Customer Reviews

Up above the world: A novel

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Bowles is a great writer and he has written better books. If you are new, have heard the murmurings, and are looking to be wowed, go with The Sheltering Sky. This is not his strongest plot or his strongest batch of characters; it is slow to get going and where exactly it gets to is up for debate. But, if you want to see Bowles laying his lifelong thematic obsessions bare, this is the book. The parargaph at the top of page 178 is one of the most shockingly honest things anyone has ever written about their art, other people, the world, period. Volumes could be written eucidating the second sentance of that paragraph (Bowles himself has written a few of them).

This well-plotted novel is so much more than it seems. It doesn't take long to get right into the story with its moody pockets, hallucinatory scenes and beautiful people who are duplicitious at best. Each character is out for more and deserves less in this brilliantly written, Central American caper. To devour Bowles' obsession with landscape as description highlighted with his self-centered characters use of illicit drugs and wild sex is more tantilizing than being an active participant. Although I am a major Bowles groupie, I must say this is my favorite of his novels. I'm just sorry more people have not read it. He is a true genius in the old school of fiction writing where the reader can really think about the peculiar actions of the characters which lead to the next plot twist. If I weren't afraid of airplanes, I would fly to Tangier and serve him some mint tea. I hope he is comfortable during this period of his life in Tangier.I read that he is not feeling well.

The first 100 pages of Up Above The World follows the travelings of Taylor and Day two Americans very reminiscent of Port and Kit of Sheltering Sky. In the last 150 pages after meeting a strange couple Taylor and Day are no longer in control of their lives but prisoners of the strange couple. Exactly how this imprisoning takes place and for what reasons only become clear in the very last pages. Only a minimal plot description can be given as the pleasure is in finding things out in the order they are meant to be found out. Having been a longtime fan of Sheltering Sky and all of his stories I hesitated reading any of his other novels as I heard they were not as good as his first. But reading this I find I am reminded not so much of the eerie and desolate majesty of Sheltering Sky which is a far better novel but of Bowles short stories, especially the ones which take place in South America as this novel does. This is not Sheltering Sky caliber fiction but it is a very competent novel and will appeal to those who admire Bowles very modern and often horrific short stories full of deviant psychologies and drugs and all sorts of sordid and often primitive "truths" about human nature. The novel reads like an extended short story really. Occasional details peculiar for being so precise stand out as always in Bowles writing. He describes the sound a cricket makes as coming from the back of its black throat. The Bowles vision is as bleak a vision as exists in serious modern fiction but it is immensely appealing as gothic things often are. I doubt many people really feel the world is as Bowles describes it. He grasps at only one side of human nature, the side the sun never reaches. Not a place you want to live but an intriguing place to travel through.

Pay attention, because this story sneaks up on you. Details, details, details -- subtlety at its best. Like other Bowles stories, this one requires reflection upon completion to truly appreciate. The ending may leave you slightly unnerved and uncomfortable, but then, that's one of Bowles' signatures....

--that a thriller doesn't have to be written at a 6th grade level. Indeed, how much more terrifying it is when executed by a real writer, rather than a bestselling hack.

In his autobiography, Paul Bowles wrote that "Up Above the World" was a bit of a lark, a novel that tried to recapture some of the earliest stories he told himself just for chills. What he's actually accomplished, I think, is something far more significant.

There's something of the quirky darkness of Jim Thompson to this novel--the bad guys are human and fallible; the good guys aren't all that likeable. The moral of the story is murky. When you've finished reading, you're left feeling uneasy.

There's none of the cartoonish butchery that you find in most popular thrillers; but it isn't the graphic description of stabbings, slicings, and disembowelments that really make you want to "turn on a light and lock the doors," as the old jacket cover cliché goes. No, what really gives you the heebie-jeebies is the cold fog of unreason and amorality that exists in the world, the everyday monsters, who are nothing more than screwed-up human beings, and who, by mere chance, we might find our paths have crossed.

Such is the case with Taylor and Day Slade. While on extended vacation abroad in Mesoamerica, they find themselves the "victims" of a hapless if unintentionally obnoxious fellow traveler they cannot seem to shake: a fat woman whom Day made the "mistake" of treating kindly.

From that point on, "Up Above the World" reads like a nightmare--a modern gothic where at every turn the Slades are prevented from doing the one and only sensible thing: run for their lives. By the time they see what's coming, there won't be much time left.

Part mystery, part meditation on evil, "Up Above the World" is not the best of Paul Bowles, but it doesn't have to be. There's enough of what makes Paul Bowles such a spellbinding writer at work here. Tightly written, compulsively readable, and with practically every page steeped in cold dread, this is a novel that isn't done with you even when you're done with it.

I leapt upon this book when I saw it at a used bookstore, having been blown away by Bowles' pivotal work, "The Sheltering Sky", which would have to rate as one of the best books I have ever read. I have to say I was underwhelmed by this one - very different in tone and style, not as compulsively readable, but still a good way to pass a few hours on a Sunday afternoon. I do have to give Bowles kudos for his ability to accurately represent some of the seamier consequences that can occur when Americans are placed in unsettling surroundings and act without plan or forethought and his ability to highlight cultural differences in entertaining yet subtle ways. He is definitely a writer whose works I shall continue to seek out.

Bowles spins a fascinating yarn which starts out a little like a travel book with the stereotypical Fat Lady aboard the cruise liner befriended by Dr Slade's wife. Disembarked in Central America, Dr Slade's wife then meets the young dashing rich Grove Soto and Soto starts to take over their lives. The novel becomes more and more intriguing and Bowles use of location to weave his intrigue using a stunning modern apartment in the city to the traditional hacienda in the country to play out the narrative. This is a novel which is enjoyable on many levels and I recommend it.

This book scared the pants off of me! It moves so slowly that you hardly know what has happened before it's too late. I wished that there had been a place to turn around before I came to the end, much as I imagine that the characters did. There is a constant feeling of dread throughout this book. Bowles characters are refined and intelligent, but there is nothing that can prevent them from becoming prey to the evil that slowly envelopes them. Bowles is a gifted writer of prose & poetry as well as a fine musician & composer. This is no exception.

Bowles' work is not for the squeamish or the weak-minded. He knew that. He wrote for those of us capable of understanding and accepting the base nature of man and dealing with it in an intellectual capacity. This is a great work of literature for those intelligent enough, tough enough and honest enough to comprehend the big picture. The ideas may be harsh, but the storytelling is so eloquent and the conjuring of imagery creates such beautiful pictures in the mind amongst the psychological and physical carnage that it demands to be read. This is a GREAT work. It takes a Graham Greene vibe and extrapolates it in an admirably frightening way. READ THIS BOOK! Paul Bowles is one of the five greatest writers of the 20th century. Read him.

Paul Bowles spent a lot of time in Morocco and, I believe, other areas of the Middle East. A long time ago, I read a book of his short stories which were based on indigenous Moroccan myths. The stories were bizarre and hard to fathom, much like what I've encountered of American Indian and other indigenous tales.

When I stumbled across this book (Up Above the World), I recognized the author's name and was curious to see what other kind of writing he had done. It didn't hurt that the back cover touted Bowles as having "undoubtedly one of the finest gifts of all men writing in English" (St. Louis Dispatch). I was somewhat disappointed, though. The book, a tale of murder in a Central American banana republic, contains some masterful passages, but I felt the plot was rather weak. Still, it was an interesting read.