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A review by lonestarwords
Hammer by Joe Mungo Reed
dark
slow-paced
3.0
Power is like a muscle that must be exercised.
Hammer
Joe Mungo Reed
•
First of all, this cover. I admit to being totally drawn in by it, in hopes I had found a new art thriller to share with all of you. And for the first 1/3 of Hammer, I was taken in, both the setting (auction houses, London) and the wild ride that happens when money, power and art collide inside the pages of a book.
•
The narration of Hammer is stellar and thank you @simonandschuster for this gifted copy. Hammer really morphs from an art-centric thriller into more of a geopolitical storyline; the timing of this book is actually mind blowing because we have a Russian oligarch named Oleg and his stop at nothing desire for wealth and power. There are lots of Putin references (Putin even makes an appearance in the story) as does Ukraine. The book is set in 2013 but clearly the author had a good working knowledge of where the world was headed. For me, when the plot veered away from art almost totally into world politics, I was both disappointed and a bit bored. This is more a criticism about what I thought the book was going to be - I think if you're looking for ripped from the headlines, international thriller, you might want to check Hammer out. But, I definitely expected and wanted the focus of the story to be the high-stakes world of fine art, and that it is not.
Hammer
Joe Mungo Reed
•
First of all, this cover. I admit to being totally drawn in by it, in hopes I had found a new art thriller to share with all of you. And for the first 1/3 of Hammer, I was taken in, both the setting (auction houses, London) and the wild ride that happens when money, power and art collide inside the pages of a book.
•
The narration of Hammer is stellar and thank you @simonandschuster for this gifted copy. Hammer really morphs from an art-centric thriller into more of a geopolitical storyline; the timing of this book is actually mind blowing because we have a Russian oligarch named Oleg and his stop at nothing desire for wealth and power. There are lots of Putin references (Putin even makes an appearance in the story) as does Ukraine. The book is set in 2013 but clearly the author had a good working knowledge of where the world was headed. For me, when the plot veered away from art almost totally into world politics, I was both disappointed and a bit bored. This is more a criticism about what I thought the book was going to be - I think if you're looking for ripped from the headlines, international thriller, you might want to check Hammer out. But, I definitely expected and wanted the focus of the story to be the high-stakes world of fine art, and that it is not.