Leni Zumas's writing crackles. Her books are sharp, bleak, funny, and possibly dangerous. When her collection of short stories, Farewell Navigator,...
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A spare and strongly affecting novel that deserves to be much better known. The language is spare but vivid and powerful; the characters are quiet Norwegians whose fates make your heart ache.
I just returned to this book, many years after loving it as a kid and fearing perhaps it might not be as good as I remembered (as is so often the case). But it was even more wonderful than I'd remembered! A truly absorbing novel, with a strong heroine who feels real.
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A wonderful book: the three narratives are subtly connected, and each of its three protagonists has to choose between the grand idea of 'Civilization' and friendship, and those choices are very much tied up with how they treat the powerless. The kind of book that grows on you as it carefully, slowly, and subtly develops its ideas through its characters.
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(2 of 3 readers found this comment helpful)
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JaneEyre has commented on (4) products.
Skipper Worse
JaneEyre, January 1, 2012
A spare and strongly affecting novel that deserves to be much better known. The language is spare but vivid and powerful; the characters are quiet Norwegians whose fates make your heart ache.The Blue Sword (Newbery Honor Roll) by Robin Mckinley
JaneEyre, January 12, 2010
I just returned to this book, many years after loving it as a kid and fearing perhaps it might not be as good as I remembered (as is so often the case). But it was even more wonderful than I'd remembered! A truly absorbing novel, with a strong heroine who feels real.(2 of 3 readers found this comment helpful)
The Dream of Scipio by Iain Pears
JaneEyre, January 8, 2010
A wonderful book: the three narratives are subtly connected, and each of its three protagonists has to choose between the grand idea of 'Civilization' and friendship, and those choices are very much tied up with how they treat the powerless. The kind of book that grows on you as it carefully, slowly, and subtly develops its ideas through its characters.(2 of 3 readers found this comment helpful)
Waiting for the Barbarians by J. M. Coetzee
JaneEyre, March 14, 2008
A powerful book that develops its central character's moral ambiguity and complicity thoughtfully.(3 of 9 readers found this comment helpful)