn't wait to finally sit down and read her latest. I was disappointed. Granted, this is a very different sort of book from the previous three - set in contemporary time, dealing with more contemporary (though certainly universal) issues. It just didn't resonate with me. The central story -- one man dealing with his grandfather's illness and the ghosts that haunt his grandfather's past -- is quite compelling,and their final scenes together are very poignant. But what do we make of the history of the Fanshawe family ... and the rather alarming painting that is discovered while the current residents of the Fanshawe house are stripping paint in the living room? It seems the Fanshawe's are supposed to parallel the lives of the novel's central protagonists. But then the issue is dropped and doesn't pop up again until the novel's final page.Barker is a master of nuance and of getting into the heads of her characters and making them real to her readers. On this level, she does not disappoint. But the book as a whole is a rather minor affair and doesn't pack much of an impact. Certainly not bad, but not great either. I look forward to her next...
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Not Pat Barker's best book - but still well worth reading.,
By Maureen "Unitarian Universalist Minister, Lif... (Hendersonville, New Caledonia) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Another World: A Novel (Paperback)
Violence crosses time and space to trouble the lives of both a centenarian and his pre-teen great grandson. The focus of the story is the dying of Geordie, who fought in the First War and now, having lived long beyond his time, is slowly dying. Other generations and other days are woven through the novel, reminding the reader of the common thread of humanity that runs through all time. I particularly commend Barker for her description of Geordie's dying and moments of actual death . . . she has obviously been there with more than one dying person. The portrayal was both respectful and, from my experience, accurate. I'm working my way through Barker's entire opus, and this is a worthwhile contribution to her fine reputation.
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A vivid and powerful depiction of the tyranny of memory.,
By
This review is from: Another World (Hardcover)
Barker might have entitled this novel Still Another World, so many overlapping worlds does she present here. On the surface it is the story of Nick and the complex life he now shares with his second wife and new son, his ex-wife and daughter, and his strange stepson. It is the story, too, of the Fanshawe family, a much earlier, and also troubled, family that once inhabited the house Nick is now restoring. But it is especially the story of Geordie, Nick's 101-year-old grandfather and the worlds he has known, including the world of war. Although Nick learned as a child that "You had to be two people, one in each world [of family and of school]," he has always believed that his grandfather "never changed; belonged to only one world." Now that Geordie is dying, however, Nick learns of Geordie's other worlds: his family life, his difficulties after World War I, his marriage, his war nightmares, the haunting death of his brother in battle, and his mother's comment that the wrong son died. And we see the tyranny of memory as Geordie relives his brother Harry's dying moments. Geordie himself says, "I know that what I remember seeing is false. It can't have been like that, and so the one thing I need to remember clearly, I can't ....It's as clear as this hand...only it's wrong." These vividly depicted battles, real and symbolic, all raise questions of responsibility and blame as each character assesses the accuracy of his own memory. Even the supernatural is evoked, peripherally, as characters consider whether they have really seen what they think they have seen. As Nick gains knowledge through his time spent with Geordie, he recalls their visit to the "ageless graves" of Thiepval, which keep perpetually alive the traumas of a terrible war, and he recognizes the contrast to the graves of the tiny churchyard in which Geordie will lie, with names hidden by moss, old mourners dead and forgotten, and gently decaying stones. And he and the reader recognize that "there's wisdom too in this." Barker's tightly constructed plots and themes, her vividly drawn characters, her evocation of atmosphere, her deft use of settings to enhance the drama, and her ability to communicate new visions, all testify to the brilliance of this novel, one which may, itself, escape the erosions of time and its "obliterating grass."
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
See all 44 books citing this book
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product).
|
