The English Harem [Paperback]

Anthony McCarten (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback
• ISBN-10: 1869414640
• ISBN-13: 978-1869414641
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Bad, bad book, July 19, 2006

By 

Charles Pooter "C.P." (Ireland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The English Harem (Paperback)

The English Harem started out well - Tracy seeing Literary figures in her supermarket customers was delightful, but that proved to be the only highlight of this disaster. I am always astounded by writers who manage to personify the opposite gender well, making their characters completely believable, but this author is hopeless. One wonders if he knows any women at all. Remember, he is supposed to be writing about Western women agreeing to be part of a harem (where the second wife is taking on the man who accidentally killed the love of her life!!) -really, what is their motivation to do this? The book is a long, drawn-out male fantasy, with glaring inaccuracies about Islam as well. It is a bad straight-to-video movie of a book; the author needs to get out more, meet some real people and some real muslims.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Slightly ridiculous in places, December 5, 2005

By 

Ms. T. Pattni "Toral" (London) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: English Harem (Paperback)

I really can't say I enjoyed this book much, and finished it more in the name of morbid fascination than general interest. Its a promising subject matter that could have been interesting, but instead was dealt with in a slightly ridiculous and melodramatic way which left no room for character development or further exploration of the key ideas. It would have been nice if the writer had gone deeper into Sam and his East-West conflict, or the real reasons behind Tracy's obsession with exoticism. Yes, there were points where I wanted to know what would happen next but I was mainly counting the pages to the end, where things turn out to sadly resemble a made-for-video matinee film.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A multicultural adventure, March 10, 2005

By 

Ralph Blumenau (London United Kingdom) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: English Harem (Paperback)

A young London working class girl becomes one of three wives of a middle aged Persian. Superb characterizations; funny; touching; a novel about goodness (in a totally unmawkish way) in the midst of lack of understanding and (for a few pages) of unbearable wickedness; full of unexpected developments until the very last page.