Customer Reviews

Candlemoth

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4 star:		(1)
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I recently read "A Quiet Belief In Angels" and became interested in RJ Ellory's style of writing. That prompted me to purchase Candlemoth and I'm glad that I bought this book. As Ellory's first published book, the story is tight, holds together well and, with the subject being someone on Death Row, raises many interesting questions regarding the treatment of prisoners awaiting execution.

His insights into the thought processes and personality traits of the main character, Daniel, really get your emotions rising and falling as Daniel remembers events leading up to his incarceration and then as Daniel faces his final few days.

This is more of a why-did-it than a who-done-it but your emotions get tugged in all directions along the way. RJ Ellory also manages to get you thinking seriously about what motivates people and why people make certain life choices.

A great first book and a great read.

'Four times I've been betrayed - twice by women, once by a better friend than any man might wish for, and lastly by a nation..'


36 year old Daniel Ford, a convicted murderer is on death row for the murder of his best friend Nathan. With thirty six days before he faces the electric chair piece by piece he relates his lifestory to the Prison Chaplin Father Rousseau. His story starts in rural North Carolina when in 1952, at six years old he meets Nathan and the two boys (one born white the other black) become best friends, their friendship lasting until Nathan's brutal murder 20 years later.

I really loved this. It was enthralling, with well drawn characters and covered the history of the period, the racism, political corruption and deaths of Martin Luther King and Kennedy well in an informative way without being boring.

Roger Jon Ellory made his big breakthrough in 2007 with A Quiet Belief in Angels which has gone on to become one of the best-selling books in the nation. There's a lot more to this Brummie lad than just that one novel though, and most people going through his back-catalogue as a response to his blockbuster success are finding that his outstanding writing skills are evident here in his debut, which again spans most of the lifetime of a single man in the south-eastern USA through the 1950s, 1960s and beyond. It is altogether different in its style, however, and in the emotions it engenders in its readers.

Most stories have a beginning, a middle, and an end. This one is a curiosity because in effect the reader knows the end before opening the first page; 36-year-old Daniel Ford is on death row in a South Carolina prison, having been tried and found guilty of the murder of his best friend some twelve years earlier. For most of the tale, then, the key questions are how, where, and above all why did he kill Nathan Verney? A singular oddity for me was that the story is told from a first-person perspective, making me constantly wonder how a dead man could be recounting the events of his life between 1952 - when at 6 years old he met Nathan - and 1982, with just a few hours to go before going to the electric chair. It turns out that although the end appears to be almost a foregone conclusion, the telling of that end is vivid, powerful and consummately makes up for the relatively genteel nature of most that had gone before, prior to Daniel's arrest around Christmas of 1969. Ellory succeeds in making you feel what it must be like to be weeks, days and finally just hours away from death.

While some of the political backdrops are too long drawn out in detail, there is no question that politics and racial prejudice lie right at the heart of the tale. Most relevant of all is the Vietnam conflict, and how Daniel and Nathan face up to the probability of being drafted into a war they both have no desire to be involved in. The other key issue is that Nathan is black, and in a part of the country with strong associations with the Ku Klux Klan, he faces harmful consequences when he simply goes out to a bar with his white friend, and takes even higher risks by having a white girlfriend - especially one with a father reputed to be a Klan king-pin. Yet another political topic central to all that goes on is the assassination of Senator Robert Kennedy, and when all is said and done at the conclusion, it becomes apparent that all of the main characters, including Daniel's girlfriends, and most if not all of the political narrative are absolutely relevant to the story as a whole, even if some of the people and background events seem to have no bearing at the time of their mention.

The prose will be regarded as merely average by anyone who has read Ellory's most recent work, but the imagery of both the tranquillity of Greenleaf South Carolina, and the intimidating inmates and warders on death row make for gripping reading. There are, throughout this tale, emotive portrayals of love, lust, envy, betrayal, guilt, fear, joy, anger and utter hopelessness. For those familiar with Ellory's other novels this one does take a while before it really takes hold, and patience might be needed at times, but the pay-off is absolute and uncompromising, with an ending that few others can hope to match. Ultimately an intense, moving and memorable story.

It's 1982 and Daniel Ford is thirty-six years old. Twelve years ago, Daniel was convicted of the murder of his best friend, Nathan Verney. In thirty-six days, he will walk to the electric chair and pay with his life.

`I ask myself what life is, what does it mean? Perhaps nothing more than a story, and each story different and rare and pronounced with its own voice.'

Father John Rousseau has been assigned to talk with Daniel during this last period of his life, and it is their conversations that lead us through Daniel's life. Daniel's friendship with Nathan started when they were aged six, and had its own difficulties in the American south of the 1950s: Nathan was coloured. The narrative takes us through the tumultuous events of the 1960s and 1970s in America: the backdrop of racial tensions; civil rights marches; assassinations and conspiracy theories; and the shadow of the Vietnam War shape the world in which Daniel and Nathan grew to adulthood.

So, what happened for Nathan to be killed and Daniel to be convicted of his murder? We learn Daniel's story as he tells it to Father Rousseau - the history is familiar, and the personal events unfold against that backdrop. If Nathan's murder defines the beginning of the end of Daniel's life, then it is necessary to go back to the beginning to understand how and why Nathan was murdered. We readers do not have the answers until the end of the novel.

'Best as I can recall it all started with a baked ham.'

This is the third of Mr Ellory's novels that I've read (although it was the first one published), and I enjoyed it. Daniel is a totally believable character, as are many of the secondary characters in the novel. At times I felt the story was in danger of being overwhelmed by the times in which it was set but by then I was totally engrossed in Daniel's story. And the ending? Read it for yourself and see what you think.

`Four times I've been betrayed - twice by women, once by a better friend than any man may wish for, and lastly by a nation. And perhaps, truth be known, I betrayed myself.'

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

I first read a Quite belief in angels as i was caught by the title and the synopsis, i was hooked by the second page! His writing is out of this world has far as i am concered. Hoping not to be dissapointed i started City of lies and was once again in awe of him and his storytelling could not put it down, so in order to see how it all started i read his first book Candlemoth amazing prose how he talks about how the moth becomes the candlemoth just brillant you become glued to his books as if you know each and every character like you know one of your family i want more books mr ellory if you get to read this, more, more, more.

RJ Ellory's Candlemoth is the story of Daniel Ford, his life, his growth, and his path to death row. The narrative is thick with description and history, but all told so convincingly through Daniel's voice that the prose does not feel plodding. Instead, it's dripping with personality and character. Reading this book, you will sink your teeth into an immersive experience that will pull you along through a man's reflection on his life and the world that beat that life into its ultimate shape.

I read this book but in Dutch "Stervensuur".I realy liked it.You have to keep reading to find out what happend and that makes it so interesting...I didnt want to put the book down...Great story From the beginning to the end.

After AQBA and City of Lies, I picked up Candlemoth. I am 1/3 (now finished)of the way through and bored. I liked the other two books a lot.
But here Ellory's writing has not yet caught the cadence that he later achieves. He loves descriptions, never satisfied with ten words when 30 will do. In the later books, he does that with a poetic rhythm that captivates me, but here it is just interminable adjectives. So, I read the previous 4 reviews, all of which liked this book as well, and I kept trying to get into it. The book never took off for me, but I am still planning to read Anniversary Man.