Did anyone else struggle with this? It's got all the ingredients - Occupied Paris casting a long shadow over the present - but it simply didn't work for me and at times seemed to be veering perilously towards time travel/magic realism which seems a lazy way out for a writer of Sebastian Faulkes's calibre. Not one of his best, for sure. 3* if I'm being generous.
There's a running joke about the characters' difficulties with the French language that made me smile, though.
'After we had the onglet and the anglais,' said Julian, 'I invented a story for Hannah.The quand one. Do you remember?...
'It was something like ... Quel cant qu'on raconte quand que le Comte est con qui racompte ses comptes. Quant á la conte du concombre, par conséquence, quand il danse le can-can dans le camp á Caen.'
Which does sum up rather neatly why we English struggle as soon as we cross the Channel. Hein?
I've only read 'Birdsong' so far - have three more on shelves and as I'm looking for a book to read at the moment might try one of the three!
ReplyDeleteBirdsong was his best, Veronica - ages since I read it but I remember being completely gripped.
ReplyDeleteI'd struggle with it just because it's Sebastian Faulks. That'll be one to leave off the list. All the others have been Kondo'ed.
ReplyDeleteI don't get very far Kondo-ing the bookshelves, Lucille. I've had to stop buying and embrace the library as even books I don't love are hard to part with. And the librarians know me as the lady who is constantly tipping over the 25 book limit.
ReplyDelete