Customer Reviews

In Memory of Angel Clare (Plume)

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

 

 

This book has lasted in the "best books" section of my bookcase for years now, and perhaps once a year I pick it up and read through it again. Honestly, it has such spark, sincerity, wit, insight. Although some of the AIDs-related themes are dated, the theme of the novel, which touches upon personal aspirations and struggles with the strata of society, are timeless. If any book has (and will) stand the test of time, this is it. Frankly, I love it.

Having loved Mr. Bram's "Father of Frankenstein", I picked this book up and was immediately enchanted. The characters are deep and involving. The emotions are raw. The lingering and potent effect of grief hangs over this novel like the fragrance of a garden of blooming flowers. Mr. Bram is a writer of concise and stirring prose. I recommend this book highly.

I'm an avid reader and tend to finish all books that I've started, be they mediocre, but this was just too much. It severely lacked continuity and substance

"In memory of Angel Clare" tries to deal with such vital issues as love, AIDS and the struggle of finding a personal space for living under all sorts of pressures and circumstances. It is unfortunate that the book eventually becomes an emtpy account of uninteresting events that happen to uninteresting and unsympathetic characters. Reading the book becomes very soon a tedious an uncomfortable experience. There is also another feature in this book that conveys an uneasy feeling to the reader, and it is the obsession of the protagonists (and the narrator) with age. It seems that in the narrator's (or the writer's) view, age is a sharp step function, its edge being somewhere around 30. Enough with this, please.