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A review by erickibler4
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Süskind
3.0
Based on the many people who've read this book whose opinions I respect, you'd think I'd have loved it.
I liked it, but it didn't wow me. The premise is that scent is the ultimate engine of attraction, and hence, power. And that he who controls it can achieve ultimate power.
The book is the tale of Grenouille, who is born without a scent of his own, but with a preternatural ability to perceive odors. He becomes an apprentice perfumer and learns to extract and bottle the odors of things. Eventually his goal becomes that of capturing the smell of a beautiful young girl, whose charms reside just as much in her scent as in her appearance. The catch is, whoever's scent Grenouille steals does not survive the process.
If you think of this story as a fable or a fairy tale, it's far too long. If you think of it as horror or suspense, it doesn't fully deliver. Not only is Grenouille not a fully developed character (his PROCESS is developed at length, and is fascinating, but the reader never seems to get a grasp of him as a person), but neither are his victims. There's no character the reader can care about, so it's a pretty flat exercise. And I don't necessarily need to like a character. Sometimes the best writers can make a reader conspire with the villain and hope against their own good nature that he gets away with it. This is not one of those stories.
I probably would have liked this more as a short story. It definitely has something in common with a lot of Bradbury's or Shirley Jackson's short stories. But as a 270 page novel, there was barely enough character development or relentless plotting to keep me turning pages.
I liked it, but it didn't wow me. The premise is that scent is the ultimate engine of attraction, and hence, power. And that he who controls it can achieve ultimate power.
The book is the tale of Grenouille, who is born without a scent of his own, but with a preternatural ability to perceive odors. He becomes an apprentice perfumer and learns to extract and bottle the odors of things. Eventually his goal becomes that of capturing the smell of a beautiful young girl, whose charms reside just as much in her scent as in her appearance. The catch is, whoever's scent Grenouille steals does not survive the process.
If you think of this story as a fable or a fairy tale, it's far too long. If you think of it as horror or suspense, it doesn't fully deliver. Not only is Grenouille not a fully developed character (his PROCESS is developed at length, and is fascinating, but the reader never seems to get a grasp of him as a person), but neither are his victims. There's no character the reader can care about, so it's a pretty flat exercise. And I don't necessarily need to like a character. Sometimes the best writers can make a reader conspire with the villain and hope against their own good nature that he gets away with it. This is not one of those stories.
I probably would have liked this more as a short story. It definitely has something in common with a lot of Bradbury's or Shirley Jackson's short stories. But as a 270 page novel, there was barely enough character development or relentless plotting to keep me turning pages.