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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Lovely writing with some story weaknesses,
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This review is from: The Man (Paperback)
Thoroughly impressed by Stoker's writing in Dracula, I wanted to see how it carried over in work of a different sort. This book, rarely reviewed or described online, seemed a good choice where nobody else's perceptions influenced mine. We meet lovely teenager Stephen (her father wanted a boy...) and Harold, approaching manhood, at the outset. We're to find out about their lives from their births to adulthood. They are beautifully drawn characters, almost too perfect each physically and in terms of integrity and strength. Stephen is given some male characteristics due to the wishes of her father and her being his only child. Harold is a thoughtful and physically superior fellow and becomes The Man of the title. They come to be raised together as trusted intimates, siblings in all but blood. They make errors which alter both of their lives and badly affect the rather adult-like turn their feelings for one another take. Stoker's descriptive skills that are so vibrant in Dracula show up here too, descriptions of thought processes and feelings in his characters, of setting and mood for his story. The pace is gentle character and story building at the beginning, but the climax brings excitement to a conclusion this reader felt was in little doubt. There are particularly strong secondary characters, the older, wiser folks who come into the lives of both young people. The weight of the propriety required of the times, pre-industrial England, is a millstone for both Stephen and Harold, although Stephen has idealistic young woman's rather liberated perspectives despite the conventions to the contrary. The slow build-up is rendered with precision and radiance. Coincidences that push credibility's limits and an ending rather easy to see coming bring the beautiful writing, well-made characters, and late excitement to a rating of four. A pleasure to read, it's not a work of greatness.
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