The Hit List

[Claire]

I just finished reading The Timetraveller's Wife today and i think it is a most excellent book. it's one of those wonderful books that breaks your heart but you simply have to surrender to it. Something inexorable about the denouement (check out my lit crit, but if there's a good way of putting it...) there's a quote on the back that says: "Pick up Niffenegger's book and you'll experience the visceral thrill that only a few novels can provide. an elegy to love and loss".

I think this is a very good way of putting it. what other books have you found that have this visceral effect, probably on your emotions? I'd cite The Five People You Meet in Heaven, The Kite Runner, Captain Correli's Mandolin, Birdsong,The Hours, Tess of the D'Urbevilles...

[mr_e]

Something inevitable about the ending (a rough translation for anyone like me who had to look up denouement). I'd also forgotten the definition of visceral, but it's a most appropriate descriptor in this case.

I'd possibly prefer this over The Kite Runner, but that's probably because I'm a maudlin navel-gazer, eh Claire? More seriously, though: the book drops hints as to what will happen, you know what it's likely to be, but you just surrender to it and enjoy the journey. The ones I could add to Claire's list are from when I was a child, so I don't know if they'd have that same effect now. Watership Down, for instance.

Thinking about it, I can now begin to see how people can read plot spoilers for soaps and still be so involved as it unfolds in front of them.

[Claire]

I also love Watership Down, but like you Mr E i read it when i was younger, as a child. i don't know if it would have such a powerful effect now, although i have read the Epilogue several times since and it does still have the power to make me cry!
I'd like to re-read this, likewise The Color Purple, which i read when i was about 13/14. i definitely need to return to that book as an adult.
I don't know which i prefer between The Kite Runner and The Time Traveller's Wife. i think the former is more consciously well written, but then the latter is so utterly convincing that it must be - if less superficially - brilliantly crafted. The Kite Runner shocked and appalled me, like a metaphorical kick in the guts, but the The Time Traveller's Wife distressed and devastated me, so who can choose?
Ah, the power of literature!

[Fez]

GOOD AS GOLD - joseph heller

painfully funny story about the life of bruce gold; haunted by his family, plagued by his relationship to jewish faith, and desperately wanting to be appreciated by his father, the white house and a string of unsuitable women. though not as likeable a man as yossarian in catch 22, bruce is nevertheless a character tormented by his own fears, jealousy and a monster of a father who belittles all his children despite being a failure for most of his own life.

the extensive list of hilarious characters rivals that of a catch 22, but importantly the plot is a lot tighter and doesn't concern itself with a few exhausting themes like something happened [heller's second novel]. a triumphant display of wit in book worth its own weight in some precious metal.

[Fez]

portrait of the artist as an old man - joseph heller

unfairly overshadowed by the success of his first novel, joseph heller ended his career with a personal novel about an aging writer struggling to come up with one last masterpiece as his imagination seems to be failing him. the autobiographical content is obvious and gives an honest and frustrating insight into the literature trade as the central character, eugene pota, life blurs on the page with his latest idea for a story. as he attempts to draw inspiration from his writing heroes [joyce, conrad, twain and many more] he discovers they too suffered a loss of drive in their latter years, with almost all of them succumbing to mounting debts, alcoholism, and nervous break downs.

born of frustration, this is a great novel let down by what heller was writing about; a declining imagination for an aging writer. its not that the story isn’t interesting, though the humour is sparse, it just falls short of the high standard he had previously set himself as he struggles to mix a normally sharp mind for fiction with his own life. the shadow of previous success in the end seemed inescapable.

[Andy]

Having read The Man In The High Castle by Philip K. Dick over my holiday I would just like to say that it is a brilliant book. Read it.

[liz.brownlloyd]

A murder mystery written in the first person - each chapter from a different point of view and each chapter giving you a few more clues.

Gives enough away for one to have part of the picture in place, but still allowing enough of the mystery to be a surprise at the end. Had to sit down with a cuppa for half an hour after I'd finished it to work out all the links between the seperate characters.

[Claire]

Mike - how can i put what i wrote about the Pursuit of Happiness here, in its apppropriate place? no wonder there was movie-confusion

[Mike]

Mike - how can i put what i wrote about the Pursuit of Happiness here, in its apppropriate place? no wonder there was movie-confusion

I don't know of any easy way. You can literally copy and paste the information here and convert the other topic to the film if you want!

[Claire]

Atonement by Ian McEwan

I have just finished reading this book and thought it was excellent. in fact, it says it was shortlisted for theMan Booker Prize in 2001 and i thought "WHAT?!" so i've actually had to check what beat it, and it was "The True History of the Kelly Gang". i suppose that must be good.

This is a tri-perspective novel, which has chapters and later sections dedicated to the perspective of a different character. Basically, a young girl called Briony Tallis sees her sister strip off to her underwear and dive into the fountain in their house's garden with her friend Robbie apparently watching. Briony wonders what perversion this is but little does she realise, that Cecilia was going into the fountain to retrieve something. this is like the butterfly flapping its wings because what gets in Briony's head at this point makes a lot of other things happen...for which she must atone.

Intelligently written; you have to read it before the film comes out. i noticed yesterday it's due in september and Knightley's in it, presumably playing Cecilia. Read it before she ruins it!!!!![/i]

[Mike]

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky

This is a novel that follows the frenzied consciousness of Raskolnikov (or Rodion Romanovich or Rodya) who against his better instincts is drawn to commit a callous double murder. Following this we follow his conflicting emotions veering from pride to contempt of himself and others to self loathing. The main character suffers a terrible dispair and his developing desire and hope of redemption.

The characters are amazingly real and the development of plot and characters is enthralling. This book is, by reputation, a difficult and complex read. However, I found that the quality of the written word, character and plot makes this book a classic and well worth a read. I will not pretend to have understood all of the literaty homages in the text, the notes explained a few but without them I would have never picked them up!

In addition there was a hint of an idea in the last few chapters of the book. The idea that a virus would make people forget who they were and become mindless, violent thugs rampaging through the world. It just goes to show that programmes like 'The Survivors' and '28 Days Later' were conceived well before the 20th Century! C&P was written in about 1865.

Another thing that struck me was the quality of translation, the translator 'Constance Garnett' did a wonderful job. Especially compared with Don Quiote which is clumbsy translations at best (or poor structure to begin with!).

[Fez]

crime and punishment is brilliant - however, i think you might find that don quioxite was poorly written to begin with rather than a bad translation. it's an ancient spanish text, one of the first adventure stories ever devised but that doesn't mean the author was much cop. i had a oxford uni press edition with notes for a-level students in the back but that couldn't hide the woeful story-telling.

[johnriley1uk]

Your reaction to Don Quixote is very interesting, because amonst the literati of the 19th Century it was regarded as one of the world's greatest novels.

They were by and large reading it in the original Spanish, but they did rate the Charles Jarvis translation very highly. I am reading that version now and have a copy contemporary with its era.

It may be that the meaning behind the simple adventure has been lost because it refers to things that we have no knowledge of. In a simplistic sense a bit like watching a spoof film without having seen any of the films it relates to.

I'm not saying my reading of the novel will fare any better, but I am steeped in 19th Century literature at the moment, so we'll see if it helps!

[Fez]

novels of such age, and especially foreign text, do tend to suffer with time as the tastes of the readers and the quality of the writing become more sophisticated. don quixote was written in 1605; an era when the written word was not widely available and most mass entertainment was performance based with oral storytelling and theatre the norm. robinson crusoe - widely regarded as the first english 'novel' published in 1719 - is a well known story retold a million times, but read it in its orginal form and the narration style is awful. amateurish in fact, though as nothing else like it existed it was considered a revelation in the same way that don quixote was over a century earlier.

[Mike]

The Abortionists Daughter - Elizabeth Hyde

This lawnfest of a book regards Dr Diana Duprey, an abortionist who has plenty of enemies. She is found floating face down in her excercise pool at home and there are supposed to be plenty of people who are implicated in her death. Her daughter struggle to cope with the fact her father is implicated in the investigation as the author slowly builds a picture of Dr Duprey's last day on earth.

The plot is painfully poor. This is a murder mystery without much mystery and to be honest the ending is so abrupt and poorly resolved it is not worth reading (due to the intense disapointment!)

All in all

PS Sorry for posting separate thread, forgot about the hit list thread!