hultqur's review against another edition
dark
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
gh7's review against another edition
3.0
You could say no one is boring if you truly get to know them. But what happens if an author doesn’t really get to know his characters? This novel taught me just how dependent a novel is on its characters. It doesn’t matter how well you can write or even how potentially compelling your story is – if your characters are pasteboard creations without an imaginatively powered inner life they simply won’t animate any circumstance they are led into.
Early on I thought this was going to be a great read. It begins with a Mafioso setpiece: a Sicilian shepherd is told some of his landlord’s sheep will be stolen that night, at the behest of his landlord. The writing is gorgeous. Foulds is brilliant at sentence writing.
Misgivings began when the second and especially the third characters were introduced. Will is an English soldier, a stickler for propriety, the kind of man who gets incensed if people don’t form an orderly queue. Ray is an even more nondescript American infantryman. Soon you begin to suspect Foulds himself wasn’t very inspired by this pair and even the prose began to lose its heightened poetical qualities. Especially dull was the American Ray. I never believed he was American; he was like Mr Nobody from Nowhere. He has no background, no pulse, no inner demons or angels by which to recognise him. He wants to make films but rather in the way children would like to fly. When he’s stationed in Africa I didn’t believe he was in Africa nor did I understand why the novel was in Africa. You have to create a self in order to show it being punctured by the horrors of the war and I’m afraid Ray never had a self for me. When we return to Italy the mafia in the form of a character called Albanese hijacks the novel. Ray meets a movie princess but of course doesn’t get her. Will is now a Field Security Officer but will be helpless to hold back the tide of corruption of the old order. Foulds suggests the mafia is more deeply rooted and enduring in Sicily than any political system. And that’s about it.
Shame because Foulds has the sensibility of a poet and at his best writes thrilling searing sentences. I think maybe he chose the wrong material here.
Early on I thought this was going to be a great read. It begins with a Mafioso setpiece: a Sicilian shepherd is told some of his landlord’s sheep will be stolen that night, at the behest of his landlord. The writing is gorgeous. Foulds is brilliant at sentence writing.
Misgivings began when the second and especially the third characters were introduced. Will is an English soldier, a stickler for propriety, the kind of man who gets incensed if people don’t form an orderly queue. Ray is an even more nondescript American infantryman. Soon you begin to suspect Foulds himself wasn’t very inspired by this pair and even the prose began to lose its heightened poetical qualities. Especially dull was the American Ray. I never believed he was American; he was like Mr Nobody from Nowhere. He has no background, no pulse, no inner demons or angels by which to recognise him. He wants to make films but rather in the way children would like to fly. When he’s stationed in Africa I didn’t believe he was in Africa nor did I understand why the novel was in Africa. You have to create a self in order to show it being punctured by the horrors of the war and I’m afraid Ray never had a self for me. When we return to Italy the mafia in the form of a character called Albanese hijacks the novel. Ray meets a movie princess but of course doesn’t get her. Will is now a Field Security Officer but will be helpless to hold back the tide of corruption of the old order. Foulds suggests the mafia is more deeply rooted and enduring in Sicily than any political system. And that’s about it.
Shame because Foulds has the sensibility of a poet and at his best writes thrilling searing sentences. I think maybe he chose the wrong material here.
scarpuccia's review against another edition
3.0
My second Adam Foulds novel. This one is set in North Africa and Sicily during world war two. It begins with a young shepherd boy who is robbed of some of his sheep in the night. This was beautifully written and engrossing. Then we jump forward in time and are introduced to Will. He lives in rural England and is about to leave for North Africa. He wanted to work for the Specials Operation Executive but instead has been assigned to the Field Security Services. We then quickly jump to Ray, an American infantryman who is about to land ashore in North Africa. Ray is not a compelling character.
At one point in the novel Ray gets lost. It occurred to me that he's lost in the entire novel. His only purpose in the book is to give the author the opportunity to write about battles and shellshock but in both cases the writing deteriorates, becoming overly poetic and hackneyed. Ray is unsuited to war but is also unsuited to a novel. His narrative become a chore to read.
The entire North African part of this book seemed like an unnecessary sideshow. It's the Sicilian characters and story which holds all the interest, charting as it does the beginning of the mafia. It would have been a better novel set entirely in Sicily and consisting predominantly of the Italian characters. The English character Will is characterised essentially by his uselessness which isn't a compelling dynamic. There's lots of great writing but the unnecessarily wide perspective and the English and especially American characters let it down. I was reminded of Andrew Miller who is also a fabulous sentence writer but who struggles to create compelling characters. And if the characters are weak the plot always suffers.
At one point in the novel Ray gets lost. It occurred to me that he's lost in the entire novel. His only purpose in the book is to give the author the opportunity to write about battles and shellshock but in both cases the writing deteriorates, becoming overly poetic and hackneyed. Ray is unsuited to war but is also unsuited to a novel. His narrative become a chore to read.
The entire North African part of this book seemed like an unnecessary sideshow. It's the Sicilian characters and story which holds all the interest, charting as it does the beginning of the mafia. It would have been a better novel set entirely in Sicily and consisting predominantly of the Italian characters. The English character Will is characterised essentially by his uselessness which isn't a compelling dynamic. There's lots of great writing but the unnecessarily wide perspective and the English and especially American characters let it down. I was reminded of Andrew Miller who is also a fabulous sentence writer but who struggles to create compelling characters. And if the characters are weak the plot always suffers.
bilinski68's review
4.0
Very good book like a war story and a mafia story all in one. Very good character development and prose. The end is a little strange but a very good story non the less.
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