Customer Reviews

Pride and Avarice: A Novel

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

 

 

This is my first Nicholas Coleridge novel and I'm pleased enough to reserve a couple of his earlier works from the library. However, the novel is frustrating in its simplistic tone and ideas. About half way through I started getting edgy waiting for the comeuppance - or some arc, some transformation of someone. I had to put it down for this reason and return to it a few days later. Throughout, though, the good stay good and the bad unrelentingly bad. This made the book a mildly amusing summer fantasy read, with some charm, however.

I did enjoy his natural, easy hand on the characters themselves. The straightforward descriptive sentences lent a nice, pleasant humour to the book and I found I wanted to keep spending time even with people I didn't (and wasn't meant to) like. Which is why I did keep thinking about the story and the people even when I took a break from reading.

The end was mildly disappointing. It felt two abrupt in length, though everything got properly resolved. This happened in the last twenty or so pages of a nearly five hundred page book. I think more effort could have been put in this area.

Four stars because my walk-away feeling was of pleasant enjoyment.

My Brit husband has a formidable task of purchasing books for me for holiday or other special times that I have not read. Granted, he could check my Amazon Account but that would not include outside purchases, gifts from others or books borrowed from friends.

He knows I have an affinity for Julian Fellowes' Snobs and Past Imperfect: A Novel so, with fingers crossed, he gave this to me at Christmas. No, it did not have the gossipy style with strong, realistic characters of a Fellowes' multi-layered work. Still I found this to be an entertaining read especially with the lead character being in British PR as had my now retired husband. There were many PR people and instances that were right on the nose. My husband read the book after I finished it and could not believe its uncanny parallel to PR reality. Thank God my husband was no Milo!

This is a light, enjoyable read with the characters who never deviate from their good or bad personas. The storyline is predictable but likeable. The synopsis has been well detailed by other reviewers so I won't repeat it here.

I enjoyed his book enough to check out his older works and will look for newer novels on the Amazon UK site.

All in all a 3.5 Star experience.

Enjoy the read!

The book is funny in places, but it's far too black and white. With one exception, the characters are either entirely good or completely evil, with nothing to make them believable. Miles is despicable, Ross is noble, and that's really all you need to know. Ross's wife, Dawn, is a social climber with a good heart, and the only person in the book who comes off as human. Another problem is the sloppy writing. Two-thirds of the way through the book, the name of Miles's mistress's ineffectual husband inexplicably changes. Suddely, Robin is Nigel for 50 pages. Then it changes back. Was the editor asleep at the switch? This mistake made an already-annoying book even more so. I gave it 2 stars for its guilty-pleasure, beach-read fun qualities, but can't truly recommend Pride and Avarice.

but a very good read, all the same. Nicholas Coleridge is a British writer who has been "discovered" in the US.
This novel, "Pride and Avarice" was published in the UK last year under the title "Deadly Sins". I've read all three of his previous novels, and have found them to be very good takes at the British social mores. I reviewed "A Much Married Man", giving it five stars.

"Pride and Avarice" is good, not great, story of two men - both wealthy - at great odds with each other. Miles Straker, a British PR genius - resents his new neighbor, Ross Clegg, a self-made millionaire, who moves into Straker's sphere of influence. Straker tries to destroy Clegg, and nearly does. It's a story that's been told a thousand times before. Coleridge does a good job at knowing the ins and outs of British public and private life, but the characters, both primary and supporting, come off as somewhat "flat". The story is better than the characterization, but that's okay, the story holds its own. The novel is enjoyable.

I normally don't comment on the price of books, but I am impressed here that "Pride and Avarice" is priced at $26.00, retail. With book prices edging higher and higher, this book is priced quite nicely.

I thought this book was a very entertaining read; I liked it enough to immediately put another of the author's books on my reading list. The author's writing style is engaging, and the story line is interesting enough that I always looked forward to picking the book up again. The characters are more sketched than fleshed-out, but they're interesting and believable; I wouldn't mind meeting some of them again in a subsequent novel.

I agree with other reviewers that the book could have been tightened up a lot towards the end. I also noted a name change in one of the minor characters--"Pat" became "Pam" for a page--but this was in keeping with the many spelling and punctuation errors throughout the book. I can't remember ever seeing a shoddier job of copy editing. I guess that's what one gets for $25.99 these days.

As a reader of much modern British fiction, I hadn't come across Mr. Coleridge and picked this book up at random. However, I found it to be a great read, very absorbing and a wonderfully insightful picture of England today.
As a story of a sophisticated PR man and the "upstart" grocery man who becomes his neighbor, the book presents many opportunities for character development as each one has a wife, four children and many friends. Mr. Coleridge does a brilliant job of juggling the many plot developments, while keeping each character wholly believable. Over the book's dozen or so years, each one develops and interacts in ways that are not predictable and keep the reader glued to the page.
Mr. Coleridge also does a terrific job with the various big scenes, making them come alive in variously funny, poignant and dramatic ways.

I look forward to reading his other books and highly recommend this one.


p.s. The style is a cross between Penny Vincenzi [but not as wordy] and Katie Fforde [but not as light and predictable, but equally funny in places].