Customer Reviews

The Full Matilda: A Novel

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Read this book. You will love it. At the start of The Full Matilda, David Haynes's writing swept me into the world of propriety, power brokers and the servants who ran the true Washington, D.C. in the early 1900s. The story opens from here and reaches all the way to present day. Matilda makes a complex and headstrong narrator for alternate chapters. Her experience throughout the Civil Rights movement creates a counterpoint to the more contemporary chapters narrated by the men in her family. The Full Matilda builds a subtle yet powerful tension between tradition and change which more closely mirrors my own experience as a minority than any other book I've read. With its humor and reverence this book makes me think deeply about who I am and who I owe for the world I live in. This is one of those rare books which can change your outlook.

The Full Matilda is written in the elegant and refined prose of David Haynes, one of America's best literary authors. I loved the comical scenes as well as the bitter sweet scenes that built up to a huge crescendo. Matilda's sacrifice was very disturbing. It was the in-your-face reality of someone in Matilda's position.

Haynes has created a great sense of place that is well grounded in time and space as well as a full fledged family genealogy. I felt the real presence of the Housewright family across the generations and their place in American History.

One of the most remarkable chapters begins on page 320-it is a portrait of the artist as a young man but unlike Joyce, Haynes has ingeniously put it towards the end of the novel rather than at the beginning.

It is very touching that teenagers in their awkward coming-of-age make the time to visit Matilda-the hothouse flower, and that they look forward to spending time with her.

The sprinkling throughout the book of Housewright Maxims was like icing on the cake.

David Haynes's The Full Matilda is a book of substance written in an elegant prose that puts me in mind of Kazuo Ishiguro and Michael Ondaatje. I look forward to Haynes's next work of art.

After reading Haynes' The Full Matilda, I was left just that - full. The author manages to capture all the humanity and quirky personas of his characters with humor but with generosity and realism, so that the book is not merely "funny," it is satisfying. You see all sides of the characters, not just their quirkiness or comedy. Just as Matilda's full range of emotions is tapped, so is the reader's, and the writing is engaging from first page to last. One of those books you're sorry to see end. Read it.

I found this book somewhat uneven, alternately very interesting and engrossing, yet sometimes boring. I think Haynes does an excellent job of writing about blacks in service and the changing nature of that job over time. He does so without judgment and yet manages to convey how other blacks might look at service positions. I found myself more involved in the passages where successive male relatives discover, are irritated by and ultimately come to love and revere Matilda, than by the passages where Matilda talks herself. All in all however I'm glad that I discovered this author and would be willing to read more of his work.

The Full Matilda by David Haynes is a superb piece of writing. Brilliantly conceived, unforgettable and universal characters, extraordinarily engaging: this book is a terrific read. Haynes is a mellifluous storyteller. Highly recommended. Make this the next book you read.

This novel follows the Houswright family--and America--for nearly a century. Through the eyes of Matilda--a strong, quirky, but thoroughly grounded woman--we see what America was and what it has become. Haynes' lyrical writing weaves a wonderful tale of familial love.