- Paperback: 320 pages
- Publisher: Burning House (3 April 2008)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1905636172
- ISBN-13: 978-1905636174
- Product Dimensions: 19.3 x 12.7 x 1.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 920,657 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
A Clockwork Apple
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More About the Author
Product Description
Review
A dazzling new voice bursts through the tired old glass ceiling of English fiction. Belinda Webb is a writer to watch. - Will Self --Will Self
Product Description
At last - an antithesis to chick-lit. Set in a dystopic Manchester A Clockwork Apple introduces Alex, an angry young heroine for our times who rages against the middling 'Blytons' and all they stand for. Her gang is all female, the state's control is exercised through addiction therapy, and Alex's solace is in high literature and postmodern deconstructionism!
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I think this book is a strong story with a convincing lead character.
Although Alex is a sadistic murderer (she kills two figures of authority and gratuitously brands one victim) we feel that she is a victim of her circumstances (her appalling alchoholic mother and a useless education system for example) and hence feel some sympathy for her. She tells us she has a volcanic temper (Etna) and she manages to control this enough to get out of prison. I also have some sympathy for here against the dumbed down education system which she portrays, which prevents her or her peers from getting access to cultural and intellectual traditiion that she feels connected to.
But ...and there had to be a but ... it does not really make any sense. How did she come to read? How did she come to be familiar with Nietzsche and Foucault at the age of sixteen in a dumbed down education system? ( I went to school 30 years ago to a supposed Grammer school and we did not encounter any of that stuff - only recently started to get to grips with it as a mature adult.) I am not saying that no child could encounter and understand this stuff but it is exceptional especially against a background of poverty and ignorance. Surely there would have been a mentor or guide who inspired her to study this stuff?
The other gripe is that there is no other sympathetic character (apart from perhas the second hand book shopkeeper). And this gets you to thinking why is that only Alex is right and everyone else is wrong?
So whilst I enjoyed it and think it has many strengths, I do not think it is a great book.
Although Alex is a sadistic murderer (she kills two figures of authority and gratuitously brands one victim) we feel that she is a victim of her circumstances (her appalling alchoholic mother and a useless education system for example) and hence feel some sympathy for her. She tells us she has a volcanic temper (Etna) and she manages to control this enough to get out of prison. I also have some sympathy for here against the dumbed down education system which she portrays, which prevents her or her peers from getting access to cultural and intellectual traditiion that she feels connected to.
But ...and there had to be a but ... it does not really make any sense. How did she come to read? How did she come to be familiar with Nietzsche and Foucault at the age of sixteen in a dumbed down education system? ( I went to school 30 years ago to a supposed Grammer school and we did not encounter any of that stuff - only recently started to get to grips with it as a mature adult.) I am not saying that no child could encounter and understand this stuff but it is exceptional especially against a background of poverty and ignorance. Surely there would have been a mentor or guide who inspired her to study this stuff?
The other gripe is that there is no other sympathetic character (apart from perhas the second hand book shopkeeper). And this gets you to thinking why is that only Alex is right and everyone else is wrong?
So whilst I enjoyed it and think it has many strengths, I do not think it is a great book.
6 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Even before you open this book, you can tell you are in for a treat. That someone would tackle Burgess and give us a new version of his tale is bold enough. That the author produces a work that stands nowhere in the shadow of Burgess, but blazes with its own fierce light is extremely satisfying. I like 'A Clockwork Orange'. I like 'A Clockwork Apple' a whole lot more.
Belinda Webb has succeeded in creating a future for our own time. Or maybe it is a parallel. Whatever the case, it is plausible, richly textured and so akin to the urban world outside the window that is hard, at times, to separate the fiction from the fact.
This is not a pastiche or slavish reworking of 'Orange'. The female protagonist of 'Apple' is very much her own grrrl. The author has given a female perspective to the world and to the tale of disaffected youth, if one can put it so mildly - although grrrl Alex is not the violent auteur of Burgess, her one crime is to have the temerity to be her own person and defend herself against the slings and arrows.
In addition to creating her own vision, Belinda Webb has achieved another rare thing in books these days. She has written well. That may seem faint praise, but good, fluent intelligent writing is a rarity these, especially when it is there in service of telling a story rather than attempting to dazzle the reader with the technical skill of the author. And as if that wasn't enough, the sustained first person narrative speaks with a genuine voice.
There is anger here, fire in the belly. It is tightly controlled both by the author and by her protagonist. Alex, for some (other characters and some readers alike), is a paradox. How can someone of such obvious erudition, intelligence, even wisdom, be so explosive? To me, the real question is why more people of such insight are not the same. How can people properly understand the society in which we live and not be angry?
As well as depth, as well as giving your conscience a bit of a kicking, this book is fun. I enjoyed reading it, and that has been a rare experience with new books of late. Beautifully crafted, it is stuffed with references and clever word play, all of which help to build a book with characters and an environment of great depth. Of course, dystopian literature is not to everyone's taste, but an intelligent and well written book such as this is worth picking up for the joy of reading something that entertains and makes you think.
Belinda Webb has succeeded in creating a future for our own time. Or maybe it is a parallel. Whatever the case, it is plausible, richly textured and so akin to the urban world outside the window that is hard, at times, to separate the fiction from the fact.
This is not a pastiche or slavish reworking of 'Orange'. The female protagonist of 'Apple' is very much her own grrrl. The author has given a female perspective to the world and to the tale of disaffected youth, if one can put it so mildly - although grrrl Alex is not the violent auteur of Burgess, her one crime is to have the temerity to be her own person and defend herself against the slings and arrows.
In addition to creating her own vision, Belinda Webb has achieved another rare thing in books these days. She has written well. That may seem faint praise, but good, fluent intelligent writing is a rarity these, especially when it is there in service of telling a story rather than attempting to dazzle the reader with the technical skill of the author. And as if that wasn't enough, the sustained first person narrative speaks with a genuine voice.
There is anger here, fire in the belly. It is tightly controlled both by the author and by her protagonist. Alex, for some (other characters and some readers alike), is a paradox. How can someone of such obvious erudition, intelligence, even wisdom, be so explosive? To me, the real question is why more people of such insight are not the same. How can people properly understand the society in which we live and not be angry?
As well as depth, as well as giving your conscience a bit of a kicking, this book is fun. I enjoyed reading it, and that has been a rare experience with new books of late. Beautifully crafted, it is stuffed with references and clever word play, all of which help to build a book with characters and an environment of great depth. Of course, dystopian literature is not to everyone's taste, but an intelligent and well written book such as this is worth picking up for the joy of reading something that entertains and makes you think.
4 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I genuinely don't know who could have written the glowing review of this book apart from the author herself, but the review is too well written to be her work, so presumably it's attributable to a desperate publisher trying to shift what may well be the worst book ever to have been published in English by any author living or dead.
The language is bad. I mean really, really bad; what the author tries to do is to mix some kind of made up language (three page dictionary in the back of the book) with phonetically spelt English, one assumes this is done to give the flavour of it being narrated by an angry Mancunian girl in some dystopian vision of the future. The made up words are one thing, and whilst annoying I suppose could be argued for. However, the phonetic spelling is beyond abysmal; sometimes it's there, sometimes it isn't, when it isn't it's bad, when it is it's worse. It reads like it was written by a teenager on the bus on the way into school.
As for the story, who knows, who cares?
The language is bad. I mean really, really bad; what the author tries to do is to mix some kind of made up language (three page dictionary in the back of the book) with phonetically spelt English, one assumes this is done to give the flavour of it being narrated by an angry Mancunian girl in some dystopian vision of the future. The made up words are one thing, and whilst annoying I suppose could be argued for. However, the phonetic spelling is beyond abysmal; sometimes it's there, sometimes it isn't, when it isn't it's bad, when it is it's worse. It reads like it was written by a teenager on the bus on the way into school.
As for the story, who knows, who cares?
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