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Beyond Black
Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
*Best price found from Amazon Marketplace seller
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*Amazon: £1.00
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 Customer Reviews
Receipt?, 30 Aug 2008
Talk about your zeitgeist novel - this one is perfect 90s. Funny, apt, intelligent. But can anyone tell me what the receipt was for? The one found under Mrs Etchells' floorboards? Because I haven't a clue.
a how-we-got-to-here book, not what-happens-next?, 24 Aug 2008
For a book you clearly either love or hate, I thought I'd go for a controversial three-stars...though I see it's been done.
This is well written, and the characters do start to take some root in your brain.
But I kind-of prefer a plot to a slow exposition of retrospective misery...
Funny, sad, tragic and enlightning... I loved this book., 01 Mar 2008
Speaking as someone who's done the Psychic & Mystic Fair Circuits and read many of Ms Mantels other books I was both intrigued and hesitant about this book as I worried she might give the usual description of supernatural.
Instead I was delighted to find that she'd used her wonderful imagination to create Alisons' world instead of the usual hackneyed view of a psychics' life, ability and how they'd comunicate with the spirit world.
This is a truely glorious work of fiction that I'd happily recommend to anyone who enjoys great writing and plot.
*Another little gem in this book is, at the end of novel there's an interview with Ms Mantel about the book, a description of her other novels, a list of her favourite books and a list of books by other authors that share a similar theme to Beyond Black.
P.S. The only reason I gave this book 4 stars instead of 5 is because I'm going to give it to her other book "Fludd" instead, though it was a close run thing.
Obviously this is a book that people love or hate - I loved it!, 14 Feb 2008
An engaging and very sympathetic central character (plus an unsympathetic but somehow still likeable supporting one in Colette - I think it was her acid tongue that I liked) gives life to this portrait of drab south-eastern England.
OK it's not Stephen King, in that the plot doesn't grip like a vice and there aren't massive supernatural shocks in store. In fact the 'fiends' were probably a lot more frightening when they were alive.
It reminded me a bit of 'The Office', purely in the sense that it's set in the same M25 hinterland where everything is a bit crap and shoddy, and it doesn't move along very fast. If you're enjoying the ride, that doesn't matter.
I found it funny, moving, and emotionally involving. The descriptions of psychic shows (based on the one (and only) show that I've seen) were spot-on, and I loved the bitching, rivalry, and ultimately friendship and support among Alison's fellow psychics. The descriptions of the male psychics particularly were very funny.
Pick it up, read the first few pages (up to about page 7) - that should be enough to tell you if you will enjoy the novel.
Various reviewers have complained about the book being too long. Au contraire - like Alison herself, there's just more of it to love.
2 words...., 25 Oct 2007
Beyond terrible.
This was simply the worst thing I have ever read, and I mean that wholeheartedly. 2-dimensional characters, a total lack of pace, excitement or direction, topped off with a horribly saccharine and conveniently 'all is well' conclusion that makes the end of The Matrix: Revolutions look like the Wachowski brothers DID, after all, know what they were doing.
Stay away from this. Read some Haruki Murakami instead.
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Giving Up the Ghost
Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
*Best price found from Amazon Marketplace seller
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*Amazon: £2.24
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Customer Reviews
Receipt?, 30 Aug 2008
Talk about your zeitgeist novel - this one is perfect 90s. Funny, apt, intelligent. But can anyone tell me what the receipt was for? The one found under Mrs Etchells' floorboards? Because I haven't a clue. a how-we-got-to-here book, not what-happens-next?, 24 Aug 2008
For a book you clearly either love or hate, I thought I'd go for a controversial three-stars...though I see it's been done.
This is well written, and the characters do start to take some root in your brain.
But I kind-of prefer a plot to a slow exposition of retrospective misery... Funny, sad, tragic and enlightning... I loved this book., 01 Mar 2008
Speaking as someone who's done the Psychic & Mystic Fair Circuits and read many of Ms Mantels other books I was both intrigued and hesitant about this book as I worried she might give the usual description of supernatural.
Instead I was delighted to find that she'd used her wonderful imagination to create Alisons' world instead of the usual hackneyed view of a psychics' life, ability and how they'd comunicate with the spirit world.
This is a truely glorious work of fiction that I'd happily recommend to anyone who enjoys great writing and plot.
*Another little gem in this book is, at the end of novel there's an interview with Ms Mantel about the book, a description of her other novels, a list of her favourite books and a list of books by other authors that share a similar theme to Beyond Black.
P.S. The only reason I gave this book 4 stars instead of 5 is because I'm going to give it to her other book "Fludd" instead, though it was a close run thing.
Obviously this is a book that people love or hate - I loved it!, 14 Feb 2008
An engaging and very sympathetic central character (plus an unsympathetic but somehow still likeable supporting one in Colette - I think it was her acid tongue that I liked) gives life to this portrait of drab south-eastern England.
OK it's not Stephen King, in that the plot doesn't grip like a vice and there aren't massive supernatural shocks in store. In fact the 'fiends' were probably a lot more frightening when they were alive.
It reminded me a bit of 'The Office', purely in the sense that it's set in the same M25 hinterland where everything is a bit crap and shoddy, and it doesn't move along very fast. If you're enjoying the ride, that doesn't matter.
I found it funny, moving, and emotionally involving. The descriptions of psychic shows (based on the one (and only) show that I've seen) were spot-on, and I loved the bitching, rivalry, and ultimately friendship and support among Alison's fellow psychics. The descriptions of the male psychics particularly were very funny.
Pick it up, read the first few pages (up to about page 7) - that should be enough to tell you if you will enjoy the novel.
Various reviewers have complained about the book being too long. Au contraire - like Alison herself, there's just more of it to love. 2 words...., 25 Oct 2007
Beyond terrible.
This was simply the worst thing I have ever read, and I mean that wholeheartedly. 2-dimensional characters, a total lack of pace, excitement or direction, topped off with a horribly saccharine and conveniently 'all is well' conclusion that makes the end of The Matrix: Revolutions look like the Wachowski brothers DID, after all, know what they were doing.
Stay away from this. Read some Haruki Murakami instead. fascinating and moving, 27 Apr 2005
I have a particular interest in this story because, weirdly, I also have hypothyroidism and endometriosis, and wanted to find out more about this commonly misdiagnosed illness. But I'm also a huge fan of Mantel's highly varied fiction, and was curious to find out where it came from. In one sense this is a familiar tale about a girl from the Northern mill-town who escapes poverty and hopelessness through a good education at grammar school. Many other British women authors, from Margaret Drabble to Margaret Forster have told it. Mantel's childhood, her apprehension of the Devil (she was raised a Catholic)her fatherlessness and confusion are described in all their black comedy and raw pain. However, the story goes off in an unexpected direction because of Mantel's illness, which colours her time in Africa and Saudi Arabia, her marriage and inevitably her choice of career. Some people are going to like it simply because of its frank account of what it feels like to go from being a size 10 to a size 20 (Yes: it sucks) and as one anxiously waiting to see if the effects can be reversed I'd like more on that... But what it also does is make you very angry on behalf of someone who, despite her formidable intelligence, was advised to become a librarian not a lawyer, and who was medicated as psychologically disturbed when she had a physical illness which rendered her infertile. It made me admire her work even more, knowing the conditions in which it must have been composed. Still waiting ......, 26 Oct 2004
I read this book waiting for something to happen but nothing did. Sounds an average childhood for a kid these days. I felt I had a more interesting childhood! Maybe I'll write a book myself one day. I thought the bit about the endometriosis was moving as many people have this condition and it is often misdiagnosed. Prize-winning autobiography: Mind 'book of the year' 2004, 18 Jul 2004
A victim of both medical disinterest and just-not-good-enough parenting, Hilary Mantel has attempted to exorcise the ghosts of her harrowing childhood in true Cixousian fashion by 'writing her self into being'. Like the journey from childlike innocence to worldly wisdom, her story takes some time to unfold. Patiently, I allowed her to set the scene. Quite suddenly, I realised I could not put the book down as I plunged headlong into the wonder of her story. Dragged in by the pathos, humour and sheer pull of Mantel's style, I sank deeper and deeper as she re-claimed her experiences on every page. Time and time again I became enthralled by her compelling life story, only to be suddenly whisked off without notice to my own 'house of childhood'. This book is so amazingly accessible, full of Joycean epiphanies that, via seemingly ordinary moments, transport the reader to the very whatness of a situation. Towards the end of the book, Mantel emerges from her esoteric childhood still possessed by the demons of her formative years. Her child-borne worthlessness and religiously instilled compliance had caused her to suffer excruciating abdominal pain, until radical surgery became her only life-saving option. Bereft of choices and feeling powerless to resist, her diseased innards were taken away - together with any hopes she had of becoming a mother. At the age of 30 years, a new ghost began to stir within her. Robbed of the child she desperately needed to induce her own re-birth, she has chosen to re-write her life in what has materialised as this prize-winning autobiography. She has done so in captivating fashion. Clean, deceptively simple writing - but rich food indeed!, 02 Aug 2003
Any autobiography written by a novelist whose literary craft and imaginative eye appeals to you, will be looked forward to and savoured, since the reader must hope that whatever the writer's life has been like, he or she will bring to bear their fine sense of observation and interpretation onto themselves. The best autobiography won't be just a catalogue of events, but will illustrate something universal. Hilary Mantel does not disappoint! This is marvellous. She takes the stuff of ordinary beginnings, and of course illustrates how extraordinary we all are, how precious and unique, how our history and memories shape and mould us. I also found her accounts of how her own ill health has had profound effects on her perception of herself extremely moving (side effects of medications which changed her whole physical identity) She chooses to take 'snapshots' of various facets of her life, and expands them into something almost approaching meditations. A wonderful book!
READ THIS BOOK, 12 Jun 2003
It is almost impossible to convey the emotional impact of this memoir. At times it is almost too painful to realise the wrong done to Mantel by the medical profession over several decades, but it is the mark of a writer of depth, intelligence, insight and wit that she has turned such appalling experience into intensely moving prose that is little short of miraculous. But then Mantel is a miraculous writer. If you haven't read her fiction you have a rare treat in store, and if you have you will have fallen upon her memoir eager to discover something about the razor sharp intellect behind such astonishing and varied story-telling. Every woman should read GIVING UP THE GHOST, as should every writer, every doctor, every student of human nature. Everyone, in fact. I defy anyone to remain unmoved by it.
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A Place of Greater Safety
Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
*Best price found from Amazon Marketplace seller
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*Amazon: £5.30
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Customer Reviews
Receipt?, 30 Aug 2008
Talk about your zeitgeist novel - this one is perfect 90s. Funny, apt, intelligent. But can anyone tell me what the receipt was for? The one found under Mrs Etchells' floorboards? Because I haven't a clue. a how-we-got-to-here book, not what-happens-next?, 24 Aug 2008
For a book you clearly either love or hate, I thought I'd go for a controversial three-stars...though I see it's been done.
This is well written, and the characters do start to take some root in your brain.
But I kind-of prefer a plot to a slow exposition of retrospective misery... Funny, sad, tragic and enlightning... I loved this book., 01 Mar 2008
Speaking as someone who's done the Psychic & Mystic Fair Circuits and read many of Ms Mantels other books I was both intrigued and hesitant about this book as I worried she might give the usual description of supernatural.
Instead I was delighted to find that she'd used her wonderful imagination to create Alisons' world instead of the usual hackneyed view of a psychics' life, ability and how they'd comunicate with the spirit world.
This is a truely glorious work of fiction that I'd happily recommend to anyone who enjoys great writing and plot.
*Another little gem in this book is, at the end of novel there's an interview with Ms Mantel about the book, a description of her other novels, a list of her favourite books and a list of books by other authors that share a similar theme to Beyond Black.
P.S. The only reason I gave this book 4 stars instead of 5 is because I'm going to give it to her other book "Fludd" instead, though it was a close run thing.
Obviously this is a book that people love or hate - I loved it!, 14 Feb 2008
An engaging and very sympathetic central character (plus an unsympathetic but somehow still likeable supporting one in Colette - I think it was her acid tongue that I liked) gives life to this portrait of drab south-eastern England.
OK it's not Stephen King, in that the plot doesn't grip like a vice and there aren't massive supernatural shocks in store. In fact the 'fiends' were probably a lot more frightening when they were alive.
It reminded me a bit of 'The Office', purely in the sense that it's set in the same M25 hinterland where everything is a bit crap and shoddy, and it doesn't move along very fast. If you're enjoying the ride, that doesn't matter.
I found it funny, moving, and emotionally involving. The descriptions of psychic shows (based on the one (and only) show that I've seen) were spot-on, and I loved the bitching, rivalry, and ultimately friendship and support among Alison's fellow psychics. The descriptions of the male psychics particularly were very funny.
Pick it up, read the first few pages (up to about page 7) - that should be enough to tell you if you will enjoy the novel.
Various reviewers have complained about the book being too long. Au contraire - like Alison herself, there's just more of it to love. 2 words...., 25 Oct 2007
Beyond terrible.
This was simply the worst thing I have ever read, and I mean that wholeheartedly. 2-dimensional characters, a total lack of pace, excitement or direction, topped off with a horribly saccharine and conveniently 'all is well' conclusion that makes the end of The Matrix: Revolutions look like the Wachowski brothers DID, after all, know what they were doing.
Stay away from this. Read some Haruki Murakami instead. fascinating and moving, 27 Apr 2005
I have a particular interest in this story because, weirdly, I also have hypothyroidism and endometriosis, and wanted to find out more about this commonly misdiagnosed illness. But I'm also a huge fan of Mantel's highly varied fiction, and was curious to find out where it came from. In one sense this is a familiar tale about a girl from the Northern mill-town who escapes poverty and hopelessness through a good education at grammar school. Many other British women authors, from Margaret Drabble to Margaret Forster have told it. Mantel's childhood, her apprehension of the Devil (she was raised a Catholic)her fatherlessness and confusion are described in all their black comedy and raw pain. However, the story goes off in an unexpected direction because of Mantel's illness, which colours her time in Africa and Saudi Arabia, her marriage and inevitably her choice of career. Some people are going to like it simply because of its frank account of what it feels like to go from being a size 10 to a size 20 (Yes: it sucks) and as one anxiously waiting to see if the effects can be reversed I'd like more on that... But what it also does is make you very angry on behalf of someone who, despite her formidable intelligence, was advised to become a librarian not a lawyer, and who was medicated as psychologically disturbed when she had a physical illness which rendered her infertile. It made me admire her work even more, knowing the conditions in which it must have been composed. Still waiting ......, 26 Oct 2004
I read this book waiting for something to happen but nothing did. Sounds an average childhood for a kid these days. I felt I had a more interesting childhood! Maybe I'll write a book myself one day. I thought the bit about the endometriosis was moving as many people have this condition and it is often misdiagnosed. Prize-winning autobiography: Mind 'book of the year' 2004, 18 Jul 2004
A victim of both medical disinterest and just-not-good-enough parenting, Hilary Mantel has attempted to exorcise the ghosts of her harrowing childhood in true Cixousian fashion by 'writing her self into being'. Like the journey from childlike innocence to worldly wisdom, her story takes some time to unfold. Patiently, I allowed her to set the scene. Quite suddenly, I realised I could not put the book down as I plunged headlong into the wonder of her story. Dragged in by the pathos, humour and sheer pull of Mantel's style, I sank deeper and deeper as she re-claimed her experiences on every page. Time and time again I became enthralled by her compelling life story, only to be suddenly whisked off without notice to my own 'house of childhood'. This book is so amazingly accessible, full of Joycean epiphanies that, via seemingly ordinary moments, transport the reader to the very whatness of a situation. Towards the end of the book, Mantel emerges from her esoteric childhood still possessed by the demons of her formative years. Her child-borne worthlessness and religiously instilled compliance had caused her to suffer excruciating abdominal pain, until radical surgery became her only life-saving option. Bereft of choices and feeling powerless to resist, her diseased innards were taken away - together with any hopes she had of becoming a mother. At the age of 30 years, a new ghost began to stir within her. Robbed of the child she desperately needed to induce her own re-birth, she has chosen to re-write her life in what has materialised as this prize-winning autobiography. She has done so in captivating fashion. Clean, deceptively simple writing - but rich food indeed!, 02 Aug 2003
Any autobiography written by a novelist whose literary craft and imaginative eye appeals to you, will be looked forward to and savoured, since the reader must hope that whatever the writer's life has been like, he or she will bring to bear their fine sense of observation and interpretation onto themselves. The best autobiography won't be just a catalogue of events, but will illustrate something universal. Hilary Mantel does not disappoint! This is marvellous. She takes the stuff of ordinary beginnings, and of course illustrates how extraordinary we all are, how precious and unique, how our history and memories shape and mould us. I also found her accounts of how her own ill health has had profound effects on her perception of herself extremely moving (side effects of medications which changed her whole physical identity) She chooses to take 'snapshots' of various facets of her life, and expands them into something almost approaching meditations. A wonderful book!
READ THIS BOOK, 12 Jun 2003
It is almost impossible to convey the emotional impact of this memoir. At times it is almost too painful to realise the wrong done to Mantel by the medical profession over several decades, but it is the mark of a writer of depth, intelligence, insight and wit that she has turned such appalling experience into intensely moving prose that is little short of miraculous. But then Mantel is a miraculous writer. If you haven't read her fiction you have a rare treat in store, and if you have you will have fallen upon her memoir eager to discover something about the razor sharp intellect behind such astonishing and varied story-telling. Every woman should read GIVING UP THE GHOST, as should every writer, every doctor, every student of human nature. Everyone, in fact. I defy anyone to remain unmoved by it.
Simply superb, 03 Apr 2008
One of the best historical novels I have read.
Hilary Mantel tackles a subject of enormous size and converts it to manageable proportions by concentrating on people rather than events.
It's a book I shall return to again and again.
My only complaint is that I wished it was longer...
A tour de force, 05 Apr 2007
Another gripping novel from Hilary Mantell, this book spans the final few decades of the 18th Century in France, describing the fall of the Ancien Regime and the rising tides of revolution through the eyes of three men at the centre of these tumultuous events - Danton, Desmoulins and the infamous Robespierre. Mantell has the great knack of being able to give even the most monstrous of characters a human dimension, and there are few more monstrous than Robespierre, the so-called incorruptible who was finally corrupted by the very pursuit of the vertu that was at the core of his political - and philosophical - beliefs. Mantell creates convincing portrayals of an array of characters, describing scenes of great horror with a sense of detachment that somehow magnifies the revulsion we feel. She skillfully handles an extremely complex period of history, revealing the human heart at the centre these remote events. Danton and Desmoulins are at once sympathetic and flawed, and the woman that loved them are given real voices. A wonderful book.
brilliant!, 21 Apr 2002
This is a gripping yet highly literate tale of the Revolution. It is unusual to find an historical novel with such flair, resonance, wit and sheer style. The characterisations of Desmoulins, Danton and Robespierre are vivid, believable and brilliantly done. Robespierre is not someone one can warm to given prior knowledge of his career, yet even he comes across as someone one can, whilst not understand and relate to, at least find some saving grace of humanity in, and that takes some skill! I have read this three times and it reads as well third time out as first. I can really recommend this as something just a little bit different, a real work of class.
Outstanding, 11 Oct 2000
The characterisation of Danton and Desmoulins is fascinating and thoroughly convincing. I found Robespierre much harder to relate to because of his role in history, and he certainly came across as the individualist he was. It was a valiant effort at him. The entire period of tumult and bloodshed is vivid, believable, well written and stylish. The interplay between characters and lives in the structure of the book as well as its plot makes for a gripping read. Thoroughly recommended.
A compelling story of real and fascinating people, 03 Feb 2000
This is a huge and dynamic novel about three makers of the French Revolution. The two more famous men, Danton and Robespierre, are linked by their mutual friend Camille Desmoulins, whose role in history was to make the speech that inflamed the mob to storm the Bastille. The novel shows us a very complex and chaotic revolution, accelerated by many types of people and careering out of anyone's control. It is far from a simple case of the peasants rising up to guillotine the aristocrats. The three main characters are diverse: Danton the bluff orator, the patriot who expects to make a good living out of the revolution; Robespierre the incorruptible, ruled by logic, who believes that the revolution is an essential reform more important than mere individuals, and the magnetic hell-raiser Camille - brilliant, immature, seductive, amoral, driven. Their wives, lovers, friends and enemies swarm through the book creating a riot of events and ideas. This is wonderful writing with sparkles of genius: Camille's wife imagines the 'semi-demi-half life' of existence without him; a major character dies leaving a book marked with her place, 'And this is it' - it is twinned with her place as a character in this book, the place she got up to. Hilary Mantel teases fiction out of history, leaving the imaginary indistinguishable from the facts. Both are compelling and thrilling, from the young Camille's subtle humiliation of his host at a dinner party, as a means of seducing his hostess, to Danton's theft of the French crown jewels for diamonds to bribe the enemy to lose a battle. The story, written in short fragments from various personal points of view, has a form similar to another great historical novel, 'The Man on a Donkey', but this is faster and races through events with a comprehensively modern air. The complexity of the historical events make it an involved narrative with a great many characters, but for the reader who is willing to be swept along, this is a lasting experience. Have two copies - one to dip into again and again, and one to lend to lucky friends.
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Customer Reviews
Receipt?, 30 Aug 2008
Talk about your zeitgeist novel - this one is perfect 90s. Funny, apt, intelligent. But can anyone tell me what the receipt was for? The one found under Mrs Etchells' floorboards? Because I haven't a clue. a how-we-got-to-here book, not what-happens-next?, 24 Aug 2008
For a book you clearly either love or hate, I thought I'd go for a controversial three-stars...though I see it's been done.
This is well written, and the characters do start to take some root in your brain.
But I kind-of prefer a plot to a slow exposition of retrospective misery... Funny, sad, tragic and enlightning... I loved this book., 01 Mar 2008
Speaking as someone who's done the Psychic & Mystic Fair Circuits and read many of Ms Mantels other books I was both intrigued and hesitant about this book as I worried she might give the usual description of supernatural.
Instead I was delighted to find that she'd used her wonderful imagination to create Alisons' world instead of the usual hackneyed view of a psychics' life, ability and how they'd comunicate with the spirit world.
This is a truely glorious work of fiction that I'd happily recommend to anyone who enjoys great writing and plot.
*Another little gem in this book is, at the end of novel there's an interview with Ms Mantel about the book, a description of her other novels, a list of her favourite books and a list of books by other authors that share a similar theme to Beyond Black.
P.S. The only reason I gave this book 4 stars instead of 5 is because I'm going to give it to her other book "Fludd" instead, though it was a close run thing.
Obviously this is a book that people love or hate - I loved it!, 14 Feb 2008
An engaging and very sympathetic central character (plus an unsympathetic but somehow still likeable supporting one in Colette - I think it was her acid tongue that I liked) gives life to this portrait of drab south-eastern England.
OK it's not Stephen King, in that the plot doesn't grip like a vice and there aren't massive supernatural shocks in store. In fact the 'fiends' were probably a lot more frightening when they were alive.
It reminded me a bit of 'The Office', purely in the sense that it's set in the same M25 hinterland where everything is a bit crap and shoddy, and it doesn't move along very fast. If you're enjoying the ride, that doesn't matter.
I found it funny, moving, and emotionally involving. The descriptions of psychic shows (based on the one (and only) show that I've seen) were spot-on, and I loved the bitching, rivalry, and ultimately friendship and support among Alison's fellow psychics. The descriptions of the male psychics particularly were very funny.
Pick it up, read the first few pages (up to about page 7) - that should be enough to tell you if you will enjoy the novel.
Various reviewers have complained about the book being too long. Au contraire - like Alison herself, there's just more of it to love. 2 words...., 25 Oct 2007
Beyond terrible.
This was simply the worst thing I have ever read, and I mean that wholeheartedly. 2-dimensional characters, a total lack of pace, excitement or direction, topped off with a horribly saccharine and conveniently 'all is well' conclusion that makes the end of The Matrix: Revolutions look like the Wachowski brothers DID, after all, know what they were doing.
Stay away from this. Read some Haruki Murakami instead. fascinating and moving, 27 Apr 2005
I have a particular interest in this story because, weirdly, I also have hypothyroidism and endometriosis, and wanted to find out more about this commonly misdiagnosed illness. But I'm also a huge fan of Mantel's highly varied fiction, and was curious to find out where it came from. In one sense this is a familiar tale about a girl from the Northern mill-town who escapes poverty and hopelessness through a good education at grammar school. Many other British women authors, from Margaret Drabble to Margaret Forster have told it. Mantel's childhood, her apprehension of the Devil (she was raised a Catholic)her fatherlessness and confusion are described in all their black comedy and raw pain. However, the story goes off in an unexpected direction because of Mantel's illness, which colours her time in Africa and Saudi Arabia, her marriage and inevitably her choice of career. Some people are going to like it simply because of its frank account of what it feels like to go from being a size 10 to a size 20 (Yes: it sucks) and as one anxiously waiting to see if the effects can be reversed I'd like more on that... But what it also does is make you very angry on behalf of someone who, despite her formidable intelligence, was advised to become a librarian not a lawyer, and who was medicated as psychologically disturbed when she had a physical illness which rendered her infertile. It made me admire her work even more, knowing the conditions in which it must have been composed. Still waiting ......, 26 Oct 2004
I read this book waiting for something to happen but nothing did. Sounds an average childhood for a kid these days. I felt I had a more interesting childhood! Maybe I'll write a book myself one day. I thought the bit about the endometriosis was moving as many people have this condition and it is often misdiagnosed. Prize-winning autobiography: Mind 'book of the year' 2004, 18 Jul 2004
A victim of both medical disinterest and just-not-good-enough parenting, Hilary Mantel has attempted to exorcise the ghosts of her harrowing childhood in true Cixousian fashion by 'writing her self into being'. Like the journey from childlike innocence to worldly wisdom, her story takes some time to unfold. Patiently, I allowed her to set the scene. Quite suddenly, I realised I could not put the book down as I plunged headlong into the wonder of her story. Dragged in by the pathos, humour and sheer pull of Mantel's style, I sank deeper and deeper as she re-claimed her experiences on every page. Time and time again I became enthralled by her compelling life story, only to be suddenly whisked off without notice to my own 'house of childhood'. This book is so amazingly accessible, full of Joycean epiphanies that, via seemingly ordinary moments, transport the reader to the very whatness of a situation. Towards the end of the book, Mantel emerges from her esoteric childhood still possessed by the demons of her formative years. Her child-borne worthlessness and religiously instilled compliance had caused her to suffer excruciating abdominal pain, until radical surgery became her only life-saving option. Bereft of choices and feeling powerless to resist, her diseased innards were taken away - together with any hopes she had of becoming a mother. At the age of 30 years, a new ghost began to stir within her. Robbed of the child she desperately needed to induce her own re-birth, she has chosen to re-write her life in what has materialised as this prize-winning autobiography. She has done so in captivating fashion. Clean, deceptively simple writing - but rich food indeed!, 02 Aug 2003
Any autobiography written by a novelist whose literary craft and imaginative eye appeals to you, will be looked forward to and savoured, since the reader must hope that whatever the writer's life has been like, he or she will bring to bear their fine sense of observation and interpretation onto themselves. The best autobiography won't be just a catalogue of events, but will illustrate something universal. Hilary Mantel does not disappoint! This is marvellous. She takes the stuff of ordinary beginnings, and of course illustrates how extraordinary we all are, how precious and unique, how our history and memories shape and mould us. I also found her accounts of how her own ill health has had profound effects on her perception of herself extremely moving (side effects of medications which changed her whole physical identity) She chooses to take 'snapshots' of various facets of her life, and expands them into something almost approaching meditations. A wonderful book!
READ THIS BOOK, 12 Jun 2003
It is almost impossible to convey the emotional impact of this memoir. At times it is almost too painful to realise the wrong done to Mantel by the medical profession over several decades, but it is the mark of a writer of depth, intelligence, insight and wit that she has turned such appalling experience into intensely moving prose that is little short of miraculous. But then Mantel is a miraculous writer. If you haven't read her fiction you have a rare treat in store, and if you have you will have fallen upon her memoir eager to discover something about the razor sharp intellect behind such astonishing and varied story-telling. Every woman should read GIVING UP THE GHOST, as should every writer, every doctor, every student of human nature. Everyone, in fact. I defy anyone to remain unmoved by it.
Simply superb, 03 Apr 2008
One of the best historical novels I have read.
Hilary Mantel tackles a subject of enormous size and converts it to manageable proportions by concentrating on people rather than events.
It's a book I shall return to again and again.
My only complaint is that I wished it was longer...
A tour de force, 05 Apr 2007
Another gripping novel from Hilary Mantell, this book spans the final few decades of the 18th Century in France, describing the fall of the Ancien Regime and the rising tides of revolution through the eyes of three men at the centre of these tumultuous events - Danton, Desmoulins and the infamous Robespierre. Mantell has the great knack of being able to give even the most monstrous of characters a human dimension, and there are few more monstrous than Robespierre, the so-called incorruptible who was finally corrupted by the very pursuit of the vertu that was at the core of his political - and philosophical - beliefs. Mantell creates convincing portrayals of an array of characters, describing scenes of great horror with a sense of detachment that somehow magnifies the revulsion we feel. She skillfully handles an extremely complex period of history, revealing the human heart at the centre these remote events. Danton and Desmoulins are at once sympathetic and flawed, and the woman that loved them are given real voices. A wonderful book.
brilliant!, 21 Apr 2002
This is a gripping yet highly literate tale of the Revolution. It is unusual to find an historical novel with such flair, resonance, wit and sheer style. The characterisations of Desmoulins, Danton and Robespierre are vivid, believable and brilliantly done. Robespierre is not someone one can warm to given prior knowledge of his career, yet even he comes across as someone one can, whilst not understand and relate to, at least find some saving grace of humanity in, and that takes some skill! I have read this three times and it reads as well third time out as first. I can really recommend this as something just a little bit different, a real work of class.
Outstanding, 11 Oct 2000
The characterisation of Danton and Desmoulins is fascinating and thoroughly convincing. I found Robespierre much harder to relate to because of his role in history, and he certainly came across as the individualist he was. It was a valiant effort at him. The entire period of tumult and bloodshed is vivid, believable, well written and stylish. The interplay between characters and lives in the structure of the book as well as its plot makes for a gripping read. Thoroughly recommended.
A compelling story of real and fascinating people, 03 Feb 2000
This is a huge and dynamic novel about three makers of the French Revolution. The two more famous men, Danton and Robespierre, are linked by their mutual friend Camille Desmoulins, whose role in history was to make the speech that inflamed the mob to storm the Bastille. The novel shows us a very complex and chaotic revolution, accelerated by many types of people and careering out of anyone's control. It is far from a simple case of the peasants rising up to guillotine the aristocrats. The three main characters are diverse: Danton the bluff orator, the patriot who expects to make a good living out of the revolution; Robespierre the incorruptible, ruled by logic, who believes that the revolution is an essential reform more important than mere individuals, and the magnetic hell-raiser Camille - brilliant, immature, seductive, amoral, driven. Their wives, lovers, friends and enemies swarm through the book creating a riot of events and ideas. This is wonderful writing with sparkles of genius: Camille's wife imagines the 'semi-demi-half life' of existence without him; a major character dies leaving a book marked with her place, 'And this is it' - it is twinned with her place as a character in this book, the place she got up to. Hilary Mantel teases fiction out of history, leaving the imaginary indistinguishable from the facts. Both are compelling and thrilling, from the young Camille's subtle humiliation of his host at a dinner party, as a means of seducing his hostess, to Danton's theft of the French crown jewels for diamonds to bribe the enemy to lose a battle. The story, written in short fragments from various personal points of view, has a form similar to another great historical novel, 'The Man on a Donkey', but this is faster and races through events with a comprehensively modern air. The complexity of the historical events make it an involved narrative with a great many characters, but for the reader who is willing to be swept along, this is a lasting experience. Have two copies - one to dip into again and again, and one to lend to lucky friends.
A truly horrible heroine, 16 Jan 2008
After reading several recommendations for Elizabeth Taylor books I decided to give Angel a go. This is the story of an arrogant young girl who lives in her imagination rather that face up to her dull life living with her mother above a grocers shop. As an escape she starts writing novels and against all odds they are huge success despite their overblown style. Angel clearly thinks that she is one of the most talented authors of her generation but she is widely derided by the critics.
This novel is designed to be darkly funny and there is much humour to be had from Angel's delusions of talent but I did struggled with the fact that the she had no redeeming features at all. Taylor shows a woman who is completely disinterested in the outside world unless it directly affects her. While this is deliberate it means the book has a slightly claustrophobic and narrow feel to it. Most of the characters were a little one dimensional though I did love Marvell the gardener who is a masterpiece. All in all I am glad that I read the book but it will not go down as one of my favourites.
Witty, Amusing, Light-Hearted Parody of the Publishing World, 02 Jul 2006
The life and times of a famous author
This is a lovely book to read on holiday or whilst travelling. It is a light-hearted dig at authors, readers, publishers and most vitriolically, of critics. Elizabeth Taylor is a fine writer with an exquisite turn of self-deprecation and devastating humour. You have the sense Taylor is either writing about herself or is secretly enjoying a joke at another author's expense. Taylor even laughs at the pretentiousness of the art world. Be that as it may, the protagonist, Angel, is completely endearing for all her extreme self-confidence and haughty self-centredness. As an example, in one scene, Angel's fierce Staffordshire bull terrier (_) Sultan, attacks a little Yorkshire terrier (_?) and, in fact, kills it. Rather than apologising to the hapless owner, whose dog it was, Angel frostily tells the owner that she should have kept the dog under control and totters off with as much dignity and pride that she can muster (whilst taking a wrong turning).
As a newly published author, Angel fantasises creating a novel preparing dreadful humiliations and a painful death for one of her critics. What writer has not had that fantasy!? In all, it is excruciatingly funny. It is set in the early part of C20 and has an air of nostalgia and ruefulness that brings to mind the style of Jane Gardam in her recent book, _Old Filth_.
I would not hesitate to recommend this book. Elizabeth Taylor has an economically light way of writing that is at the same time both incisive and cruel, but yet charming - and thoroughly enjoyable!
Dark masterpiece..., 29 Jan 2005
Elizabeth Taylor is one of English literature's best kept secrets; her shrewd, observant novels of human frailty have won her a small but devoted readership and 'Angel' is held by many as their favourite of her books. Spurred on by loneliness and desperation, the young and staunchly determined Angelica Deverell draws on her own naïve perceptions of literature to produce what she thinks are masterpieces. Refusing to believe herself to be anything less than a genius, she disregards her publisher's attempts to restrain her high-flown prose and clumsy syntax and embarks on a starry career as a romantic novelist. Her books are bestsellers - despite being rubbished by critics - and Angel's uncompromisingly high view of herself is vindicated. Her success, however, spells dissatisfaction for those who tolerate her as her behaviour grows more outrageous and inconsiderate.
Elizabeth Taylor charts Angel's spectacular rise and gradual fall with a devastating eye for ironic detail. The intentions, desires and frustrations of Angelica and those around her are conveyed with the lightest touch. The fluctuating line between Angel's astounding arrogance and her unspoken terrified hopes, would, in the hands of a lesser writer have become a farce, or at the very least a satire. Taylor sees all and judges not. The novel is moving, humane and compelling. Read it.
disappointing, but worth a look., 07 Jul 2003
i received this book with great anticipation as i'd had it recommended as a wonderful read. however, i was a little disappointed. i found it rather dated - and speaking as one who generally prefers to read books by dead authors, that's a stern criticism! for me, certainly, it lacks the timeless quality that characterises good writing. i found the characters and situations unengaging and unbelievable, and as a result my interest waned before i got to the end of the book, and abandoned it about three-quarters of the way through. it's about a working class girl (angel) who decides to write a book, and despite being a dreadful and corny writer, becomes a bestseller of romance novels. once she is rich and successful, she abandons her working-class roots and remains deluded that she is writing something of quality, and forms relationships borne of her delusions. unfortunately none of the characters ever felt more than 2-dimensional to me, and i always felt the author's presence obtrusively. as i say, it was recommended most heartily to me, so perhaps you may enjoy it, but i found it disappointingly lacking.
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Fludd
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Customer Reviews
Receipt?, 30 Aug 2008
Talk about your zeitgeist novel - this one is perfect 90s. Funny, apt, intelligent. But can anyone tell me what the receipt was for? The one found under Mrs Etchells' floorboards? Because I haven't a clue. a how-we-got-to-here book, not what-happens-next?, 24 Aug 2008
For a book you clearly either love or hate, I thought I'd go for a controversial three-stars...though I see it's been done.
This is well written, and the characters do start to take some root in your brain.
But I kind-of prefer a plot to a slow exposition of retrospective misery... Funny, sad, tragic and enlightning... I loved this book., 01 Mar 2008
Speaking as someone who's done the Psychic & Mystic Fair Circuits and read many of Ms Mantels other books I was both intrigued and hesitant about this book as I worried she might give the usual description of supernatural.
Instead I was delighted to find that she'd used her wonderful imagination to create Alisons' world instead of the usual hackneyed view of a psychics' life, ability and how they'd comunicate with the spirit world.
This is a truely glorious work of fiction that I'd happily recommend to anyone who enjoys great writing and plot.
*Another little gem in this book is, at the end of novel there's an interview with Ms Mantel about the book, a description of her other novels, a list of her favourite books and a list of books by other authors that share a similar theme to Beyond Black.
P.S. The only reason I gave this book 4 stars instead of 5 is because I'm going to give it to her other book "Fludd" instead, though it was a close run thing.
Obviously this is a book that people love or hate - I loved it!, 14 Feb 2008
An engaging and very sympathetic central character (plus an unsympathetic but somehow still likeable supporting one in Colette - I think it was her acid tongue that I liked) gives life to this portrait of drab south-eastern England.
OK it's not Stephen King, in that the plot doesn't grip like a vice and there aren't massive supernatural shocks in store. In fact the 'fiends' were probably a lot more frightening when they were alive.
It reminded me a bit of 'The Office', purely in the sense that it's set in the same M25 hinterland where everything is a bit crap and shoddy, and it doesn't move along very fast. If you're enjoying the ride, that doesn't matter.
I found it funny, moving, and emotionally involving. The descriptions of psychic shows (based on the one (and only) show that I've seen) were spot-on, and I loved the bitching, rivalry, and ultimately friendship and support among Alison's fellow psychics. The descriptions of the male psychics particularly were very funny.
Pick it up, read the first few pages (up to about page 7) - that should be enough to tell you if you will enjoy the novel.
Various reviewers have complained about the book being too long. Au contraire - like Alison herself, there's just more of it to love. 2 words...., 25 Oct 2007
Beyond terrible.
This was simply the worst thing I have ever read, and I mean that wholeheartedly. 2-dimensional characters, a total lack of pace, excitement or direction, topped off with a horribly saccharine and conveniently 'all is well' conclusion that makes the end of The Matrix: Revolutions look like the Wachowski brothers DID, after all, know what they were doing.
Stay away from this. Read some Haruki Murakami instead. fascinating and moving, 27 Apr 2005
I have a particular interest in this story because, weirdly, I also have hypothyroidism and endometriosis, and wanted to find out more about this commonly misdiagnosed illness. But I'm also a huge fan of Mantel's highly varied fiction, and was curious to find out where it came from. In one sense this is a familiar tale about a girl from the Northern mill-town who escapes poverty and hopelessness through a good education at grammar school. Many other British women authors, from Margaret Drabble to Margaret Forster have told it. Mantel's childhood, her apprehension of the Devil (she was raised a Catholic)her fatherlessness and confusion are described in all their black comedy and raw pain. However, the story goes off in an unexpected direction because of Mantel's illness, which colours her time in Africa and Saudi Arabia, her marriage and inevitably her choice of career. Some people are going to like it simply because of its frank account of what it feels like to go from being a size 10 to a size 20 (Yes: it sucks) and as one anxiously waiting to see if the effects can be reversed I'd like more on that... But what it also does is make you very angry on behalf of someone who, despite her formidable intelligence, was advised to become a librarian not a lawyer, and who was medicated as psychologically disturbed when she had a physical illness which rendered her infertile. It made me admire her work even more, knowing the conditions in which it must have been composed. Still waiting ......, 26 Oct 2004
I read this book waiting for something to happen but nothing did. Sounds an average childhood for a kid these days. I felt I had a more interesting childhood! Maybe I'll write a book myself one day. I thought the bit about the endometriosis was moving as many people have this condition and it is often misdiagnosed. Prize-winning autobiography: Mind 'book of the year' 2004, 18 Jul 2004
A victim of both medical disinterest and just-not-good-enough parenting, Hilary Mantel has attempted to exorcise the ghosts of her harrowing childhood in true Cixousian fashion by 'writing her self into being'. Like the journey from childlike innocence to worldly wisdom, her story takes some time to unfold. Patiently, I allowed her to set the scene. Quite suddenly, I realised I could not put the book down as I plunged headlong into the wonder of her story. Dragged in by the pathos, humour and sheer pull of Mantel's style, I sank deeper and deeper as she re-claimed her experiences on every page. Time and time again I became enthralled by her compelling life story, only to be suddenly whisked off without notice to my own 'house of childhood'. This book is so amazingly accessible, full of Joycean epiphanies that, via seemingly ordinary moments, transport the reader to the very whatness of a situation. Towards the end of the book, Mantel emerges from her esoteric childhood still possessed by the demons of her formative years. Her child-borne worthlessness and religiously instilled compliance had caused her to suffer excruciating abdominal pain, until radical surgery became her only life-saving option. Bereft of choices and feeling powerless to resist, her diseased innards were taken away - together with any hopes she had of becoming a mother. At the age of 30 years, a new ghost began to stir within her. Robbed of the child she desperately needed to induce her own re-birth, she has chosen to re-write her life in what has materialised as this prize-winning autobiography. She has done so in captivating fashion. Clean, deceptively simple writing - but rich food indeed!, 02 Aug 2003
Any autobiography written by a novelist whose literary craft and imaginative eye appeals to you, will be looked forward to and savoured, since the reader must hope that whatever the writer's life has been like, he or she will bring to bear their fine sense of observation and interpretation onto themselves. The best autobiography won't be just a catalogue of events, but will illustrate something universal. Hilary Mantel does not disappoint! This is marvellous. She takes the stuff of ordinary beginnings, and of course illustrates how extraordinary we all are, how precious and unique, how our history and memories shape and mould us. I also found her accounts of how her own ill health has had profound effects on her perception of herself extremely moving (side effects of medications which changed her whole physical identity) She chooses to take 'snapshots' of various facets of her life, and expands them into something almost approaching meditations. A wonderful book!
READ THIS BOOK, 12 Jun 2003
It is almost impossible to convey the emotional impact of this memoir. At times it is almost too painful to realise the wrong done to Mantel by the medical profession over several decades, but it is the mark of a writer of depth, intelligence, insight and wit that she has turned such appalling experience into intensely moving prose that is little short of miraculous. But then Mantel is a miraculous writer. If you haven't read her fiction you have a rare treat in store, and if you have you will have fallen upon her memoir eager to discover something about the razor sharp intellect behind such astonishing and varied story-telling. Every woman should read GIVING UP THE GHOST, as should every writer, every doctor, every student of human nature. Everyone, in fact. I defy anyone to remain unmoved by it.
Simply superb, 03 Apr 2008
One of the best historical novels I have read.
Hilary Mantel tackles a subject of enormous size and converts it to manageable proportions by concentrating on people rather than events.
It's a book I shall return to again and again.
My only complaint is that I wished it was longer...
A tour de force, 05 Apr 2007
Another gripping novel from Hilary Mantell, this book spans the final few decades of the 18th Century in France, describing the fall of the Ancien Regime and the rising tides of revolution through the eyes of three men at the centre of these tumultuous events - Danton, Desmoulins and the infamous Robespierre. Mantell has the great knack of being able to give even the most monstrous of characters a human dimension, and there are few more monstrous than Robespierre, the so-called incorruptible who was finally corrupted by the very pursuit of the vertu that was at the core of his political - and philosophical - beliefs. Mantell creates convincing portrayals of an array of characters, describing scenes of great horror with a sense of detachment that somehow magnifies the revulsion we feel. She skillfully handles an extremely complex period of history, revealing the human heart at the centre these remote events. Danton and Desmoulins are at once sympathetic and flawed, and the woman that loved them are given real voices. A wonderful book.
brilliant!, 21 Apr 2002
This is a gripping yet highly literate tale of the Revolution. It is unusual to find an historical novel with such flair, resonance, wit and sheer style. The characterisations of Desmoulins, Danton and Robespierre are vivid, believable and brilliantly done. Robespierre is not someone one can warm to given prior knowledge of his career, yet even he comes across as someone one can, whilst not understand and relate to, at least find some saving grace of humanity in, and that takes some skill! I have read this three times and it reads as well third time out as first. I can really recommend this as something just a little bit different, a real work of class.
Outstanding, 11 Oct 2000
The characterisation of Danton and Desmoulins is fascinating and thoroughly convincing. I found Robespierre much harder to relate to because of his role in history, and he certainly came across as the individualist he was. It was a valiant effort at him. The entire period of tumult and bloodshed is vivid, believable, well written and stylish. The interplay between characters and lives in the structure of the book as well as its plot makes for a gripping read. Thoroughly recommended.
A compelling story of real and fascinating people, 03 Feb 2000
This is a huge and dynamic novel about three makers of the French Revolution. The two more famous men, Danton and Robespierre, are linked by their mutual friend Camille Desmoulins, whose role in history was to make the speech that inflamed the mob to storm the Bastille. The novel shows us a very complex and chaotic revolution, accelerated by many types of people and careering out of anyone's control. It is far from a simple case of the peasants rising up to guillotine the aristocrats. The three main characters are diverse: Danton the bluff orator, the patriot who expects to make a good living out of the revolution; Robespierre the incorruptible, ruled by logic, who believes that the revolution is an essential reform more important than mere individuals, and the magnetic hell-raiser Camille - brilliant, immature, seductive, amoral, driven. Their wives, lovers, friends and enemies swarm through the book creating a riot of events and ideas. This is wonderful writing with sparkles of genius: Camille's wife imagines the 'semi-demi-half life' of existence without him; a major character dies leaving a book marked with her place, 'And this is it' - it is twinned with her place as a character in this book, the place she got up to. Hilary Mantel teases fiction out of history, leaving the imaginary indistinguishable from the facts. Both are compelling and thrilling, from the young Camille's subtle humiliation of his host at a dinner party, as a means of seducing his hostess, to Danton's theft of the French crown jewels for diamonds to bribe the enemy to lose a battle. The story, written in short fragments from various personal points of view, has a form similar to another great historical novel, 'The Man on a Donkey', but this is faster and races through events with a comprehensively modern air. The complexity of the historical events make it an involved narrative with a great many characters, but for the reader who is willing to be swept along, this is a lasting experience. Have two copies - one to dip into again and again, and one to lend to lucky friends.
A truly horrible heroine, 16 Jan 2008
After reading several recommendations for Elizabeth Taylor books I decided to give Angel a go. This is the story of an arrogant young girl who lives in her imagination rather that face up to her dull life living with her mother above a grocers shop. As an escape she starts writing novels and against all odds they are huge success despite their overblown style. Angel clearly thinks that she is one of the most talented authors of her generation but she is widely derided by the critics.
This novel is designed to be darkly funny and there is much humour to be had from Angel's delusions of talent but I did struggled with the fact that the she had no redeeming features at all. Taylor shows a woman who is completely disinterested in the outside world unless it directly affects her. While this is deliberate it means the book has a slightly claustrophobic and narrow feel to it. Most of the characters were a little one dimensional though I did love Marvell the gardener who is a masterpiece. All in all I am glad that I read the book but it will not go down as one of my favourites.
Witty, Amusing, Light-Hearted Parody of the Publishing World, 02 Jul 2006
The life and times of a famous author
This is a lovely book to read on holiday or whilst travelling. It is a light-hearted dig at authors, readers, publishers and most vitriolically, of critics. Elizabeth Taylor is a fine writer with an exquisite turn of self-deprecation and devastating humour. You have the sense Taylor is either writing about herself or is secretly enjoying a joke at another author's expense. Taylor even laughs at the pretentiousness of the art world. Be that as it may, the protagonist, Angel, is completely endearing for all her extreme self-confidence and haughty self-centredness. As an example, in one scene, Angel's fierce Staffordshire bull terrier (_) Sultan, attacks a little Yorkshire terrier (_?) and, in fact, kills it. Rather than apologising to the hapless owner, whose dog it was, Angel frostily tells the owner that she should have kept the dog under control and totters off with as much dignity and pride that she can muster (whilst taking a wrong turning).
As a newly published author, Angel fantasises creating a novel preparing dreadful humiliations and a painful death for one of her critics. What writer has not had that fantasy!? In all, it is excruciatingly funny. It is set in the early part of C20 and has an air of nostalgia and ruefulness that brings to mind the style of Jane Gardam in her recent book, _Old Filth_.
I would not hesitate to recommend this book. Elizabeth Taylor has an economically light way of writing that is at the same time both incisive and cruel, but yet charming - and thoroughly enjoyable!
Dark masterpiece..., 29 Jan 2005
Elizabeth Taylor is one of English literature's best kept secrets; her shrewd, observant novels of human frailty have won her a small but devoted readership and 'Angel' is held by many as their favourite of her books. Spurred on by loneliness and desperation, the young and staunchly determined Angelica Deverell draws on her own naïve perceptions of literature to produce what she thinks are masterpieces. Refusing to believe herself to be anything less than a genius, she disregards her publisher's attempts to restrain her high-flown prose and clumsy syntax and embarks on a starry career as a romantic novelist. Her books are bestsellers - despite being rubbished by critics - and Angel's uncompromisingly high view of herself is vindicated. Her success, however, spells dissatisfaction for those who tolerate her as her behaviour grows more outrageous and inconsiderate.
Elizabeth Taylor charts Angel's spectacular rise and gradual fall with a devastating eye for ironic detail. The intentions, desires and frustrations of Angelica and those around her are conveyed with the lightest touch. The fluctuating line between Angel's astounding arrogance and her unspoken terrified hopes, would, in the hands of a lesser writer have become a farce, or at the very least a satire. Taylor sees all and judges not. The novel is moving, humane and compelling. Read it.
disappointing, but worth a look., 07 Jul 2003
i received this book with great anticipation as i'd had it recommended as a wonderful read. however, i was a little disappointed. i found it rather dated - and speaking as one who generally prefers to read books by dead authors, that's a stern criticism! for me, certainly, it lacks the timeless quality that characterises good writing. i found the characters and situations unengaging and unbelievable, and as a result my interest waned before i got to the end of the book, and abandoned it about three-quarters of the way through. it's about a working class girl (angel) who decides to write a book, and despite being a dreadful and corny writer, becomes a bestseller of romance novels. once she is rich and successful, she abandons her working-class roots and remains deluded that she is writing something of quality, and forms relationships borne of her delusions. unfortunately none of the characters ever felt more than 2-dimensional to me, and i always felt the author's presence obtrusively. as i say, it was recommended most heartily to me, so perhaps you may enjoy it, but i found it disappointingly lacking.
From the back cover..., 02 Jul 2007
TIME OUT: "Set in the fictitious village of Fetherhoughton, buried in the northern moorland,
Mantel's cleverly absorbing novel centres on the sheltered community's relationship with the
Church, which "bears some but not much resemblance to the Roman Catholic Church in the
real world, c.1956"
NEW STATESMAN & SOCIETY: "Then Fludd arrives. Fludd is a curate sent to assist Angwin - or is he? Loving beauty and language, sowing scandal and unrest in Fetherhoughton, might he not be the devil? Fludd is a quaint and lovely novel ... It doesn't only believe in miracles; it believes in happy endings."
SUNDAY TIMES: "The message of Hilary Mantel's excellent and ambitious novel is that the human form of this alchemy is perfectly possible; all one needs is love."
GUARDIAN: "In Fludd Hilary Mantel draws on her imagination, inventing a dark universe which
works to laws of her own making. The effect is dazzling, and establishes her in the front rank of novelists writing in English today."
a beautifully realised work by Mantel, 14 Nov 2006
I love Mantel. And can't believe her books aren't better known. Her work is complex, and unlike anyone else I have read, she seems to embody the skills and stories of four or five different authors. Her books cross continents and eras, her writing veering from brutally real to entirely magical. Fludd is the shortest and one of her most likeable reads. The Yorkshire town, the smell of a fusty 1950's school gym, the fear of the unknown, the superstition of Christianity and the allusion to alchemy are all intertwined and beautifully evoked in this gem of a book.
A bit of supernatural magic, perhaps, 04 Sep 2003
The doleful, English, mill town of Fetherhoughton is the stage for this short, delightful novel, FLUDD, by Hilary Mantel. There are four principal players. Father Angwin, pastor of the Roman Catholic church of St. Thomas Aquinas, has lost his belief in God's existence, but determinedly continues to serve his flock while suffering the oversight of his idiot diocesan bishop. Miss Dempsey, his spinster housekeeper, lives in terror of a small wart above her upper lip, thinking it a portent of cancer. Sister Philomena, a nun teaching in the parish school, is an Irish girl forced by her family into the convent, where she endures the petty tyranny of its Mother Superior. Then there's FLUDD, a curate ostensibly sent by the obnoxious bishop to help Angwin modernize his pastoral approach. Or is he? Once Fludd is in residence, people begin to, um, transform. The engaging aspect of this story is that the reader never understands the nature of the being called Fludd, a mystery also grazing Angwin's perception during his first meal with Fludd, when the former observed: "Whenever (he) looked up at (Fludd), it seemed that his whiskey glass was raised to his lips, but the level of what was in it did not seem to go down; and yet from time to time the young man reached out for the bottle, and topped himself up. It had been the same with their late dinner, there were three sausages on Father Fludd's plate, and he was always cutting into one or other, and spearing a bit on his fork; he was always chewing in an unobtrusive, polite way, with his mouth shut tight. And yet there were always three sausages on his plate, until at last, quite suddenly, there were none." Is Fludd a man, or something else. He can tell fortunes by looking at the palm of one's hand. He alludes to having once been the practitioner of another profession that sounds a lot like alchemy. Odd talents for a Catholic priest. In any case, by the satisfying end of the tale, you, the reader, is left to decide for yourself - if you can.
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Vacant Possession
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Customer Reviews
Receipt?, 30 Aug 2008
Talk about your zeitgeist novel - this one is perfect 90s. Funny, apt, intelligent. But can anyone tell me what the receipt was for? The one found under Mrs Etchells' floorboards? Because I haven't a clue. a how-we-got-to-here book, not what-happens-next?, 24 Aug 2008
For a book you clearly either love or hate, I thought I'd go for a controversial three-stars...though I see it's been done.
This is well written, and the characters do start to take some root in your brain.
But I kind-of prefer a plot to a slow exposition of retrospective misery... Funny, sad, tragic and enlightning... I loved this book., 01 Mar 2008
Speaking as someone who's done the Psychic & Mystic Fair Circuits and read many of Ms Mantels other books I was both intrigued and hesitant about this book as I worried she might give the usual description of supernatural.
Instead I was delighted to find that she'd used her wonderful imagination to create Alisons' world instead of the usual hackneyed view of a psychics' life, ability and how they'd comunicate with the spirit world.
This is a truely glorious work of fiction that I'd happily recommend to anyone who enjoys great writing and plot.
*Another little gem in this book is, at the end of novel there's an interview with Ms Mantel about the book, a description of her other novels, a list of her favourite books and a list of books by other authors that share a similar theme to Beyond Black.
P.S. The only reason I gave this book 4 stars instead of 5 is because I'm going to give it to her other book "Fludd" instead, though it was a close run thing.
Obviously this is a book that people love or hate - I loved it!, 14 Feb 2008
An engaging and very sympathetic central character (plus an unsympathetic but somehow still likeable supporting one in Colette - I think it was her acid tongue that I liked) gives life to this portrait of drab south-eastern England.
OK it's not Stephen King, in that the plot doesn't grip like a vice and there aren't massive supernatural shocks in store. In fact the 'fiends' were probably a lot more frightening when they were alive.
It reminded me a bit of 'The Office', purely in the sense that it's set in the same M25 hinterland where everything is a bit crap and shoddy, and it doesn't move along very fast. If you're enjoying the ride, that doesn't matter.
I found it funny, moving, and emotionally involving. The descriptions of psychic shows (based on the one (and only) show that I've seen) were spot-on, and I loved the bitching, rivalry, and ultimately friendship and support among Alison's fellow psychics. The descriptions of the male psychics particularly were very funny.
Pick it up, read the first few pages (up to about page 7) - that should be enough to tell you if you will enjoy the novel.
Various reviewers have complained about the book being too long. Au contraire - like Alison herself, there's just more of it to love. 2 words...., 25 Oct 2007
Beyond terrible.
This was simply the worst thing I have ever read, and I mean that wholeheartedly. 2-dimensional characters, a total lack of pace, excitement or direction, topped off with a horribly saccharine and conveniently 'all is well' conclusion that makes the end of The Matrix: Revolutions look like the Wachowski brothers DID, after all, know what they were doing.
Stay away from this. Read some Haruki Murakami instead. fascinating and moving, 27 Apr 2005
I have a particular interest in this story because, weirdly, I also have hypothyroidism and endometriosis, and wanted to find out more about this commonly misdiagnosed illness. But I'm also a huge fan of Mantel's highly varied fiction, and was curious to find out where it came from. In one sense this is a familiar tale about a girl from the Northern mill-town who escapes poverty and hopelessness through a good education at grammar school. Many other British women authors, from Margaret Drabble to Margaret Forster have told it. Mantel's childhood, her apprehension of the Devil (she was raised a Catholic)her fatherlessness and confusion are described in all their black comedy and raw pain. However, the story goes off in an unexpected direction because of Mantel's illness, which colours her time in Africa and Saudi Arabia, her marriage and inevitably her choice of career. Some people are going to like it simply because of its frank account of what it feels like to go from being a size 10 to a size 20 (Yes: it sucks) and as one anxiously waiting to see if the effects can be reversed I'd like more on that... But what it also does is make you very angry on behalf of someone who, despite her formidable intelligence, was advised to become a librarian not a lawyer, and who was medicated as psychologically disturbed when she had a physical illness which rendered her infertile. It made me admire her work even more, knowing the conditions in which it must have been composed. Still waiting ......, 26 Oct 2004
I read this book waiting for something to happen but nothing did. Sounds an average childhood for a kid these days. I felt I had a more interesting childhood! Maybe I'll write a book myself one day. I thought the bit about the endometriosis was moving as many people have this condition and it is often misdiagnosed. Prize-winning autobiography: Mind 'book of the year' 2004, 18 Jul 2004
A victim of both medical disinterest and just-not-good-enough parenting, Hilary Mantel has attempted to exorcise the ghosts of her harrowing childhood in true Cixousian fashion by 'writing her self into being'. Like the journey from childlike innocence to worldly wisdom, her story takes some time to unfold. Patiently, I allowed her to set the scene. Quite suddenly, I realised I could not put the book down as I plunged headlong into the wonder of her story. Dragged in by the pathos, humour and sheer pull of Mantel's style, I sank deeper and deeper as she re-claimed her experiences on every page. Time and time again I became enthralled by her compelling life story, only to be suddenly whisked off without notice to my own 'house of childhood'. This book is so amazingly accessible, full of Joycean epiphanies that, via seemingly ordinary moments, transport the reader to the very whatness of a situation. Towards the end of the book, Mantel emerges from her esoteric childhood still possessed by the demons of her formative years. Her child-borne worthlessness and religiously instilled compliance had caused her to suffer excruciating abdominal pain, until radical surgery became her only life-saving option. Bereft of choices and feeling powerless to resist, her diseased innards were taken away - together with any hopes she had of becoming a mother. At the age of 30 years, a new ghost began to stir within her. Robbed of the child she desperately needed to induce her own re-birth, she has chosen to re-write her life in what has materialised as this prize-winning autobiography. She has done so in captivating fashion. Clean, deceptively simple writing - but rich food indeed!, 02 Aug 2003
Any autobiography written by a novelist whose literary craft and imaginative eye appeals to you, will be looked forward to and savoured, since the reader must hope that whatever the writer's life has been like, he or she will bring to bear their fine sense of observation and interpretation onto themselves. The best autobiography won't be just a catalogue of events, but will illustrate something universal. Hilary Mantel does not disappoint! This is marvellous. She takes the stuff of ordinary beginnings, and of course illustrates how extraordinary we all are, how precious and unique, how our history and memories shape and mould us. I also found her accounts of how her own ill health has had profound effects on her perception of herself extremely moving (side effects of medications which changed her whole physical identity) She chooses to take 'snapshots' of various facets of her life, and expands them into something almost approaching meditations. A wonderful book!
READ THIS BOOK, 12 Jun 2003
It is almost impossible to convey the emotional impact of this memoir. At times it is almost too painful to realise the wrong done to Mantel by the medical profession over several decades, but it is the mark of a writer of depth, intelligence, insight and wit that she has turned such appalling experience into intensely moving prose that is little short of miraculous. But then Mantel is a miraculous writer. If you haven't read her fiction you have a rare treat in store, and if you have you will have fallen upon her memoir eager to discover something about the razor sharp intellect behind such astonishing and varied story-telling. Every woman should read GIVING UP THE GHOST, as should every writer, every doctor, every student of human nature. Everyone, in fact. I defy anyone to remain unmoved by it.
Simply superb, 03 Apr 2008
One of the best historical novels I have read.
Hilary Mantel tackles a subject of enormous size and converts it to manageable proportions by concentrating on people rather than events.
It's a book I shall return to again and again.
My only complaint is that I wished it was longer...
A tour de force, 05 Apr 2007
Another gripping novel from Hilary Mantell, this book spans the final few decades of the 18th Century in France, describing the fall of the Ancien Regime and the rising tides of revolution through the eyes of three men at the centre of these tumultuous events - Danton, Desmoulins and the infamous Robespierre. Mantell has the great knack of being able to give even the most monstrous of characters a human dimension, and there are few more monstrous than Robespierre, the so-called incorruptible who was finally corrupted by the very pursuit of the vertu that was at the core of his political - and philosophical - beliefs. Mantell creates convincing portrayals of an array of characters, describing scenes of great horror with a sense of detachment that somehow magnifies the revulsion we feel. She skillfully handles an extremely complex period of history, revealing the human heart at the centre these remote events. Danton and Desmoulins are at once sympathetic and flawed, and the woman that loved them are given real voices. A wonderful book.
brilliant!, 21 Apr 2002
This is a gripping yet highly literate tale of the Revolution. It is unusual to find an historical novel with such flair, resonance, wit and sheer style. The characterisations of Desmoulins, Danton and Robespierre are vivid, believable and brilliantly done. Robespierre is not someone one can warm to given prior knowledge of his career, yet even he comes across as someone one can, whilst not understand and relate to, at least find some saving grace of humanity in, and that takes some skill! I have read this three times and it reads as well third time out as first. I can really recommend this as something just a little bit different, a real work of class.
Outstanding, 11 Oct 2000
The characterisation of Danton and Desmoulins is fascinating and thoroughly convincing. I found Robespierre much harder to relate to because of his role in history, and he certainly came across as the individualist he was. It was a valiant effort at him. The entire period of tumult and bloodshed is vivid, believable, well written and stylish. The interplay between characters and lives in the structure of the book as well as its plot makes for a gripping read. Thoroughly recommended.
A compelling story of real and fascinating people, 03 Feb 2000
This is a huge and dynamic novel about three makers of the French Revolution. The two more famous men, Danton and Robespierre, are linked by their mutual friend Camille Desmoulins, whose role in history was to make the speech that inflamed the mob to storm the Bastille. The novel shows us a very complex and chaotic revolution, accelerated by many types of people and careering out of anyone's control. It is far from a simple case of the peasants rising up to guillotine the aristocrats. The three main characters are diverse: Danton the bluff orator, the patriot who expects to make a good living out of the revolution; Robespierre the incorruptible, ruled by logic, who believes that the revolution is an essential reform more important than mere individuals, and the magnetic hell-raiser Camille - brilliant, immature, seductive, amoral, driven. Their wives, lovers, friends and enemies swarm through the book creating a riot of events and ideas. This is wonderful writing with sparkles of genius: Camille's wife imagines the 'semi-demi-half life' of existence without him; a major character dies leaving a book marked with her place, 'And this is it' - it is twinned with her place as a character in this book, the place she got up to. Hilary Mantel teases fiction out of history, leaving the imaginary indistinguishable from the facts. Both are compelling and thrilling, from the young Camille's subtle humiliation of his host at a dinner party, as a means of seducing his hostess, to Danton's theft of the French crown jewels for diamonds to bribe the enemy to lose a battle. The story, written in short fragments from various personal points of view, has a form similar to another great historical novel, 'The Man on a Donkey', but this is faster and races through events with a comprehensively modern air. The complexity of the historical events make it an involved narrative with a great many characters, but for the reader who is willing to be swept along, this is a lasting experience. Have two copies - one to dip into again and again, and one to lend to lucky friends.
A truly horrible heroine, 16 Jan 2008
After reading several recommendations for Elizabeth Taylor books I decided to give Angel a go. This is the story of an arrogant young girl who lives in her imagination rather that face up to her dull life living with her mother above a grocers shop. As an escape she starts writing novels and against all odds they are huge success despite their overblown style. Angel clearly thinks that she is one of the most talented authors of her generation but she is widely derided by the critics.
This novel is designed to be darkly funny and there is much humour to be had from Angel's delusions of talent but I did struggled with the fact that the she had no redeeming features at all. Taylor shows a woman who is completely disinterested in the outside world unless it directly affects her. While this is deliberate it means the book has a slightly claustrophobic and narrow feel to it. Most of the characters were a little one dimensional though I did love Marvell the gardener who is a masterpiece. All in all I am glad that I read the book but it will not go down as one of my favourites.
Witty, Amusing, Light-Hearted Parody of the Publishing World, 02 Jul 2006
The life and times of a famous author
This is a lovely book to read on holiday or whilst travelling. It is a light-hearted dig at authors, readers, publishers and most vitriolically, of critics. Elizabeth Taylor is a fine writer with an exquisite turn of self-deprecation and devastating humour. You have the sense Taylor is either writing about herself or is secretly enjoying a joke at another author's expense. Taylor even laughs at the pretentiousness of the art world. Be that as it may, the protagonist, Angel, is completely endearing for all her extreme self-confidence and haughty self-centredness. As an example, in one scene, Angel's fierce Staffordshire bull terrier (_) Sultan, attacks a little Yorkshire terrier (_?) and, in fact, kills it. Rather than apologising to the hapless owner, whose dog it was, Angel frostily tells the owner that she should have kept the dog under control and totters off with as much dignity and pride that she can muster (whilst taking a wrong turning).
As a newly published author, Angel fantasises creating a novel preparing dreadful humiliations and a painful death for one of her critics. What writer has not had that fantasy!? In all, it is excruciatingly funny. It is set in the early part of C20 and has an air of nostalgia and ruefulness that brings to mind the style of Jane Gardam in her recent book, _Old Filth_.
I would not hesitate to recommend this book. Elizabeth Taylor has an economically light way of writing that is at the same time both incisive and cruel, but yet charming - and thoroughly enjoyable!
Dark masterpiece..., 29 Jan 2005
Elizabeth Taylor is one of English literature's best kept secrets; her shrewd, observant novels of human frailty have won her a small but devoted readership and 'Angel' is held by many as their favourite of her books. Spurred on by loneliness and desperation, the young and staunchly determined Angelica Deverell draws on her own naïve perceptions of literature to produce what she thinks are masterpieces. Refusing to believe herself to be anything less than a genius, she disregards her publisher's attempts to restrain her high-flown prose and clumsy syntax and embarks on a starry career as a romantic novelist. Her books are bestsellers - despite being rubbished by critics - and Angel's uncompromisingly high view of herself is vindicated. Her success, however, spells dissatisfaction for those who tolerate her as her behaviour grows more outrageous and inconsiderate.
Elizabeth Taylor charts Angel's spectacular rise and gradual fall with a devastating eye for ironic detail. The intentions, desires and frustrations of Angelica and those around her are conveyed with the lightest touch. The fluctuating line between Angel's astounding arrogance and her unspoken terrified hopes, would, in the hands of a lesser writer have become a farce, or at the very least a satire. Taylor sees all and judges not. The novel is moving, humane and compelling. Read it.
disappointing, but worth a look., 07 Jul 2003
i received this book with great anticipation as i'd had it recommended as a wonderful read. however, i was a little disappointed. i found it rather dated - and speaking as one who generally prefers to read books by dead authors, that's a stern criticism! for me, certainly, it lacks the timeless quality that characterises good writing. i found the characters and situations unengaging and unbelievable, and as a result my interest waned before i got to the end of the book, and abandoned it about three-quarters of the way through. it's about a working class girl (angel) who decides to write a book, and despite being a dreadful and corny writer, becomes a bestseller of romance novels. once she is rich and successful, she abandons her working-class roots and remains deluded that she is writing something of quality, and forms relationships borne of her delusions. unfortunately none of the characters ever felt more than 2-dimensional to me, and i always felt the author's presence obtrusively. as i say, it was recommended most heartily to me, so perhaps you may enjoy it, but i found it disappointingly lacking.
From the back cover..., 02 Jul 2007
TIME OUT: "Set in the fictitious village of Fetherhoughton, buried in the northern moorland,
Mantel's cleverly absorbing novel centres on the sheltered community's relationship with the
Church, which "bears some but not much resemblance to the Roman Catholic Church in the
real world, c.1956"
NEW STATESMAN & SOCIETY: "Then Fludd arrives. Fludd is a curate sent to assist Angwin - or is he? Loving beauty and language, sowing scandal and unrest in Fetherhoughton, might he not be the devil? Fludd is a quaint and lovely novel ... It doesn't only believe in miracles; it believes in happy endings."
SUNDAY TIMES: "The message of Hilary Mantel's excellent and ambitious novel is that the human form of this alchemy is perfectly possible; all one needs is love."
GUARDIAN: "In Fludd Hilary Mantel draws on her imagination, inventing a dark universe which
works to laws of her own making. The effect is dazzling, and establishes her in the front rank of novelists writing in English today."
a beautifully realised work by Mantel, 14 Nov 2006
I love Mantel. And can't believe her books aren't better known. Her work is complex, and unlike anyone else I have read, she seems to embody the skills and stories of four or five different authors. Her books cross continents and eras, her writing veering from brutally real to entirely magical. Fludd is the shortest and one of her most likeable reads. The Yorkshire town, the smell of a fusty 1950's school gym, the fear of the unknown, the superstition of Christianity and the allusion to alchemy are all intertwined and beautifully evoked in this gem of a book.
A bit of supernatural magic, perhaps, 04 Sep 2003
The doleful, English, mill town of Fetherhoughton is the stage for this short, delightful novel, FLUDD, by Hilary Mantel. There are four principal players. Father Angwin, pastor of the Roman Catholic church of St. Thomas Aquinas, has lost his belief in God's existence, but determinedly continues to serve his flock while suffering the oversight of his idiot diocesan bishop. Miss Dempsey, his spinster housekeeper, lives in terror of a small wart above her upper lip, thinking it a portent of cancer. Sister Philomena, a nun teaching in the parish school, is an Irish girl forced by her family into the convent, where she endures the petty tyranny of its Mother Superior. Then there's FLUDD, a curate ostensibly sent by the obnoxious bishop to help Angwin modernize his pastoral approach. Or is he? Once Fludd is in residence, people begin to, um, transform. The engaging aspect of this story is that the reader never understands the nature of the being called Fludd, a mystery also grazing Angwin's perception during his first meal with Fludd, when the former observed: "Whenever (he) looked up at (Fludd), it seemed that his whiskey glass was raised to his lips, but the level of what was in it did not seem to go down; and yet from time to time the young man reached out for the bottle, and topped himself up. It had been the same with their late dinner, there were three sausages on Father Fludd's plate, and he was always cutting into one or other, and spearing a bit on his fork; he was always chewing in an unobtrusive, polite way, with his mouth shut tight. And yet there were always three sausages on his plate, until at last, quite suddenly, there were none." Is Fludd a man, or something else. He can tell fortunes by looking at the palm of one's hand. He alludes to having once been the practitioner of another profession that sounds a lot like alchemy. Odd talents for a Catholic priest. In any case, by the satisfying end of the tale, you, the reader, is left to decide for yourself - if you can.
Brilliant, riveting and entertaining, 26 Nov 2006
I have read this book over and over. Its bleak, horrific and oh so funny. Muriel is a disturbing character, self-preserving and understandably vicious, but the comedy shines through, making the novel unforgettable. I never undertand why Hilary Mantel is not more acclaimed as an author - she is needle-sharp.
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Customer Reviews
Receipt?, 30 Aug 2008
Talk about your zeitgeist novel - this one is perfect 90s. Funny, apt, intelligent. But can anyone tell me what the receipt was for? The one found under Mrs Etchells' floorboards? Because I haven't a clue.
a how-we-got-to-here book, not what-happens-next?, 24 Aug 2008
For a book you clearly either love or hate, I thought I'd go for a controversial three-stars...though I see it's been done.
This is well written, and the characters do start to take some root in your brain.
But I kind-of prefer a plot to a slow exposition of retrospective misery...
Funny, sad, tragic and enlightning... I loved this book., 01 Mar 2008
Speaking as someone who's done the Psychic & Mystic Fair Circuits and read many of Ms Mantels other books I was both intrigued and hesitant about this book as I worried she might give the usual description of supernatural.
Instead I was delighted to find that she'd used her wonderful imagination to create Alisons' world instead of the usual hackneyed view of a psychics' life, ability and how they'd comunicate with the spirit world.
This is a truely glorious work of fiction that I'd happily recommend to anyone who enjoys great writing and plot.
*Another little gem in this book is, at the end of novel there's an interview with Ms Mantel about the book, a description of her other novels, a list of her favourite books and a list of books by other authors that share a similar theme to Beyond Black.
P.S. The only reason I gave this book 4 stars instead of 5 is because I'm going to give it to her other book "Fludd" instead, though it was a close run thing.
Obviously this is a book that people love or hate - I loved it!, 14 Feb 2008
An engaging and very sympathetic central character (plus an unsympathetic but somehow still likeable supporting one in Colette - I think it was her acid tongue that I liked) gives life to this portrait of drab south-eastern England.
OK it's not Stephen King, in that the plot doesn't grip like a vice and there aren't massive supernatural shocks in store. In fact the 'fiends' were probably a lot more frightening when they were alive.
It reminded me a bit of 'The Office', purely in the sense that it's set in the same M25 hinterland where everything is a bit crap and shoddy, and it doesn't move along very fast. If you're enjoying the ride, that doesn't matter.
I found it funny, moving, and emotionally involving. The descriptions of psychic shows (based on the one (and only) show that I've seen) were spot-on, and I loved the bitching, rivalry, and ultimately friendship and support among Alison's fellow psychics. The descriptions of the male psychics particularly were very funny.
Pick it up, read the first few pages (up to about page 7) - that should be enough to tell you if you will enjoy the novel.
Various reviewers have complained about the book being too long. Au contraire - like Alison herself, there's just more of it to love.
2 words...., 25 Oct 2007
Beyond terrible.
This was simply the worst thing I have ever read, and I mean that wholeheartedly. 2-dimensional characters, a total lack of pace, excitement or direction, topped off with a horribly saccharine and conveniently 'all is well' conclusion that makes the end of The Matrix: Revolutions look like the Wachowski brothers DID, after | | |