The novel's narrator, Stevens, is a perfect English butler who tries to give his narrow existence form and meaning through the self-effacing, almost mystical practice of his profession. In a career that spans the second world war, Stevens is oblivious of the real life that goes on around him--oblivious, for instance, of the fact that his aristocrat employer is a Nazi sympathizer. Still, there are even larger matters at stake in this heartbreaking, beautifully crafted novel-- namely, Stevens' own ability to allow some bit of life-affirming love into his tightly repressed existence.

Beautifully written, 01 Oct 2008
I loved this absolutely beautifully written book and read it in one sitting. Narrated by an English butler, Mr Stevens (we never know his first name), it is a truly moving tale. From the day he sets off on his journey, the story captivates you until the final pages. I loved his definitions of the word 'dignity' and I would thoroughly recommend this as an excellent, enthralling read of times gone by. I wished it had been longer! It won the Booker prize and for once, you can see why.

Faultless, 25 Sep 2008
In short, yes! To all the articulately phrased 5 star reviews above. The Remains of the Day is one of the 20th century's great books. Absolutely essential on the bookshelf. A great gift. Utterly beautiful and clever and sly and absorbing. 5 stars aren't really enough. (Does this volume control go to 11?)

My favourite book of all time, 25 Aug 2008
I read this book on a long plane journey back from Hong Kong when I was 18. Though I had been in Asia for 9 months, I was immediately thrust back into the pre-world war II of gentrified England; stultified, polite and controlled. It astounds me how Japanese-born Ishiguro creates so well the character of Stevens, the middle-aged painfully correct and repressed butler. You bleed for him as his own inhibitions hold him back from criticising his master and accepting he is in love.

One of the final scenes in Weymouth makes me cry everytime. It is Stevens realisation of all he has loved and lost and nothing I have read since has ever been able to compare to that bitter-sweet tang of understanding that it is too late to try again.

Absolutely masterful.

Beautiful, touching, heart-breaking. Simply wonderful. , 15 Aug 2008
I have read this book four or five times now. I recently purchased the book again. The brilliance of The Remains of the Day is illustrated by the fact that you can read it several times and the poignancy and emotional evocation hit with the same force as reading for the first time. The book opens with a prologue that centres on the theme of bantering - which is quite simply brilliant in the way it probes and makes real issues of culture and meaning, and the difficulties inherent in stepping into different worlds. The rest of the book is simply beautiful, moving and real to an extent that is very rarely reached. I am hardly ever touched on a deep emotional level by novels but this book tears me apart every time. Reading it makes me want to reach out and talk to Mr Stevens and Miss Kenton and plead with them not to walk away from their love for each other. Without doubt one of the best novels ever written.

Touching and beautiful, 23 Jun 2008
It was an impulse read after seeing the movie. What a dear book! It's been a long time since I really enjoyed reading and I read a lot but what I mean is deriving almost physical pleasure from beautiful and eloquent language, and taking time over a book unfolding the characters. One cannot fail to be moved by the story and it certainly made me want to re-assess the certain priorities. My favourite scene is towards the end when Miss Kenton confesses that the reason she was unhappy with her marriage is because she often wondered what kind of a life she might have had with him, Stevens, it's absolutely breathtaking. Why or why do we waste opportunities.....

Beautifully written, 01 Oct 2008
I loved this absolutely beautifully written book and read it in one sitting. Narrated by an English butler, Mr Stevens (we never know his first name), it is a truly moving tale. From the day he sets off on his journey, the story captivates you until the final pages. I loved his definitions of the word 'dignity' and I would thoroughly recommend this as an excellent, enthralling read of times gone by. I wished it had been longer! It won the Booker prize and for once, you can see why.

Faultless, 25 Sep 2008
In short, yes! To all the articulately phrased 5 star reviews above. The Remains of the Day is one of the 20th century's great books. Absolutely essential on the bookshelf. A great gift. Utterly beautiful and clever and sly and absorbing. 5 stars aren't really enough. (Does this volume control go to 11?)

My favourite book of all time, 25 Aug 2008
I read this book on a long plane journey back from Hong Kong when I was 18. Though I had been in Asia for 9 months, I was immediately thrust back into the pre-world war II of gentrified England; stultified, polite and controlled. It astounds me how Japanese-born Ishiguro creates so well the character of Stevens, the middle-aged painfully correct and repressed butler. You bleed for him as his own inhibitions hold him back from criticising his master and accepting he is in love.

One of the final scenes in Weymouth makes me cry everytime. It is Stevens realisation of all he has loved and lost and nothing I have read since has ever been able to compare to that bitter-sweet tang of understanding that it is too late to try again.

Absolutely masterful.

Beautiful, touching, heart-breaking. Simply wonderful. , 15 Aug 2008
I have read this book four or five times now. I recently purchased the book again. The brilliance of The Remains of the Day is illustrated by the fact that you can read it several times and the poignancy and emotional evocation hit with the same force as reading for the first time. The book opens with a prologue that centres on the theme of bantering - which is quite simply brilliant in the way it probes and makes real issues of culture and meaning, and the difficulties inherent in stepping into different worlds. The rest of the book is simply beautiful, moving and real to an extent that is very rarely reached. I am hardly ever touched on a deep emotional level by novels but this book tears me apart every time. Reading it makes me want to reach out and talk to Mr Stevens and Miss Kenton and plead with them not to walk away from their love for each other. Without doubt one of the best novels ever written.

Touching and beautiful, 23 Jun 2008
It was an impulse read after seeing the movie. What a dear book! It's been a long time since I really enjoyed reading and I read a lot but what I mean is deriving almost physical pleasure from beautiful and eloquent language, and taking time over a book unfolding the characters. One cannot fail to be moved by the story and it certainly made me want to re-assess the certain priorities. My favourite scene is towards the end when Miss Kenton confesses that the reason she was unhappy with her marriage is because she often wondered what kind of a life she might have had with him, Stevens, it's absolutely breathtaking. Why or why do we waste opportunities.....


A strange, disappointing read, 31 Aug 2008
This is a strange book. The plot unfolds very slowly - in places, too slowly - at first with hints, then with a little more; tasters of what's to come. And yet in the end, I felt there were too many unanaswered quesitons, and I felt cheated. The characters are two-dimensional and never really come alive. For me, a good novel has to have 3 main ingredients. It has to have at least one really sympathetic character, it should be well-written, and it must hold my attention. The best this novel did for me was to hold my attention, but only because I wanted explanations and answers, and in the end these were not forthcoming.

Adding my voice to the sound of disappointment..., 25 Aug 2008
I was excited to see this work by Kazuo Ishiguro, having read a good number of his previous novels and enjoyed them. Unfortunately, "Never Let Me Go" falls short of Ishiguro's usual high standard.

Whilst the premise of the story has great potential, the plot lacks pace and the delivery struggles to hold (my) the reader's interest. Who is the intended audience? I wonder. Not seasoned adult readers, surely.

I found "Never Let Me Go" a slow, tedious read, and while I did find myself wanting to discover if there were indeed any dark mystery, I resorted to speed reading to reach the end - a sure sign, for me, of a certain lack of quality.

Sorry to say, when there are so many spectacular reads out there, and so little time, this one gets a thumbs down from me.

Sensitive, ultimately credible, 20 Aug 2008
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro is a compelling portrait of people on the downside of a dystopia. Like Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale or J G Ballard's Kingdom come, Never Let me Go is built around an abhorrent aspect of social organisation. Crucially, in all three books, the focus of the subject matter is merely an extension of a facet of our own society. Fertility issues provide the material for The Handmaid's Tale, while brainless consumerism fuelled Kingdom Come. Kazuo Ishiguro's subject matter has a medical focus that provides an essentially more credible idea than either of the two other works mentioned. Eventually Ballard's vision cannot be maintained by his scant material, whereas Margaret Atwood's is strengthened by the credibility of its own downside. Ishiguro's story line is strong enough in itself to maintain interest, credibility and drama from start to finish. There is real humanity in this story.

The book begins in Hailsham, an obviously special school set in an idyllic corner of the English countryside. But this is clearly no ordinary education. We follow the fortunes of three of its students, Kathy, Ruth and Tommy. We see them grow up, make their fumbling transformation from childhood to adolescence and then embark upon the stuttering unpredictability of young adulthood. Hailsham's students have to learn how to deal with their own shortcomings and how to manage their talents. They must cope with sometimes strained relations with their teachers, especially in the area of reconciling what they want to do versus what seems to be demanded of them, and thus what they are allowed to attempt. They become aware of sex and introduce themselves to its world in their own ways at different times, each of them reacting differently to their experience.

So what makes these people so special? Well, for a start they live protected lives. They never appear to need any money, nor possessions, for that matter, what little they do have being recycled ad infinitum via a system of almost formal barter. They seem to be protected from fashion, consumerism, family break-up, mass media and even street life. Surely there is something strange about them, despite their apparently normal physical, mental and psychological characteristics.

Not until about half way through the book does the reader start to fill in the blanks. But by the end the dreadful picture is complete, and rendered even more frightening by its complete credibility. To find out the nature of the plot, you will have to read the book, but, though I have stressed the importance of the overall concept's contribution to the book's success, it is not the subject matter that makes this a superb novel. It is the characterisation, the empathy that the reader develops with Kathy and Tommy and the sympathy that their tragedy eventually engenders. The context served to amplify these responses, not blur or confuse them. It is this quality that makes never Let Me Go a completely memorable and highly moving read.




Lazy and pretentious, 15 Aug 2008
I was both disappointed and depressed by this book. It seemed to me that the author had an interesting idea which he didn't feel it necessary to think through with enough dedication, and his half-heartedness is evident in this tediously drawn-out and unloveable story. His trademark simplicity of language, elsewhere used with integrity, here only exacerbates a basically poor plot, feeble characterisation, and a curious absence of warmth or sensitivity or insight. Having a first person narrator with such limitations was always going to be problematic, but it doesn't excuse the author's inability to inject any life and magic into the characters or the plot. Time and again he keeps us hanging on with the narrator's promise of 'what happened next' - which is invariably some very minor event which he fails to enliven with any true significance - no humour, emotion, energy or interest. The reader may be drawn in by the easy language, which often degenerates into repetition and banality; but the 'oddness' of the story lies fundamentally in its emptiness. He touches on areas of great potential - the maternal instinct, sexuality and emotion, heredity, the role of art and so on, but leaves them dangling in a way which suggests laziness and sloppiness rather than some sort of postmodern reflection on life in general. He acutely observes nuances of mannerism and behaviour, but the characters themselves are wooden, and we feel Ishiguro himself doesn't really believe in them. The fact that it all ends in death for them in spite of art and love is almost cynical here - his depiction of art and love is as flimsy as the collages the 'students' make out of bits of rubbish. There is such a thing as integrity in art, and I fail to see how this made it into any 'Gallery'.

Disturbingly beautiful, 07 Aug 2008
I love the beautiful haunting phrasing of Kazuo Ishiguro, and this novel is no exception. A compelling read and a truely disturbing vision of the future.

Owen Meany is a dwarfish boy with a strange voice who accidentally kills his best friend's mum with a baseball and believes--correctly, it transpires--that he is an instrument of God, to be redeemed by martyrdom. John Irving's novel, which inspired the 1998 Jim Carrey movie Simon Birch, is his most popular book in Britain, and perhaps the oddest Christian mystic novel since Flannery O'Connor's work. Irving fans will find much that is familiar: the New England prep-school-town setting, symbolic amputations of man and beast, the Garp-like unknown father of the narrator (Owen's orphaned best friend), the rough comedy. The scene of doltish Dr Dolder, Owen's shrink, drunkenly driving his VW down the school's marble steps is a marvellous set piece. So are the Christmas pageants Owen stars in. But it's all, as Highlights magazine used to put it, "fun with a purpose". When Owen plays baby Jesus in the pageants, and glimpses a tombstone with his death date while enacting A Christmas Carol, the slapstick doesn't change the fact that he was born to be martyred. The book's countless subplots add up to a moral argument, specifically an indictment of American foreign policy--from Vietnam to the Contras.

The book's mystic religiosity is steeped in Robertson Davies' Deptford trilogy, and the fatal baseball relates to the fatefully misdirected snowball in the first Deptford novel, Fifth Business. Tiny, symbolic Owen echoes the hero of Irving's teacher Günter Grass's The Tin Drum--the two characters share the same initials. A rollicking entertainment, Owen Meany is also a meditation on literature, history and God. --Tim Appelo

Beautifully written, 01 Oct 2008
I loved this absolutely beautifully written book and read it in one sitting. Narrated by an English butler, Mr Stevens (we never know his first name), it is a truly moving tale. From the day he sets off on his journey, the story captivates you until the final pages. I loved his definitions of the word 'dignity' and I would thoroughly recommend this as an excellent, enthralling read of times gone by. I wished it had been longer! It won the Booker prize and for once, you can see why.

Faultless, 25 Sep 2008
In short, yes! To all the articulately phrased 5 star reviews above. The Remains of the Day is one of the 20th century's great books. Absolutely essential on the bookshelf. A great gift. Utterly beautiful and clever and sly and absorbing. 5 stars aren't really enough. (Does this volume control go to 11?)

My favourite book of all time, 25 Aug 2008
I read this book on a long plane journey back from Hong Kong when I was 18. Though I had been in Asia for 9 months, I was immediately thrust back into the pre-world war II of gentrified England; stultified, polite and controlled. It astounds me how Japanese-born Ishiguro creates so well the character of Stevens, the middle-aged painfully correct and repressed butler. You bleed for him as his own inhibitions hold him back from criticising his master and accepting he is in love.

One of the final scenes in Weymouth makes me cry everytime. It is Stevens realisation of all he has loved and lost and nothing I have read since has ever been able to compare to that bitter-sweet tang of understanding that it is too late to try again.

Absolutely masterful.

Beautiful, touching, heart-breaking. Simply wonderful. , 15 Aug 2008
I have read this book four or five times now. I recently purchased the book again. The brilliance of The Remains of the Day is illustrated by the fact that you can read it several times and the poignancy and emotional evocation hit with the same force as reading for the first time. The book opens with a prologue that centres on the theme of bantering - which is quite simply brilliant in the way it probes and makes real issues of culture and meaning, and the difficulties inherent in stepping into different worlds. The rest of the book is simply beautiful, moving and real to an extent that is very rarely reached. I am hardly ever touched on a deep emotional level by novels but this book tears me apart every time. Reading it makes me want to reach out and talk to Mr Stevens and Miss Kenton and plead with them not to walk away from their love for each other. Without doubt one of the best novels ever written.

Touching and beautiful, 23 Jun 2008
It was an impulse read after seeing the movie. What a dear book! It's been a long time since I really enjoyed reading and I read a lot but what I mean is deriving almost physical pleasure from beautiful and eloquent language, and taking time over a book unfolding the characters. One cannot fail to be moved by the story and it certainly made me want to re-assess the certain priorities. My favourite scene is towards the end when Miss Kenton confesses that the reason she was unhappy with her marriage is because she often wondered what kind of a life she might have had with him, Stevens, it's absolutely breathtaking. Why or why do we waste opportunities.....


A strange, disappointing read, 31 Aug 2008
This is a strange book. The plot unfolds very slowly - in places, too slowly - at first with hints, then with a little more; tasters of what's to come. And yet in the end, I felt there were too many unanaswered quesitons, and I felt cheated. The characters are two-dimensional and never really come alive. For me, a good novel has to have 3 main ingredients. It has to have at least one really sympathetic character, it should be well-written, and it must hold my attention. The best this novel did for me was to hold my attention, but only because I wanted explanations and answers, and in the end these were not forthcoming.

Adding my voice to the sound of disappointment..., 25 Aug 2008
I was excited to see this work by Kazuo Ishiguro, having read a good number of his previous novels and enjoyed them. Unfortunately, "Never Let Me Go" falls short of Ishiguro's usual high standard.

Whilst the premise of the story has great potential, the plot lacks pace and the delivery struggles to hold (my) the reader's interest. Who is the intended audience? I wonder. Not seasoned adult readers, surely.

I found "Never Let Me Go" a slow, tedious read, and while I did find myself wanting to discover if there were indeed any dark mystery, I resorted to speed reading to reach the end - a sure sign, for me, of a certain lack of quality.

Sorry to say, when there are so many spectacular reads out there, and so little time, this one gets a thumbs down from me.

Sensitive, ultimately credible, 20 Aug 2008
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro is a compelling portrait of people on the downside of a dystopia. Like Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale or J G Ballard's Kingdom come, Never Let me Go is built around an abhorrent aspect of social organisation. Crucially, in all three books, the focus of the subject matter is merely an extension of a facet of our own society. Fertility issues provide the material for The Handmaid's Tale, while brainless consumerism fuelled Kingdom Come. Kazuo Ishiguro's subject matter has a medical focus that provides an essentially more credible idea than either of the two other works mentioned. Eventually Ballard's vision cannot be maintained by his scant material, whereas Margaret Atwood's is strengthened by the credibility of its own downside. Ishiguro's story line is strong enough in itself to maintain interest, credibility and drama from start to finish. There is real humanity in this story.

The book begins in Hailsham, an obviously special school set in an idyllic corner of the English countryside. But this is clearly no ordinary education. We follow the fortunes of three of its students, Kathy, Ruth and Tommy. We see them grow up, make their fumbling transformation from childhood to adolescence and then embark upon the stuttering unpredictability of young adulthood. Hailsham's students have to learn how to deal with their own shortcomings and how to manage their talents. They must cope with sometimes strained relations with their teachers, especially in the area of reconciling what they want to do versus what seems to be demanded of them, and thus what they are allowed to attempt. They become aware of sex and introduce themselves to its world in their own ways at different times, each of them reacting differently to their experience.

So what makes these people so special? Well, for a start they live protected lives. They never appear to need any money, nor possessions, for that matter, what little they do have being recycled ad infinitum via a system of almost formal barter. They seem to be protected from fashion, consumerism, family break-up, mass media and even street life. Surely there is something strange about them, despite their apparently normal physical, mental and psychological characteristics.

Not until about half way through the book does the reader start to fill in the blanks. But by the end the dreadful picture is complete, and rendered even more frightening by its complete credibility. To find out the nature of the plot, you will have to read the book, but, though I have stressed the importance of the overall concept's contribution to the book's success, it is not the subject matter that makes this a superb novel. It is the characterisation, the empathy that the reader develops with Kathy and Tommy and the sympathy that their tragedy eventually engenders. The context served to amplify these responses, not blur or confuse them. It is this quality that makes never Let Me Go a completely memorable and highly moving read.




Lazy and pretentious, 15 Aug 2008
I was both disappointed and depressed by this book. It seemed to me that the author had an interesting idea which he didn't feel it necessary to think through with enough dedication, and his half-heartedness is evident in this tediously drawn-out and unloveable story. His trademark simplicity of language, elsewhere used with integrity, here only exacerbates a basically poor plot, feeble characterisation, and a curious absence of warmth or sensitivity or insight. Having a first person narrator with such limitations was always going to be problematic, but it doesn't excuse the author's inability to inject any life and magic into the characters or the plot. Time and again he keeps us hanging on with the narrator's promise of 'what happened next' - which is invariably some very minor event which he fails to enliven with any true significance - no humour, emotion, energy or interest. The reader may be drawn in by the easy language, which often degenerates into repetition and banality; but the 'oddness' of the story lies fundamentally in its emptiness. He touches on areas of great potential - the maternal instinct, sexuality and emotion, heredity, the role of art and so on, but leaves them dangling in a way which suggests laziness and sloppiness rather than some sort of postmodern reflection on life in general. He acutely observes nuances of mannerism and behaviour, but the characters themselves are wooden, and we feel Ishiguro himself doesn't really believe in them. The fact that it all ends in death for them in spite of art and love is almost cynical here - his depiction of art and love is as flimsy as the collages the 'students' make out of bits of rubbish. There is such a thing as integrity in art, and I fail to see how this made it into any 'Gallery'.

Disturbingly beautiful, 07 Aug 2008
I love the beautiful haunting phrasing of Kazuo Ishiguro, and this novel is no exception. A compelling read and a truely disturbing vision of the future.

Life Changing? Not for me., 26 Sep 2008
Having greatly enjoyed `The World According to Garp' I was looking forward to `A Prayer for Owen Meany `which has the reputation of being Irving's best book. But I was sadly disappointed and remain somewhat baffled by the praise heaped on this novel - it is not dreadful, but not wonderful either.

I didn't warm to Owen, while at times intriguing I found him increasingly annoying as the book progressed. THE DECISION TO HAVE ALL OF HIS SPEECH IN CAPITALS DOESN'T HELP AS IT FEELS LIKE HE IS SHOUTING & LONGER PASSAGES ARE DIFFICULT TO READ. John Wheelwright the narrator is bland and dull, only distinguished by his love of Owen. Which leaves only the supporting character to add interest, I'd have liked more of Johns', Mother, Grandmother & his cousin Hester.

My second problem is that the book is too long by at least 200 pages. The basic plot elements would make a decent novella. Once Owens fate is mostly revealed, about half way through, narrative & character getting lost in a long wade through dull and often repetitive diversions on religion, Vietnam, contras, Johns boring life in Canada. Before we finally get anywhere near a conclusion. I was tempted to give up about 2/3rd through, only carrying on in hope of a revelatory ending.

My biggest problem though is that while Irving seems to be trying to make points about faith and religion. It isn't clear what they are, and the whole thing becomes increasing turgid. Some claim this book as life changing (though without saying how their lives have changed). They are I think reading it as an endorsement of faith, but I'm not sure if that is the intention. Irving twice quotes Thomas Hardy on `living in a world where nothing bears out in practice what it promises incipiently' and the underwhelming nature of the key `revelations'' here (Johns father, the detail of Owens fate) seem to fit with that view. But it is such a mess of ideas it is difficult to know what Irving intended.

A novel I will remember, but couldn't recommended.



Takes your breath away, 28 Aug 2008
Every few months I take time out from my work and sit and read these reviews on Amazon, just to remind me of this wonderful book and to bring back my experience of reading it for the first time. Five minutes into reading the reviews and I'm silently weeping.

It's a utter privelidge to have had the opportunity to read such a book.

Beautiful Owen , 13 Aug 2008
I read this a few weeks ago and half-way through it I thought it was a bit over-long. It's a great story and the characters are superb - Owen has to be one of the best characters of all time. But it's a bit of a marathon of a book and as I read it I just wanted to finish it - not because it was boring but because I'm always eager to read my next book. However, as I got towards the end a strange thing happened. The closer I came to finishing it the more I didn't want it to end. The more you get to know Owen the more you want him to be part of your life forever. And you know what? I think he will be. A truly great book. Long... but you might end up wishing it was longer.

Against the tide, 23 Jul 2008
This was the first book by John Irving I've read and I found it rather too drawn out for its own good.I can't believe I've read the same book as the other reviewers or is the Irving publicity machine so convincing as to warp the literary sensibilities of a large part of the educated population.
As soon as I picked the book up and saw the location (New England) I knew I was in trouble,I don't go a bundle on the intellectually aspirational type people who write from that neck of the woods,they seem to write for sewing cicles and coffee mornings in my mind,but maybe I'm just bitter and twisted.Its just too comfortable for me ,like being smothered with expensive cushions or drowning in warm beer.But maybe thats what the general public wants it obviously sells in vast quantities.
To sum up I think I was too impressed by the shining accolades bestowed upon it.It obviously touched many people and I suppose these will be among his loyal fans, mainly made up of spiritually retarded sentimental dreamers with unrealised literary ambitions,but I guess I'm being a tad cruel and reactionist now.


Who can forget Owen Meany? , 05 Jun 2008
Every now and then, about once a year or so, I take this book down from the shelf and just look at it for a while without opening it. You see, I am doomed to remember a boy with a wrecked voice. I read the opening lines; again I am instantly captivated and find myself thinking of Owen Meany.
INTO PARADISE MAY THE ANGELS LEAD YOU

Beautifully written, 01 Oct 2008
I loved this absolutely beautifully written book and read it in one sitting. Narrated by an English butler, Mr Stevens (we never know his first name), it is a truly moving tale. From the day he sets off on his journey, the story captivates you until the final pages. I loved his definitions of the word 'dignity' and I would thoroughly recommend this as an excellent, enthralling read of times gone by. I wished it had been longer! It won the Booker prize and for once, you can see why.

Faultless, 25 Sep 2008
In short, yes! To all the articulately phrased 5 star reviews above. The Remains of the Day is one of the 20th century's great books. Absolutely essential on the bookshelf. A great gift. Utterly beautiful and clever and sly and absorbing. 5 stars aren't really enough. (Does this volume control go to 11?)

My favourite book of all time, 25 Aug 2008
I read this book on a long plane journey back from Hong Kong when I was 18. Though I had been in Asia for 9 months, I was immediately thrust back into the pre-world war II of gentrified England; stultified, polite and controlled. It astounds me how Japanese-born Ishiguro creates so well the character of Stevens, the middle-aged painfully correct and repressed butler. You bleed for him as his own inhibitions hold him back from criticising his master and accepting he is in love.

One of the final scenes in Weymouth makes me cry everytime. It is Stevens realisation of all he has loved and lost and nothing I have read since has ever been able to compare to that bitter-sweet tang of understanding that it is too late to try again.

Absolutely masterful.

Beautiful, touching, heart-breaking. Simply wonderful. , 15 Aug 2008
I have read this book four or five times now. I recently purchased the book again. The brilliance of The Remains of the Day is illustrated by the fact that you can read it several times and the poignancy and emotional evocation hit with the same force as reading for the first time. The book opens with a prologue that centres on the theme of bantering - which is quite simply brilliant in the way it probes and makes real issues of culture and meaning, and the difficulties inherent in stepping into different worlds. The rest of the book is simply beautiful, moving and real to an extent that is very rarely reached. I am hardly ever touched on a deep emotional level by novels but this book tears me apart every time. Reading it makes me want to reach out and talk to Mr Stevens and Miss Kenton and plead with them not to walk away from their love for each other. Without doubt one of the best novels ever written.

Touching and beautiful, 23 Jun 2008
It was an impulse read after seeing the movie. What a dear book! It's been a long time since I really enjoyed reading and I read a lot but what I mean is deriving almost physical pleasure from beautiful and eloquent language, and taking time over a book unfolding the characters. One cannot fail to be moved by the story and it certainly made me want to re-assess the certain priorities. My favourite scene is towards the end when Miss Kenton confesses that the reason she was unhappy with her marriage is because she often wondered what kind of a life she might have had with him, Stevens, it's absolutely breathtaking. Why or why do we waste opportunities.....


A strange, disappointing read, 31 Aug 2008
This is a strange book. The plot unfolds very slowly - in places, too slowly - at first with hints, then with a little more; tasters of what's to come. And yet in the end, I felt there were too many unanaswered quesitons, and I felt cheated. The characters are two-dimensional and never really come alive. For me, a good novel has to have 3 main ingredients. It has to have at least one really sympathetic character, it should be well-written, and it must hold my attention. The best this novel did for me was to hold my attention, but only because I wanted explanations and answers, and in the end these were not forthcoming.

Adding my voice to the sound of disappointment..., 25 Aug 2008
I was excited to see this work by Kazuo Ishiguro, having read a good number of his previous novels and enjoyed them. Unfortunately, "Never Let Me Go" falls short of Ishiguro's usual high standard.

Whilst the premise of the story has great potential, the plot lacks pace and the delivery struggles to hold (my) the reader's interest. Who is the intended audience? I wonder. Not seasoned adult readers, surely.

I found "Never Let Me Go" a slow, tedious read, and while I did find myself wanting to discover if there were indeed any dark mystery, I resorted to speed reading to reach the end - a sure sign, for me, of a certain lack of quality.

Sorry to say, when there are so many spectacular reads out there, and so little time, this one gets a thumbs down from me.

Sensitive, ultimately credible, 20 Aug 2008
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro is a compelling portrait of people on the downside of a dystopia. Like Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale or J G Ballard's Kingdom come, Never Let me Go is built around an abhorrent aspect of social organisation. Crucially, in all three books, the focus of the subject matter is merely an extension of a facet of our own society. Fertility issues provide the material for The Handmaid's Tale, while brainless consumerism fuelled Kingdom Come. Kazuo Ishiguro's subject matter has a medical focus that provides an essentially more credible idea than either of the two other works mentioned. Eventually Ballard's vision cannot be maintained by his scant material, whereas Margaret Atwood's is strengthened by the credibility of its own downside. Ishiguro's story line is strong enough in itself to maintain interest, credibility and drama from start to finish. There is real humanity in this story.

The book begins in Hailsham, an obviously special school set in an idyllic corner of the English countryside. But this is clearly no ordinary education. We follow the fortunes of three of its students, Kathy, Ruth and Tommy. We see them grow up, make their fumbling transformation from childhood to adolescence and then embark upon the stuttering unpredictability of young adulthood. Hailsham's students have to learn how to deal with their own shortcomings and how to manage their talents. They must cope with sometimes strained relations with their teachers, especially in the area of reconciling what they want to do versus what seems to be demanded of them, and thus what they are allowed to attempt. They become aware of sex and introduce themselves to its world in their own ways at different times, each of them reacting differently to their experience.

So what makes these people so special? Well, for a start they live protected lives. They never appear to need any money, nor possessions, for that matter, what little they do have being recycled ad infinitum via a system of almost formal barter. They seem to be protected from fashion, consumerism, family break-up, mass media and even street life. Surely there is something strange about them, despite their apparently normal physical, mental and psychological characteristics.

Not until about half way through the book does the reader start to fill in the blanks. But by the end the dreadful picture is complete, and rendered even more frightening by its complete credibility. To find out the nature of the plot, you will have to read the book, but, though I have stressed the importance of the overall concept's contribution to the book's success, it is not the subject matter that makes this a superb novel. It is the characterisation, the empathy that the reader develops with Kathy and Tommy and the sympathy that their tragedy eventually engenders. The context served to amplify these responses, not blur or confuse them. It is this quality that makes never Let Me Go a completely memorable and highly moving read.




Lazy and pretentious, 15 Aug 2008
I was both disappointed and depressed by this book. It seemed to me that the author had an interesting idea which he didn't feel it necessary to think through with enough dedication, and his half-heartedness is evident in this tediously drawn-out and unloveable story. His trademark simplicity of language, elsewhere used with integrity, here only exacerbates a basically poor plot, feeble characterisation, and a curious absence of warmth or sensitivity or insight. Having a first person narrator with such limitations was always going to be problematic, but it doesn't excuse the author's inability to inject any life and magic into the characters or the plot. Time and again he keeps us hanging on with the narrator's promise of 'what happened next' - which is invariably some very minor event which he fails to enliven with any true significance - no humour, emotion, energy or interest. The reader may be drawn in by the easy language, which often degenerates into repetition and banality; but the 'oddness' of the story lies fundamentally in its emptiness. He touches on areas of great potential - the maternal instinct, sexuality and emotion, heredity, the role of art and so on, but leaves them dangling in a way which suggests laziness and sloppiness rather than some sort of postmodern reflection on life in general. He acutely observes nuances of mannerism and behaviour, but the characters themselves are wooden, and we feel Ishiguro himself doesn't really believe in them. The fact that it all ends in death for them in spite of art and love is almost cynical here - his depiction of art and love is as flimsy as the collages the 'students' make out of bits of rubbish. There is such a thing as integrity in art, and I fail to see how this made it into any 'Gallery'.

Disturbingly beautiful, 07 Aug 2008
I love the beautiful haunting phrasing of Kazuo Ishiguro, and this novel is no exception. A compelling read and a truely disturbing vision of the future.

Life Changing? Not for me., 26 Sep 2008
Having greatly enjoyed `The World According to Garp' I was looking forward to `A Prayer for Owen Meany `which has the reputation of being Irving's best book. But I was sadly disappointed and remain somewhat baffled by the praise heaped on this novel - it is not dreadful, but not wonderful either.

I didn't warm to Owen, while at times intriguing I found him increasingly annoying as the book progressed. THE DECISION TO HAVE ALL OF HIS SPEECH IN CAPITALS DOESN'T HELP AS IT FEELS LIKE HE IS SHOUTING & LONGER PASSAGES ARE DIFFICULT TO READ. John Wheelwright the narrator is bland and dull, only distinguished by his love of Owen. Which leaves only the supporting character to add interest, I'd have liked more of Johns', Mother, Grandmother & his cousin Hester.

My second problem is that the book is too long by at least 200 pages. The basic plot elements would make a decent novella. Once Owens fate is mostly revealed, about half way through, narrative & character getting lost in a long wade through dull and often repetitive diversions on religion, Vietnam, contras, Johns boring life in Canada. Before we finally get anywhere near a conclusion. I was tempted to give up about 2/3rd through, only carrying on in hope of a revelatory ending.

My biggest problem though is that while Irving seems to be trying to make points about faith and religion. It isn't clear what they are, and the whole thing becomes increasing turgid. Some claim this book as life changing (though without saying how their lives have changed). They are I think reading it as an endorsement of faith, but I'm not sure if that is the intention. Irving twice quotes Thomas Hardy on `living in a world where nothing bears out in practice what it promises incipiently' and the underwhelming nature of the key `revelations'' here (Johns father, the detail of Owens fate) seem to fit with that view. But it is such a mess of ideas it is difficult to know what Irving intended.

A novel I will remember, but couldn't recommended.



Takes your breath away, 28 Aug 2008
Every few months I take time out from my work and sit and read these reviews on Amazon, just to remind me of this wonderful book and to bring back my experience of reading it for the first time. Five minutes into reading the reviews and I'm silently weeping.

It's a utter privelidge to have had the opportunity to read such a book.

Beautiful Owen , 13 Aug 2008
I read this a few weeks ago and half-way through it I thought it was a bit over-long. It's a great story and the characters are superb - Owen has to be one of the best characters of all time. But it's a bit of a marathon of a book and as I read it I just wanted to finish it - not because it was boring but because I'm always eager to read my next book. However, as I got towards the end a strange thing happened. The closer I came to finishing it the more I didn't want it to end. The more you get to know Owen the more you want him to be part of your life forever. And you know what? I think he will be. A truly great book. Long... but you might end up wishing it was longer.

Against the tide, 23 Jul 2008
This was the first book by John Irving I've read and I found it rather too drawn out for its own good.I can't believe I've read the same book as the other reviewers or is the Irving publicity machine so convincing as to warp the literary sensibilities of a large part of the educated population.
As soon as I picked the book up and saw the location (New England) I knew I was in trouble,I don't go a bundle on the intellectually aspirational type people who write from that neck of the woods,they seem to write for sewing cicles and coffee mornings in my mind,but maybe I'm just bitter and twisted.Its just too comfortable for me ,like being smothered with expensive cushions or drowning in warm beer.But maybe thats what the general public wants it obviously sells in vast quantities.
To sum up I think I was too impressed by the shining accolades bestowed upon it.It obviously touched many people and I suppose these will be among his loyal fans, mainly made up of spiritually retarded sentimental dreamers with unrealised literary ambitions,but I guess I'm being a tad cruel and reactionist now.


Who can forget Owen Meany? , 05 Jun 2008
Every now and then, about once a year or so, I take this book down from the shelf and just look at it for a while without opening it. You see, I am doomed to remember a boy with a wrecked voice. I read the opening lines; again I am instantly captivated and find myself thinking of Owen Meany.
INTO PARADISE MAY THE ANGELS LEAD YOU

garp wrote..., 21 Mar 2008
the humour in this is what captivates every one of it's readers. irving creates a special kind of relationship between his characters and his readers, you care about what happens to then when you aren't reading the book and when it's over you can just sit there for a time just thinking about it. personally this book was an impulse buy after a traumatic day, books are cheaper than smack and much better for your health. definitely worth it, i sat up reading it all night. buy it, you won't regret it.

It isn't as bad as Owen Meany..., 07 Dec 2007
A grotesque 'comedy' by a writer who thinks he's an awful lot better than he actually is, and boy does he want you to know it. Hypocritical, degrading to women and at least 300 pages too long. An 'X-Rated soap opera' with a medley of irritating characters - T.S.Garp not least of all.

New to his books, 09 Mar 2007
I only picked this up after being recommended it- and having read no John Irving books before, had no hopes for this book. However, right from the start I found myself engrossed in the storyline and the characters! In fact, putting the book down was a challenge as all the way through there is something you want resolved and want to know what happens...the events themselves are plastered with twists and turns, unusual and sometimes comical moments, but always heartfelt in one way or another. I also really liked the style it was written in, and everything came together to create a great read for those into all genres of literature.

The Dickens of our age , 12 Feb 2007
John Irving has a talent that every writer on Earth wants: he is able to create characters powerful enough to make the reader draw breath, powerful enough to make the reader leave finger marks over the cover from gripping it too tight.
I read the book when I was 15 and now I am 18. I have read many fiction books since then but none that have left an indelible impression as Technical Sargent Garp have. His character is one filled with all the flaws, hopes and failings of the Western Man. This is perhaps what is so appealing and endearing about his character: he makes the same mistakes that we would in his situation, and he suffers for them like we would. His failings include: 1) His "lust" as his mother puts it 2) His inherent contradictions that set him up to be knocked down. but we don't laugh at him, we cry with him.

What a book. Don't waste your time reading another review-go buy it now!

The first book I've bought by John Irving, now he's my favourite author, 15 Oct 2006
I really like this book. I'm a very young reader as I'd like to put it.
I find that this book has a pretty good humour and amazing, unforgetable characters and events.
I lent this book to a friend and she commented to me that she refused to read it any further because of how graphic it was when Garp's mother wants to have children but she doesnt want to be with a man so she turns to Technical Sergeant Garp who is parlylized. Personaly I don't really mind a book with too much sexual activity. There's no point in not including real life.
If you're a reader who doesn't really enjoy a book that has sex in them, then I wouldn't reccomend Jonh Irving because his novels have quite a bit of it, I'm not saying that in every single sentance there's the word 'penis'.
I would say that to anyone that likes a bit of imagination and that's mature enough to read the book without showing every single 'rude' word to the person closest to you then buy this book. I certainly enjoyed it. It's far better than any book found in my school library!

Beautifully written, 01 Oct 2008
I loved this absolutely beautifully written book and read it in one sitting. Narrated by an English butler, Mr Stevens (we never know his first name), it is a truly moving tale. From the day he sets off on his journey, the story captivates you until the final pages. I loved his definitions of the word 'dignity' and I would thoroughly recommend this as an excellent, enthralling read of times gone by. I wished it had been longer! It won the Booker prize and for once, you can see why.

Faultless, 25 Sep 2008
In short, yes! To all the articulately phrased 5 star reviews above. The Remains of the Day is one of the 20th century's great books. Absolutely essential on the bookshelf. A great gift. Utterly beautiful and clever and sly and absorbing. 5 stars aren't really enough. (Does this volume control go to 11?)

My favourite book of all time, 25 Aug 2008
I read this book on a long plane journey back from Hong Kong when I was 18. Though I had been in Asia for 9 months, I was immediately thrust back into the pre-world war II of gentrified England; stultified, polite and controlled. It astounds me how Japanese-born Ishiguro creates so well the character of Stevens, the middle-aged painfully correct and repressed butler. You bleed for him as his own inhibitions hold him back from criticising his master and accepting he is in love.

One of the final scenes in Weymouth makes me cry everytime. It is Stevens realisation of all he has loved and lost and nothing I have read since has ever been able to compare to that bitter-sweet tang of understanding that it is too late to try again.

Absolutely masterful.

Beautiful, touching, heart-breaking. Simply wonderful. , 15 Aug 2008
I have read this book four or five times now. I recently purchased the book again. The brilliance of The Remains of the Day is illustrated by the fact that you can read it several times and the poignancy and emotional evocation hit with the same force as reading for the first time. The book opens with a prologue that centres on the theme of bantering - which is quite simply brilliant in the way it probes and makes real issues of culture and meaning, and the difficulties inherent in stepping into different worlds. The rest of the book is simply beautiful, moving and real to an extent that is very rarely reached. I am hardly ever touched on a deep emotional level by novels but this book tears me apart every time. Reading it makes me want to reach out and talk to Mr Stevens and Miss Kenton and plead with them not to walk away from their love for each other. Without doubt one of the best novels ever written.

Touching and beautiful, 23 Jun 2008
It was an impulse read after seeing the movie. What a dear book! It's been a long time since I really enjoyed reading and I read a lot but what I mean is deriving almost physical pleasure from beautiful and eloquent language, and taking time over a book unfolding the characters. One cannot fail to be moved by the story and it certainly made me want to re-assess the certain priorities. My favourite scene is towards the end when Miss Kenton confesses that the reason she was unhappy with her marriage is because she often wondered what kind of a life she might have had with him, Stevens, it's absolutely breathtaking. Why or why do we waste opportunities.....


A strange, disappointing read, 31 Aug 2008
This is a strange book. The plot unfolds very slowly - in places, too slowly - at first with hints, then with a little more; tasters of what's to come. And yet in the end, I felt there were too many unanaswered quesitons, and I felt cheated. The characters are two-dimensional and never really come alive. For me, a good novel has to have 3 main ingredients. It has to have at least one really sympathetic character, it should be well-written, and it must hold my attention. The best this novel did for me was to hold my attention, but only because I wanted explanations and answers, and in the end these were not forthcoming.

Adding my voice to the sound of disappointment..., 25 Aug 2008
I was excited to see this work by Kazuo Ishiguro, having read a good number of his previous novels and enjoyed them. Unfortunately, "Never Let Me Go" falls short of Ishiguro's usual high standard.

Whilst the premise of the story has great potential, the plot lacks pace and the delivery struggles to hold (my) the reader's interest. Who is the intended audience? I wonder. Not seasoned adult readers, surely.

I found "Never Let Me Go" a slow, tedious read, and while I did find myself wanting to discover if there were indeed any dark mystery, I resorted to speed reading to reach the end - a sure sign, for me, of a certain lack of quality.

Sorry to say, when there are so many spectacular reads out there, and so little time, this one gets a thumbs down from me.

Sensitive, ultimately credible, 20 Aug 2008
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro is a compelling portrait of people on the downside of a dystopia. Like Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale or J G Ballard's Kingdom come, Never Let me Go is built around an abhorrent aspect of social organisation. Crucially, in all three books, the focus of the subject matter is merely an extension of a facet of our own society. Fertility issues provide the material for The Handmaid's Tale, while brainless consumerism fuelled Kingdom Come. Kazuo Ishiguro's subject matter has a medical focus that provides an essentially more credible idea than either of the two other works mentioned. Eventually Ballard's vision cannot be maintained by his scant material, whereas Margaret Atwood's is strengthened by the credibility of its own downside. Ishiguro's story line is strong enough in itself to maintain interest, credibility and drama from start to finish. There is real humanity in this story.

The book begins in Hailsham, an obviously special school set in an idyllic corner of the English countryside. But this is clearly no ordinary education. We follow the fortunes of three of its students, Kathy, Ruth and Tommy. We see them grow up, make their fumbling transformation from childhood to adolescence and then embark upon the stuttering unpredictability of young adulthood. Hailsham's students have to learn how to deal with their own shortcomings and how to manage their talents. They must cope with sometimes strained relations with their teachers, especially in the area of reconciling what they want to do versus what seems to be demanded of them, and thus what they are allowed to attempt. They become aware of sex and introduce themselves to its world in their own ways at different times, each of them reacting differently to their experience.

So what makes these people so special? Well, for a start they live protected lives. They never appear to need any money, nor possessions, for that matter, what little they do have being recycled ad infinitum via a system of almost formal barter. They seem to be protected from fashion, consumerism, family break-up, mass media and even street life. Surely there is something strange about them, despite their apparently normal physical, mental and psychological characteristics.

Not until about half way through the book does the reader start to fill in the blanks. But by the end the dreadful picture is complete, and rendered even more frightening by its complete credibility. To find out the nature of the plot, you will have to read the book, but, though I have stressed the importance of the overall concept's contribution to the book's success, it is not the subject matter that makes this a superb novel. It is the characterisation, the empathy that the reader develops with Kathy and Tommy and the sympathy that their tragedy eventually engenders. The context served to amplify these responses, not blur or confuse them. It is this quality that makes never Let Me Go a completely memorable and highly moving read.




Lazy and pretentious, 15 Aug 2008
I was both disappointed and depressed by this book. It seemed to me that the author had an interesting idea which he didn't feel it necessary to think through with enough dedication, and his half-heartedness is evident in this tediously drawn-out and unloveable story. His trademark simplicity of language, elsewhere used with integrity, here only exacerbates a basically poor plot, feeble characterisation, and a curious absence of warmth or sensitivity or insight. Having a first person narrator with such limitations was always going to be problematic, but it doesn't excuse the author's inability to inject any life and magic into the characters or the plot. Time and again he keeps us hanging on with the narrator's promise of 'what happened next' - which is invariably some very minor event which he fails to enliven with any true significance - no humour, emotion, energy or interest. The reader may be drawn in by the easy language, which often degenerates into repetition and banality; but the 'oddness' of the story lies fundamentally in its emptiness. He touches on areas of great potential - the maternal instinct, sexuality and emotion, heredity, the role of art and so on, but leaves them dangling in a way which suggests laziness and sloppiness rather than some sort of postmodern reflection on life in general. He acutely observes nuances of mannerism and behaviour, but the characters themselves are wooden, and we feel Ishiguro himself doesn't really believe in them. The fact that it all ends in death for them in spite of art and love is almost cynical here - his depiction of art and love is as flimsy as the collages the 'students' make out of bits of rubbish. There is such a thing as integrity in art, and I fail to see how this made it into any 'Gallery'.

Disturbingly beautiful, 07 Aug 2008
I love the beautiful haunting phrasing of Kazuo Ishiguro, and this novel is no exception. A compelling read and a truely disturbing vision of the future.

Life Changing? Not for me., 26 Sep 2008
Having greatly enjoyed `The World According to Garp' I was looking forward to `A Prayer for Owen Meany `which has the reputation of being Irving's best book. But I was sadly disappointed and remain somewhat baffled by the praise heaped on this novel - it is not dreadful, but not wonderful either.

I didn't warm to Owen, while at times intriguing I found him increasingly annoying as the book progressed. THE DECISION TO HAVE ALL OF HIS SPEECH IN CAPITALS DOESN'T HELP AS IT FEELS LIKE HE IS SHOUTING & LONGER PASSAGES ARE DIFFICULT TO READ. John Wheelwright the narrator is bland and dull, only distinguished by his love of Owen. Which leaves only the supporting character to add interest, I'd have liked more of Johns', Mother, Grandmother & his cousin Hester.

My second problem is that the book is too long by at least 200 pages. The basic plot elements would make a decent novella. Once Owens fate is mostly revealed, about half way through, narrative & character getting lost in a long wade through dull and often repetitive diversions on religion, Vietnam, contras, Johns boring life in Canada. Before we finally get anywhere near a conclusion. I was tempted to give up about 2/3rd through, only carrying on in hope of a revelatory ending.

My biggest problem though is that while Irving seems to be trying to make points about faith and religion. It isn't clear what they are, and the whole thing becomes increasing turgid. Some claim this book as life changing (though without saying how their lives have changed). They are I think reading it as an endorsement of faith, but I'm not sure if that is the intention. Irving twice quotes Thomas Hardy on `living in a world where nothing bears out in practice what it promises incipiently' and the underwhelming nature of the key `revelations'' here (Johns father, the detail of Owens fate) seem to fit with that view. But it is such a mess of ideas it is difficult to know what Irving intended.

A novel I will remember, but couldn't recommended.



Takes your breath away, 28 Aug 2008
Every few months I take time out from my work and sit and read these reviews on Amazon, just to remind me of this wonderful book and to bring back my experience of reading it for the first time. Five minutes into reading the reviews and I'm silently weeping.

It's a utter privelidge to have had the opportunity to read such a book.

Beautiful Owen , 13 Aug 2008
I read this a few weeks ago and half-way through it I thought it was a bit over-long. It's a great story and the characters are superb - Owen has to be one of the best characters of all time. But it's a bit of a marathon of a book and as I read it I just wanted to finish it - not because it was boring but because I'm always eager to read my next book. However, as I got towards the end a strange thing happened. The closer I came to finishing it the more I didn't want it to end. The more you get to know Owen the more you want him to be part of your life forever. And you know what? I think he will be. A truly great book. Long... but you might end up wishing it was longer.

Against the tide, 23 Jul 2008
This was the first book by John Irving I've read and I found it rather too drawn out for its own good.I can't believe I've read the same book as the other reviewers or is the Irving publicity machine so convincing as to warp the literary sensibilities of a large part of the educated population.
As soon as I picked the book up and saw the location (New England) I knew I was in trouble,I don't go a bundle on the intellectually aspirational type people who write from that neck of the woods,they seem to write for sewing cicles and coffee mornings in my mind,but maybe I'm just bitter and twisted.Its just too comfortable for me ,like being smothered with expensive cushions or drowning in warm beer.But maybe thats what the general public wants it obviously sells in vast quantities.
To sum up I think I was too impressed by the shining accolades bestowed upon it.It obviously touched many people and I suppose these will be among his loyal fans, mainly made up of spiritually retarded sentimental dreamers with unrealised literary ambitions,but I guess I'm being a tad cruel and reactionist now.


Who can forget Owen Meany? , 05 Jun 2008
Every now and then, about once a year or so, I take this book down from the shelf and just look at it for a while without opening it. You see, I am doomed to remember a boy with a wrecked voice. I read the opening lines; again I am instantly captivated and find myself thinking of Owen Meany.
INTO PARADISE MAY THE ANGELS LEAD YOU

garp wrote..., 21 Mar 2008
the humour in this is what captivates every one of it's readers. irving creates a special kind of relationship between his characters and his readers, you care about what happens to then when you aren't reading the book and when it's over you can just sit there for a time just thinking about it. personally this book was an impulse buy after a traumatic day, books are cheaper than smack and much better for your health. definitely worth it, i sat up reading it all night. buy it, you won't regret it.

It isn't as bad as Owen Meany..., 07 Dec 2007
A grotesque 'comedy' by a writer who thinks he's an awful lot better than he actually is, and boy does he want you to know it. Hypocritical, degrading to women and at least 300 pages too long. An 'X-Rated soap opera' with a medley of irritating characters - T.S.Garp not least of all.

New to his books, 09 Mar 2007
I only picked this up after being recommended it- and having read no John Irving books before, had no hopes for this book. However, right from the start I found myself engrossed in the storyline and the characters! In fact, putting the book down was a challenge as all the way through there is something you want resolved and want to know what happens...the events themselves are plastered with twists and turns, unusual and sometimes comical moments, but always heartfelt in one way or another. I also really liked the style it was written in, and everything came together to create a great read for those into all genres of literature.

The Dickens of our age , 12 Feb 2007
John Irving has a talent that every writer on Earth wants: he is able to create characters powerful enough to make the reader draw breath, powerful enough to make the reader leave finger marks over the cover from gripping it too tight.
I read the book when I was 15 and now I am 18. I have read many fiction books since then but none that have left an indelible impression as Technical Sargent Garp have. His character is one filled with all the flaws, hopes and failings of the Western Man. This is perhaps what is so appealing and endearing about his character: he makes the same mistakes that we would in his situation, and he suffers for them like we would. His failings include: 1) His "lust" as his mother puts it 2) His inherent contradictions that set him up to be knocked down. but we don't laugh at him, we cry with him.

What a book. Don't waste your time reading another review-go buy it now!

The first book I've bought by John Irving, now he's my favourite author, 15 Oct 2006
I really like this book. I'm a very young reader as I'd like to put it.
I find that this book has a pretty good humour and amazing, unforgetable characters and events.
I lent this book to a friend and she commented to me that she refused to read it any further because of how graphic it was when Garp's mother wants to have children but she doesnt want to be with a man so she turns to Technical Sergeant Garp who is parlylized. Personaly I don't really mind a book with too much sexual activity. There's no point in not including real life.
If you're a reader who doesn't really enjoy a book that has sex in them, then I wouldn't reccomend Jonh Irving because his novels have quite a bit of it, I'm not saying that in every single sentance there's the word 'penis'.
I would say that to anyone that likes a bit of imagination and that's mature enough to read the book without showing every single 'rude' word to the person closest to you then buy this book. I certainly enjoyed it. It's far better than any book found in my school library!

An Extraordinary Portrait Of Weimar Berlin!, 17 Mar 2005
"I am a camera with its shutter open, quite passive, recording, not thinking," wrote Christopher Isherwood, at the beginning of "Goodbye to Berlin." "Recording the man shaving at the window opposite and the woman in the kimono washing her hair. Some day, all this will have to be developed, carefully printed, fixed." In the six portraits of Weimar Berlin that comprise "Goodbye To Berlin," Isherwood chronicles his life among the demimonde in this gloriously decadent capital city. He lived there, off and on, between 1929 and 1933. These marvelous stories are a fusion of fact and fiction. With each tale, and the passing of time, the sense of foreboding and the author's prophetic imagery intensifies, as Germany prepares to embrace Adolph Hitler.

Berlin was still a charming city of broad avenues, parks and cafés during this period. It was also a grotesque metropolis of night-people, visionaries, political fanatics - a place filled with intrigue, where vice and virtue were found in abundance - more of the former than the latter. 1930s Berlin was a powerful city of mobs and millionaires. And it was one huge salon, a center of European intellectual life where the arts and sciences flourished. This is the scene which provides a backdrop for Isherwood's stories.

The six "Goodbye To Berlin" stories form a relatively continuous narrative. In "A Berlin Diary - Autumn 1930," Isherwood introduces the reader to his landlady, the infamous Fraulein Schroeder, "Schroederschen," who calls him Herr Issyvoo. She is able to recite a history of her former lodgers by looking at the spots, stains and spillages left behind on her furniture, carpets and linens. Fellow flatmates include: Frl. Kost, a young woman, plump, blonde and pretty, who makes a living at the world's oldest profession - extremely upscale, of course; Bobby, who is a mixer at a west-end bar called the Troika, has adopted an English Christian name because they are all the rage; a commercial traveler, who is out most of the time, lives in the tiny attic which Frl. Schroeder refers to as the Swedish Pavilion; and Frl. Mayr, with her enormous arms, bull-dog jaw and coarse string-colored hair, is a music hall singer - the best in all of Germany, Schroeder assures with pride.

"Sally Bowles" certainly is divine decadence, and her antics make for a wonderful story. I had a difficult time keeping the image of Liza Minnelli singing "Cabaret" out of my mind, however. I must say though, after reading about Isherwood's Sally, I have to laud Ms. Minnelli on her performance. Her characterization is indeed recognizable in this Ms. Bowles.

"On Ruegen Island - Summer 1931" describes the author's holiday and the two characters he becomes involved with at a summer resort, Otto Nowak and Peter Wilkinson. Otto is a working class German youth, who uses his attractiveness to freeload off of men and women alike, rather than earn an honest wage. Peter Wilkinson, an Englishman living in Berlin, is extremely neurotic and very attached to Otto, although the two quarrel and bicker constantly.

"The Nowaks," Otto, (of Ruegen Island), and his immediate family, take Isherwood in as a lodger. As money becomes more difficult to come by and the effects of hyperinflation take their toll on Christopher's pocketbook, he has to economize and temporarily leaves Frl. Schroeder's relatively luxurious flat, for the slum-like, working-class projects of Wassertorstrasse.

In "The Landaurers," a wealthy Jewish family is aware of what is in store with the rise of Hitler's Nazism. Natalie befriends Isherwood, and through her so does her family. In this story the perils ahead are obvious and the Landaurers make preparations to leave Germany.

And in "A Berlin Diary - Winter - 1932-33," Isherwood bids farewell to Berlin. He will not return until 1952.

These are well written and important stories which paint a picture of a never-to-be-forgotten time. The language and content give a real sense of the period, and Christopher Isherwood's taut and descriptive narrative is superb. Highly recommended!
JANA

Stunning, Atmospheric, Prescient, 10 Mar 2003
`Goodbye to Berlin' is writing at its best: spare, unadorned, and sincere. Christopher Isherwood flies in the face of today's tendency towards florid, pretentious writing, which seems to favor five similies when none would have done. His evocation of pre-WWII Berlin through a series of interlinked stories, and the deft, subtly drawn characters - the famous Sally Bowles is just one - is unforgettable.

Perhaps it is the way Isherwood writes with a remarkable lack of ego - as his famous quote states, events are captured as objectively as a camera records light onto a photographic film. This does not mean he is impassive; quite the opposite. His desire is clearly to record a fragile time exactly as it was. Nobody knows the outcome of history until it happens, and the rise of the Nazi party as told here is all the more horrifying, as we experience it as the people themselves must have done - first a fringe party regarded as little more than a joke, then as rulers of the country, in a frighteningly short space of time.

Although it's small and perfectly formed, you'll never want it to end. Isherwood's original intention was to include these episodes in a much larger opus about Germany in the Weimar Republic, but there's something about the fragmented quality of the eventual book which is perfectly suited to its subject matter.

It takes pride of place in my library.

Amazing portrayal of a city soon to change, 30 Jan 2003
What is unique in this book is its lack of reference to Nazism. Only at the end do we really see politics enter the novel and feel Berlin's doom closing in. Almost everyone Isherwood comes across are not political- they just want to get on with life. As an exception to this there is a group of Communists her sets out to meet but they seem devoted to theory alone.
The sense of Berlin's eminent change builds up momentum throughout the novel- at the start it is difficult to imagine the city Isherwood is writing about is soon to lose a vast amount of its population to the camps, the army or the bombs and most of its buildings destroyed. The light-hearted section detailing Sally Bowles's friendship guides us into more serious pieces on poverty and charged relationships ending with Isherwood's exit from Berlin, as the Nazi's power grows too strong.
Isherwood's writing seems modern for its time and has a sense of amusing reality that reminded me of George Orwell's Down and Out In Paris In London. What struck me as his finest point was the way in which his characters just leap off the page into reality and seem bursting with life. This makes the ending seem even more poignant than it is as we leave many of these characters to face their fate.
This is a wonderful last glance back at the old Berlin that no longer exists.

Hello to old Berlin, 17 Aug 2000
This book is known as the original of "Cabaret"- which is why I bought it. And am I glad I did- don't expect the story as seen on stage or film, for here you will find several accounts of pre-war Berlin from various view points. The book is made up of several, smaller, novella's that are vaguely related while independent in themselves. Isherwood's strength lies in his ability to create characters that are believable (all, or at least most, were based on real persons that Isherwood had met), and to evoke the atmosphere of the Berlin of the 30's. His writing style is quite simple, yet says all that there is to say- which makes this book very easy to read. He manages to create the increasingly opressive atmosphere of pre-war Germany throughout the book; which grows into an observation of Germany's response to the growing threat of Nazism- which makes us feel as though we could possibly have been there. It is a fascinating account of the changes that took place, and it shows how people can be led astray to believe false truths etc. This has to be one of my favourite books of all time because of what it is- A study of various characters, A document of a changing Germany, An echo of a lifestyle now lost...Read and Enjoy- with crude fascination!

Beautifully written, 01 Oct 2008
I loved this absolutely beautifully written book and read it in one sitting. Narrated by an English butler, Mr Stevens (we never know his first name), it is a truly moving tale. From the day he sets off on his journey, the story captivates you until the final pages. I loved his definitions of the word 'dignity' and I would thoroughly recommend this as an excellent, enthralling read of times gone by. I wished it had been longer! It won the Booker prize and for once, you can see why.

Faultless, 25 Sep 2008
In short, yes! To all the articulately phrased 5 star reviews above. The Remains of the Day is one of the 20th century's great books. Absolutely essential on the bookshelf. A great gift. Utterly beautiful and clever and sly and absorbing. 5 stars aren't really enough. (Does this volume control go to 11?)

My favourite book of all time, 25 Aug 2008
I read this book on a long plane journey back from Hong Kong when I was 18. Though I had been in Asia for 9 months, I was immediately thrust back into the pre-world war II of gentrified England; stultified, polite and controlled. It astounds me how Japanese-born Ishiguro creates so well the character of Stevens, the middle-aged painfully correct and repressed butler. You bleed for him as his own inhibitions hold him back from criticising his master and accepting he is in love.

One of the final scenes in Weymouth makes me cry everytime. It is Stevens realisation of all he has loved and lost and nothing I have read since has ever been able to compare to that bitter-sweet tang of understanding that it is too late to try again.

Absolutely masterful.

Beautiful, touching, heart-breaking. Simply wonderful. , 15 Aug 2008
I have read this book four or five times now. I recently purchased the book again. The brilliance of The Remains of the Day is illustrated by the fact that you can read it several times and the poignancy and emotional evocation hit with the same force as reading for the first time. The book opens with a prologue that centres on the theme of bantering - which is quite simply brilliant in the way it probes and makes real issues of culture and meaning, and the difficulties inherent in stepping into different worlds. The rest of the book is simply beautiful, moving and real to an extent that is very rarely reached. I am hardly ever touched on a deep emotional level by novels but this book tears me apart every time. Reading it makes me want to reach out and talk to Mr Stevens and Miss Kenton and plead with them not to walk away from their love for each other. Without doubt one of the best novels ever written.

Touching and beautiful, 23 Jun 2008
It was an impulse read after seeing the movie. What a dear book! It's been a long time since I really enjoyed reading and I read a lot but what I mean is deriving almost physical pleasure from beautiful and eloquent language, and taking time over a book unfolding the characters. One cannot fail to be moved by the story and it certainly made me want to re-assess the certain priorities. My favourite scene is towards the end when Miss Kenton confesses that the reason she was unhappy with her marriage is because she often wondered what kind of a life she might have had with him, Stevens, it's absolutely breathtaking. Why or why do we waste opportunities.....


A strange, disappointing read, 31 Aug 2008
This is a strange book. The plot unfolds very slowly - in places, too slowly - at first with hints, then with a little more; tasters of what's to come. And yet in the end, I felt there were too many unanaswered quesitons, and I felt cheated. The characters are two-dimensional and never really come alive. For me, a good novel has to have 3 main ingredients. It has to have at least one really sympathetic character, it should be well-written, and it must hold my attention. The best this novel did for me was to hold my attention, but only because I wanted explanations and answers, and in the end these were not forthcoming.

Adding my voice to the sound of disappointment..., 25 Aug 2008
I was excited to see this work by Kazuo Ishiguro, having read a good number of his previous novels and enjoyed them. Unfortunately, "Never Let Me Go" falls short of Ishiguro's usual high standard.

Whilst the premise of the story has great potential, the plot lacks pace and the delivery struggles to hold (my) the reader's interest. Who is the intended audience? I wonder. Not seasoned adult readers, surely.

I found "Never Let Me Go" a slow, tedious read, and while I did find myself wanting to discover if there were indeed any dark mystery, I resorted to speed reading to reach the end - a sure sign, for me, of a certain lack of quality.

Sorry to say, when there are so many spectacular reads out there, and so little time, this one gets a thumbs down from me.

Sensitive, ultimately credible, 20 Aug 2008
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro is a compelling portrait of people on the downside of a dystopia. Like Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale or J G Ballard's Kingdom come, Never Let me Go is built around an abhorrent aspect of social organisation. Crucially, in all three books, the focus of the subject matter is merely an extension of a facet of our own society. Fertility issues provide the material for The Handmaid's Tale, while brainless consumerism fuelled Kingdom Come. Kazuo Ishiguro's subject matter has a medical focus that provides an essentially more credible idea than either of the two other works mentioned. Eventually Ballard's vision cannot be maintained by his scant material, whereas Margaret Atwood's is strengthened by the credibility of its own downside. Ishiguro's story line is strong enough in itself to maintain interest, credibility and drama from start to finish. There is real humanity in this story.

The book begins in Hailsham, an obviously special school set in an idyllic corner of the English countryside. But this is clearly no ordinary education. We follow the fortunes of three of its students, Kathy, Ruth and Tommy. We see them grow up, make their fumbling transformation from childhood to adolescence and then embark upon the stuttering unpredictability of young adulthood. Hailsham's students have to learn how to deal with their own shortcomings and how to manage their talents. They must cope with sometimes strained relations with their teachers, especially in the area of reconciling what they want to do versus what seems to be demanded of them, and thus what they are allowed to attempt. They become aware of sex and introduce themselves to its world in their own ways at different times, each of them reacting differently to their experience.

So what makes these people so special? Well, for a start they live protected lives. They never appear to need any money, nor possessions, for that matter, what little they do have being recycled ad infinitum via a system of almost formal barter. They seem to be protected from fashion, consumerism, family break-up, mass media and even street life. Surely there is something strange about them, despite their apparently normal physical, mental and psychological characteristics.

Not until about half way through the book does the reader start to fill in the blanks. But by the end the dreadful picture is complete, and rendered even more frightening by its complete credibility. To find out the nature of the plot, you will have to read the book, but, though I have stressed the importance of the overall concept's contribution to the book's success, it is not the subject matter that makes this a superb novel. It is the characterisation, the empathy that the reader develops with Kathy and Tommy and the sympathy that their tragedy eventually engenders. The context served to amplify these responses, not blur or confuse them. It is this quality that makes never Let Me Go a completely memorable and highly moving read.




Lazy and pretentious, 15 Aug 2008
I was both disappointed and depressed by this book. It seemed to me that the author had an interesting idea which he didn't feel it necessary to think through with enough dedication, and his half-heartedness is evident in this tediously drawn-out and unloveable story. His trademark simplicity of language, elsewhere used with integrity, here only exacerbates a basically poor plot, feeble characterisation, and a curious absence of warmth or sensitivity or insight. Having a first person narrator with such limitations was always going to be problematic, but it doesn't excuse the author's inability to inject any life and magic into the characters or the plot. Time and again he keeps us hanging on with the narrator's promise of 'what happened next' - which is invariably some very minor event which he fails to enliven with any true significance - no humour, emotion, energy or interest. The reader may be drawn in by the easy language, which often degenerates into repetition and banality; but the 'oddness' of the story lies fundamentally in its emptiness. He touches on areas of great potential - the maternal instinct, sexuality and emotion, heredity, the role of art and so on, but leaves them dangling in a way which suggests laziness and sloppiness rather than some sort of postmodern reflection on life in general. He acutely observes nuances of mannerism and behaviour, but the characters themselves are wooden, and we feel Ishiguro himself doesn't really believe in them. The fact that it all ends in death for them in spite of art and love is almost cynical here - his depiction of art and love is as flimsy as the collages the 'students' make out of bits of rubbish. There is such a thing as integrity in art, and I fail to see how this made it into any 'Gallery'.

Disturbingly beautiful, 07 Aug 2008
I love the beautiful haunting phrasing of Kazuo Ishiguro, and this novel is no exception. A compelling read and a truely disturbing vision of the future.

Life Changing? Not for me., 26 Sep 2008
Having greatly enjoyed `The World According to Garp' I was looking forward to `A Prayer for Owen Meany `which has the reputation of being Irving's best book. But I was sadly disappointed and remain somewhat baffled by the praise heaped on this novel - it is not dreadful, but not wonderful either.

I didn't warm to Owen, while at times intriguing I found him increasingly annoying as the book progressed. THE DECISION TO HAVE ALL OF HIS SPEECH IN CAPITALS DOESN'T HELP AS IT FEELS LIKE HE IS SHOUTING & LONGER PASSAGES ARE DIFFICULT TO READ. John Wheelwright the narrator is bland and dull, only distinguished by his love of Owen. Which leaves only the supporting character to add interest, I'd have liked more of Johns', Mother, Grandmother & his cousin Hester.

My second problem is that the book is too long by at least 200 pages. The basic plot elements would make a decent novella. Once Owens fate is mostly revealed, about half way through, narrative & character getting lost in a long wade through dull and often repetitive diversions on religion, Vietnam, contras, Johns boring life in Canada. Before we finally get anywhere near a conclusion. I was tempted to give up about 2/3rd through, only carrying on in hope of a revelatory ending.

My biggest problem though is that while Irving seems to be trying to make points about faith and religion. It isn't clear what they are, and the whole thing becomes increasing turgid. Some claim this book as life changing (though without saying how their lives have changed). They are I think reading it as an endorsement of faith, but I'm not sure if that is the intention. Irving twice quotes Thomas Hardy on `living in a world where nothing bears out in practice what it promises incipiently' and the underwhelming nature of the key `revelations'' here (Johns father, the detail of Owens fate) seem to fit with that view. But it is such a mess of ideas it is difficult to know what Irving intended.

A novel I will remember, but couldn't recommended.



Takes your breath away, 28 Aug 2008
Every few months I take time out from my work and sit and read these reviews on Amazon, just to remind me of this wonderful book and to bring back my experience of reading it for the first time. Five minutes into reading the reviews and I'm silently weeping.

It's a utter privelidge to have had the opportunity to read such a book.

Beautiful Owen , 13 Aug 2008
I read this a few weeks ago and half-way through it I thought it was a bit over-long. It's a great story and the characters are superb - Owen has to be one of the best characters of all time. But it's a bit of a marathon of a book and as I read it I just wanted to finish it - not because it was boring but because I'm always eager to read my next book. However, as I got towards the end a strange thing happened. The closer I came to finishing it the more I didn't want it to end. The more you get to know Owen the more you want him to be part of your life forever. And you know what? I think he will be. A truly great book. Long... but you might end up wishing it was longer.

Against the tide, 23 Jul 2008
This was the first book by John Irving I've read and I found it rather too drawn out for its own good.I can't believe I've read the same book as the other reviewers or is the Irving publicity machine so convincing as to warp the literary sensibilities of a large part of the educated population.
As soon as I picked the book up and saw the location (New England) I knew I was in trouble,I don't go a bundle on the intellectually aspirational type people who write from that neck of the woods,they seem to write for sewing cicles and coffee mornings in my mind,but maybe I'm just bitter and twisted.Its just too comfortable for me ,like being smothered with expensive cushions or drowning in warm beer.But maybe thats what the general public wants it obviously sells in vast quantities.
To sum up I think I was too impressed by the shining accolades bestowed upon it.It obviously touched many people and I suppose these will be among his loyal fans, mainly made up of spiritually retarded sentimental dreamers with unrealised literary ambitions,but I guess I'm being a tad cruel and reactionist now.


Who can forget Owen Meany? , 05 Jun 2008
Every now and then, about once a year or so, I take this book down from the shelf and just look at it for a while without opening it. You see, I am doomed to remember a boy with a wrecked voice. I read the opening lines; again I am instantly captivated and find myself thinking of Owen Meany.
INTO PARADISE MAY THE ANGELS LEAD YOU

garp wrote..., 21 Mar 2008
the humour in this is what captivates every one of it's readers. irving creates a special kind of relationship between his characters and his readers, you care about what happens to then when you aren't reading the book and when it's over you can just sit there for a time just thinking about it. personally this book was an impulse buy after a traumatic day, books are cheaper than smack and much better for your health. definitely worth it, i sat up reading it all night. buy it, you won't regret it.

It isn't as bad as Owen Meany..., 07 Dec 2007
A grotesque 'comedy' by a writer who thinks he's an awful lot better than he actually is, and boy does he want you to know it. Hypocritical, degrading to women and at least 300 pages too long. An 'X-Rated soap opera' with a medley of irritating characters - T.S.Garp not least of all.

New to his books, 09 Mar 2007
I only picked this up after being recommended it- and having read no John Irving books before, had no hopes for this book. However, right from the start I found myself engrossed in the storyline and the characters! In fact, putting the book down was a challenge as all the way through there is something you want resolved and want to know what happens...the events themselves are plastered with twists and turns, unusual and sometimes comical moments, but always heartfelt in one way or another. I also really liked the style it was written in, and everything came together to create a great read for those into all genres of literature.

The Dickens of our age , 12 Feb 2007
John Irving has a talent that every writer on Earth wants: he is able to create characters powerful enough to make the reader draw breath, powerful enough to make the reader leave finger marks over the cover from gripping it too tight.
I read the book when I was 15 and now I am 18. I have read many fiction books since then but none that have left an indelible impression as Technical Sargent Garp have. His character is one filled with all the flaws, hopes and failings of the Western Man. This is perhaps what is so appealing and endearing about his character: he makes the same mistakes that we would in his situation, and he suffers for them like we would. His failings include: 1) His "lust" as his mother puts it 2) His inherent contradictions that set him up to be knocked down. but we don't laugh at him, we cry with him.

What a book. Don't waste your time reading another review-go buy it now!

The first book I've bought by John Irving, now he's my favourite author, 15 Oct 2006
I really like this book. I'm a very young reader as I'd like to put it.
I find that this book has a pretty good humour and amazing, unforgetable characters and events.
I lent this book to a friend and she commented to me that she refused to read it any further because of how graphic it was when Garp's mother wants to have children but she doesnt want to be with a man so she turns to Technical Sergeant Garp who is parlylized. Personaly I don't really mind a book with too much sexual activity. There's no point in not including real life.
If you're a reader who doesn't really enjoy a book that has sex in them, then I wouldn't reccomend Jonh Irving because his novels have quite a bit of it, I'm not saying that in every single sentance there's the word 'penis'.
I would say that to anyone that likes a bit of imagination and that's mature enough to read the book without showing every single 'rude' word to the person closest to you then buy this book. I certainly enjoyed it. It's far better than any book found in my school library!

An Extraordinary Portrait Of Weimar Berlin!, 17 Mar 2005
"I am a camera with its shutter open, quite passive, recording, not thinking," wrote Christopher Isherwood, at the beginning of "Goodbye to Berlin." "Recording the man shaving at the window opposite and the woman in the kimono washing her hair. Some day, all this will have to be developed, carefully printed, fixed." In the six portraits of Weimar Berlin that comprise "Goodbye To Berlin," Isherwood chronicles his life among the demimonde in this gloriously decadent capital city. He lived there, off and on, between 1929 and 1933. These marvelous stories are a fusion of fact and fiction. With each tale, and the passing of time, the sense of foreboding and the author's prophetic imagery intensifies, as Germany prepares to embrace Adolph Hitler.

Berlin was still a charming city of broad avenues, parks and cafés during this period. It was also a grotesque metropolis of night-people, visionaries, political fanatics - a place filled with intrigue, where vice and virtue were found in abundance - more of the former than the latter. 1930s Berlin was a powerful city of mobs and millionaires. And it was one huge salon, a center of European intellectual life where the arts and sciences flourished. This is the scene which provides a backdrop for Isherwood's stories.

The six "Goodbye To Berlin" stories form a relatively continuous narrative. In "A Berlin Diary - Autumn 1930," Isherwood introduces the reader to his landlady, the infamous Fraulein Schroeder, "Schroederschen," who calls him Herr Issyvoo. She is able to recite a history of her former lodgers by looking at the spots, stains and spillages left behind on her furniture, carpets and linens. Fellow flatmates include: Frl. Kost, a young woman, plump, blonde and pretty, who makes a living at the world's oldest profession - extremely upscale, of course; Bobby, who is a mixer at a west-end bar called the Troika, has adopted an English Christian name because they are all the rage; a commercial traveler, who is out most of the time, lives in the tiny attic which Frl. Schroeder refers to as the Swedish Pavilion; and Frl. Mayr, with her enormous arms, bull-dog jaw and coarse string-colored hair, is a music hall singer - the best in all of Germany, Schroeder assures with pride.

"Sally Bowles" certainly is divine decadence, and her antics make for a wonderful story. I had a difficult time keeping the image of Liza Minnelli singing "Cabaret" out of my mind, however. I must say though, after reading about Isherwood's Sally, I have to laud Ms. Minnelli on her performance. Her characterization is indeed recognizable in this Ms. Bowles.

"On Ruegen Island - Summer 1931" describes the author's holiday and the two characters he becomes involved with at a summer resort, Otto Nowak and Peter Wilkinson. Otto is a working class German youth, who uses his attractiveness to freeload off of men and women alike, rather than earn an honest wage. Peter Wilkinson, an Englishman living in Berlin, is extremely neurotic and very attached to Otto, although the two quarrel and bicker constantly.

"The Nowaks," Otto, (of Ruegen Island), and his immediate family, take Isherwood in as a lodger. As money becomes more difficult to come by and the effects of hyperinflation take their toll on Christopher's pocketbook, he has to economize and temporarily leaves Frl. Schroeder's relatively luxurious flat, for the slum-like, working-class projects of Wassertorstrasse.

In "The Landaurers," a wealthy Jewish family is aware of what is in store with the rise of Hitler's Nazism. Natalie befriends Isherwood, and through her so does her family. In this story the perils ahead are obvious and the Landaurers make preparations to leave Germany.

And in "A Berlin Diary - Winter - 1932-33," Isherwood bids farewell to Berlin. He will not return until 1952.

These are well written and important stories which paint a picture of a never-to-be-forgotten time. The language and content give a real sense of the period, and Christopher Isherwood's taut and descriptive narrative is superb. Highly recommended!
JANA

Stunning, Atmospheric, Prescient, 10 Mar 2003
`Goodbye to Berlin' is writing at its best: spare, unadorned, and sincere. Christopher Isherwood flies in the face of today's tendency towards florid, pretentious writing, which seems to favor five similies when none would have done. His evocation of pre-WWII Berlin through a series of interlinked stories, and the deft, subtl