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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A work of transition,
By Boris Bangemann "boyse" (Singapore) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Gabriel's Gift: A Novel (Hardcover)
Hanif Kureishi's fiction is one of my minor addictions. I love his irreverent wit and the mastery of his dialogue. He is a truly gifted observer and listener. Kureishi is an interesting author because he vacillates between the self-assurance of the satirical writer and the vulnerability that is part of being human. He used to rage against the very people by whom he wanted to be loved - as if they could never love him enough. In this sense, "Intimacy" is his most instructive and illuminating book.Gabriel's Gift is, in some ways, a re-run of his first novel, "The Buddha of Suburbia", this time with a happy end for the characters. Kureishi seems to have mellowed a lot since his earlier writings, but this change has not yet translated into a new style of writing or into new ideas. Gabriel's Gift is a book that gave me the sense of the author wanting to explore his roots as an artist in order to get somewhere, but he did not quite know where (which, of course, is not the hallmark of a great novel). But then again, Hanif Kureishi is always in search of himself. It is one of his strengths. Sometimes he delivers great writing along the way, at other times he does not.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Variation on a Well-Known Theme,
By Ford Ka (Edinburgh, Scotland) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Gabriel's Gift: A Novel (Paperback)
It is difficult to tell why Hanif Kureishi did not come up with anything new but decided to replay the themes of his most successful novel The Buddha of Suburbia. However, he did when he shouldn't have. This is a nice novel but there is so little inside that you may pass it by and never miss it. If you don't know Kureish yet - get Buddha. Gabriel's a mistake.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Modern Fairy-tale,
By A Customer
This review is from: Gabriel's Gift: A Novel (Hardcover)
Society is still as dark and deceptive as ever but Gabriel, Kureishi's most recent teenage protagonist, has the gift to dispel its gloom. Gabriel's ill-suited parents have finally separated, he is bored, left to his own devices and well on his way to becoming a drug addict. But, instead of following all the easy paths to becoming a failure, he decides to take his parents' problems into his own hands. Although the story is unrealistically idealistic, it carries with it an unmistakable aura of hope, in the modern shape of fame. Fame is the gift and the fairy that can deliver anybody in style from all the difficulties of twentieth-first-century living. Once more Kureishi injects his characteristic comedy and light-heartedness into a serious subject without too much irreverence and with a little more hope. As a modern fairy-tale, 'Gabriel's Gift' is able to offer a nice dream with just enough kick in the backside to keep it real.
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