Talking It Over [Paperback]

Julian Barnes (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 27, 1992

In this powerfully affecting Flaubert's Parrot gives readers a brilliant take on the deceptions that make up the quivering substrata of erotic love. "An interplay of serious thought and dazzling wit. . . . It's moving, it's funny, it's frightening . . . fiction at its best."--New York Times Book Review.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The members of a love triangle take turns narrating this ingenious novel from British author Barnes, whose earlier works Metroland and Before She Left Me will also be released in Vintage International editions this October.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Stuart Hughes and Oliver Russell have been friends since childhood. When the fiscally astute but socially inept Stuart meets the beautiful and artistic Gillian Wyatt at a London wine bar, Oliver can hardly believe it. Gillian clearly deserves someone more cultured, more sophisticated--someone more like Oliver himself. Oliver tags along on the couple's first dates, stands as best man at their wedding, and only when it is too late declares his love for his best friend's wife. It's rather like a British version of the film Jules and Jim , he jokes. In fact, the narrative strategy has more in common with TV documentary than prose fiction. The characters are "talking heads" who address the reader directly, in three autonomous though interrelated harangues. There is no omniscient narrator to interpret the story; each character is defined entirely by speech. A witty and provocative novel from the author of the masterpiece Flaubert's Parrot ( LJ 4/1/85). Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 6/1/91. --Ed ward B. St. John, Loyola Law Sch. Lib., Los Angeles
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (October 27, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679736875
• ISBN-13: 978-0679736875
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #158,011 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Julian Barnes is the author of nine novels, including Metroland, Flaubert's Parrot, A History of the World in 10 ½ Chapters, England, England and Arthur and George, and two collections of short stories, Cross Channel and The Lemon Table.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ready To Be a Confidant, December 5, 2000

By 

taking a rest - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Talking It Over (Paperback)

Prepared or not, while you still must read, what you read is almost entirely directed to you. You are told what has happened, what your new friends think, and what they are to do. Turn the page and then be told of the effect their actions were upon another of your new acquaintances. This book almost becomes interactive. If it were to be read to you, instead of by you, you would undoubtedly answer, interrupt and question them, and then yourself for talking to those who are not there. You would likely take sides, and wish you could conspire to help the party you favor.

The Author Julian Barnes places you in the midst of a triangle, albeit one with tangential appendages, and the story that transpires is only a bit less unusual than the form the book takes. The reader is expected to be the listener, provide a shoulder, and sometimes to refuse the proffered cigarette less neutrality is to be compromised. The menagerie Mr. Barnes provides as your newfound pals, range from the mundane, to the brilliantly eccentric, and when brought together form an eclectic group. The cameos played by the briefest of speakers often come under the heading "He/she lies like an eyewitness". All believe they speak the truth, but truth is relative, perspective is everything.

Mr. Barnes is egalitarian as you are chosen to lend your sympathetic ear to men, women, the young and the not so young. He also offers the occasional insight from a player whose appearance doesn't even rate that of a cameo, florists as psychologists.

He also takes the most familiar range of human emotion and demonstrates with an ease that is a bit disconcerting, how double edged and painful they can be, This is true whether he cuts a swath with a broadsword, or slips a stiletto from the hand of one friend to the vitals of another.

Triangles are used to describe the actions between 3 individuals. Mr. Barnes uses the same shape, but the complexity of his writing requires more than one. A pyramid might result, at once the most stable of shapes, and repeatedly pointed as well.

A wonderful commentator on the human condition.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great read, December 7, 2000

By 

Tom Douglas (Marlow) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Talking It Over (Paperback)

Barnes was criticised when this book was published for using a gimmick, and for being lightweight reading.

The criticism is totally unfounded - this really is a quality book.

It is a classic menage a trois, told in the first person by all three characters. The different views of identical events is entertaining and sometimes hilarious, and the love story will be familiar to everyone.

The characters are very real and you have met all of them (or at least parts of all of them) in your real life, and this gives the book real resonance.

I have read it three times (its extremely rare for me to read any book more than once), and it is easy to open a page at random and read a few pages.

Its impossible to read this book without smiling.

Highly recommended!

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Funny, sexy and well written, April 27, 2000

By 

Ian Muldoon (Coffs Harbour, NSW Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Talking It Over (Paperback)

"He lies like an eye-witness" Russian saying. This quote appears on the frontispiece of this enjoyable novel. The opening words of the novel are:" My name is Stuart, and I remember everything." So I, dear reader, was sucked in straight away. It's a first person narrative from the point of view of the three main characters (the eternal triangle?) Gillian, Stuart and Oliver. If you are familiar with the Japanese film masterpiece RASHOMON you will be familiar with the premise. This book will make your day a little bit brighter. Delicious and sympathetic humour.