Reviews

1.5 - I'm in the minority judging by the other reviews, but that is ok, we like what we like...

This is a collection of 5 short stories and a novella. I found the first 3 stories so stilted and mind-numbingly boring, that I nearly put the book down. The fourth story (Long Distance – my favourite) was interesting enough to keep me reading. The emotion in it was not as restrained, but interestingly the real emotion came from a foreigner (rather than an American) and was shocking to the person who has caused it. The final short story was on the verge of being interesting but didn’t quite go there for me. I found most of the characters to be unaware of their motives, even though they all examined what was happening in their emotional worlds and they often came to fairly large conclusions.

I was not far into the novella when I realized it had been made into a movie, “The Secret Lives of Dentists”; which I found to be one of the most painfully tedious movies I’ve ever sat through. I remember watching and just hoping, believing it had to get better – it had to go somewhere, it didn’t. I’m not sure why I kept reading the novella when I realised it’s relation to the movie but I am sort of glad I did. The novella is much better than the movie, which was not translated to the screen well and the inevitable changes lost the good qualities from the story.

The story has feeling and I felt an empathy and understanding for Dave (the narrator), I didn’t when I watched the movie, I just wanted to slap them all. Some sequences are changed around too and something that happens in Dave’s imagination (as a way of him experimenting with different coping mechanisms) is made real in the movie (but with changes). It was the most jarring scene in the movie for me, I could not understand it’s purpose – the original stuff from the story has a purpose and it is well served for the development of the story. The restraint of the emotion in this story (which I have to assume is just how Smiley approaches the world) has a point, as Dave wants to avoid the release of his wife’s emotion and with it the confession of her adultery. It was well done, and I actually became somewhat absorbed in parts.

lizmart88's review against another edition

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3.0

Lovely book of short stories with a novella at the end. The stories explore relationships - from marriage to friendship. They're set in the seventies, when this was written, but feel just as relevant today (minus all the land-line references!).

The first story is of a single woman who befriends a couple and is surprised by their relationship coming apart. How much can we know of other people's interior lives? How much do we project our own needs and wants on others?

The novella explores a man who believes his wife is cheating on him. They have three kids and share a dental practice. We see him moving through the "age of grief" as he processes this supposed knowledge and continues with his life.