by Iain Banks
I was enjoying the hell out of this book right up until, near the end, it decided without warning to become a murder mystery. That section felt so out of place with the rest of this meandering, detailed meditation on death and growing up.When life was full of mysteries and strangenesses, and talking...
This book is written in a very non-linear style which made it very difficult to comprehend what was going on at the beginning. Once I understood the rhythm of the narrative what developed was a very well written, interesting story of a family in Scotland. Banks did an excellent job with characteriza...
The first Iain Banks book I read was The Wasp Factory, which I fell in love with on the spot. So I rushed out and bought the next Iain Banks book I saw - this. I stuck with it, thoroughly bored, hoping fervently it would suddenly all turn around and something amazing would happen........ but it neve...
When I heard Iain Banks speak at the Islay Book Festival a few years back, he said the miniseries was better. At some point I'll get around to reading this and see how they compare.
And it is like this.Suddenly tears spring from your eyes and and you are too surprised by them to be able to stop the small flood that follows. Not entirely timely since you are in your favourite coffee shop hereabouts waiting for a vegetable tagine.* * * * Prentice, you prat, how can you ...
_________________________________________(Gratuitous cross-promotion)I wrote this minimalist review as a protest against notgettingenough's intolerably wordy screeds. For example, look at her recent review of Jeremy Clarkson. I mean don't. Don't!
This was loaned to me, unsolicited, by a colleague who thought I might like it. She was so right. There is so much in this book that is utterly memorable (who could ever forget the exploding pacemaker?), and I remember the excitement of reading it, and the slow unraveling of the mystery. Wonderful.
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