Customer Reviews

An Odor of Sanctity

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

As the title would suggest, this is the story of a young man during the conflict between Muslims and Christians in Moorish Spain. The hero of our story is torn between two cultures and different expectations from various family members. Yerby is quite graphic in his discriptions of battles and does appear to have done his home work with this one. There of course is a great amount of sadness and suffering in this tale, but of course these were truely hard times, so that would be expected. I first read this one in the early 1960 and once again several years later. As with several of Yerby's works, parts of the story do sag a bit, but overall his story telling ability pulls him through. I have this one five stars simply because I enjoyed the story and setting. Many perhaps might mark it down just a bit. Overall though, I do recommend it.

I Have lived though the adventures and have been reluctant to put the book away even at three in the morning.I know nothing about writing but this book has taken me through a wide range of emotions from actual tears to great joy. This for me is Frank yearby's best work. My copy is old and the pages are brown now. Where can I get a new copy - beg borrow or steal

I have read this book so many times that my paper back copy is old and brown.

The first time I read this book was some 7 years ago, and I have re-read it at least three time since then. It is one of these novels that leave a sharp clear image. A rich experience of life in that time. A very well researched novel, and a very informative source, beyond history facts and deep into human sympathy. Capturing, interesting, educative and exciting.

It is a wonderful story with so many levels...a young mans battle with his culutre, prejudices and faith...set in the wonderful age of moorish spain...with yerby's typical grand style this powerful epic comes to life and our hero comes of age. It can be translated into any time period...A battle all men and women confront and rarely win.

Yerby sets this entertaining novel in the remote time of early medieval Spain, and blends a colorful tapestry of the clash of cultures: the ruling class of sophisticated and educated Moors, the cruder Christian Goths, themselves only less recent invaders, and the Jewish middle class wary of both.For color and excitement, Yerby is undeniably a skilled talespinner, but his usual weakness of shallow characterization and wooden dialogue ("we women are curious little beasts, Aizun") is evident here. I was troubled by the continuing thread of misogyny and homophobia that runs throughout all of Yerby's work, but for light entertainment, Yerby certainly delivers. The adventures of the young Goth noble Alaric, who is drawn into the worldly and sensuous Moorish culture as he battles his lifelong attraction to asceticism and mysticism, will keep you turning the pages. This is one of Yerby's better efforts.

I first read this book as a teenager, and it has stayed with me forever. I recently re-read it and it is as fine as ever, perhaps more so. Yes, Yerby's characterizations of his female characters is somewhat less than PC--he was writing potboilers for the Fifties. His plots are sometimes thin, and his astonishingly negative view of Africans (in view of the fact that he was half-black himself) is disconcerting. Looking past this, however, the story is really a remarkably subtle and complex discursion on God and faith. His characters ask questions and ponder answers that are relevant to anyone in any age, regardless of religious background. I believe that is why Yerby picked the milieu he did--10th century Spain under the Moors, where his Muslim, Jewish and Christian characters easily discuss religion without resorting to bloodshed. Alaric moves from believer to skeptic and, perhaps, sainthood in the course of forty years, while at the same time sampling a wide variety of women, lifestyles and careers. Yerby is a master at balancing his action scenes with his philosophical discourse, so that it becomes neither shallow nor heavy-handed. I will be reading this book for another 30 years, at least. It never gets old.

I just finished reading this book for the 15th time over the last 30 years. It never fails to make me laugh and cry. It makes me question myself concerning my faith ,my family, and the quality of life that I lead. I believe it redifines what a man should be, should strive for. It is without doubt my favorite book. Get it. Read it. Love it.

Too young to have read Frank Yerby's work during his lifetime. Word of his "costume" novels seemed to undermine his importance as an objective commentator on the African diaspora and the American South. Yerby entertained his readers with a glamorized notion of the "fortunate" plantation owners and their melodramatic lives. Yerby's writing about the African experience in the new world takes on an objectivity which tells the story of actual events in the East West dialogue. "The Odor of Sanctity", the book just ordered, is told in the manner of the entertaining story teller, and yet, there it is; the emergence of a new people and culture, the Africans.

This novel is set in ancient Greece at the time of the Spartans. Ariston is a pubescent Spartan lad who's captured by the Athenian enemy. Trained from birth in the Spartan tradition of being physically tough, he needs all of his strength to survive his new life as a slave in Athens.

He is sold to a brothel, where he is forced into sex with paying patrons. This homosexual lifestyle was common at that time in history. His body is broken, but his spirit remains high.

Eventually a rich customer purchases Ariston for his personal use, saving him from the life in the cruel brothel. Ariston grows up to a normal life in Greece of the time. Eventually he becomes an actor on the stage, and becomes famous in the dramatic arts.

Yerby is known for his sweeping historical dramas. In this novel he has captured the essence of ancient Greek culture, its cruelties and customs, its many battles and wars. And of course the famous historical characters such as philosophers and poets.

All in all a good read, with interesting characters set in a facinating time period.