- Hardcover: 352 pages
- Publisher: Fourth Estate; First Edition edition (16 Jun 2004)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0007178654
- ISBN-13: 978-0007178650
- Product Dimensions: 20 x 13.4 x 3.2 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,487,194 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Canarino
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Product details |
More About the Author
Product Description
Review
Praise for ‘Canarino’:
'A remarkably vigorous and subtle first novel: it is written with commanding authority and is impressively accomplished. The plotting is bold and alluring. The characters are vividly realised, forensically examined…beautifully observed. The writing throughout is spare and punctilious.' Independent
'A memorable debut.' Observer
'An artistic triumph.' Sunday Telegraph
'An impressively structured novel.' Spectator
'A sharp, pacily written examination of a marriage in slow motion.' Time Out
'Superbly draws a secure, unquestioned world and its subsequent downfall. There is much to admire in the writing.' Times Literary Supplement
'Divorce, money, sexy men and classy prose. Chick lit for clever girls.' Style Magazine, Sunday Times
Sunday Telegraph
'An artistic triumph'
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organise and find favourite items. |
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This is not just another book for your beach bag. The writing is wonderful, the story absolutely perfectly spun. I could not put this book down. I see my mother, my sister-in-law in Elizabeth; know many men like David. I enjoyed the transatlantic canvas the author used. The story is told not by just one character, but by several, which allows for no confusion or regrets once you reach the end. And it is so nice to read about people who are so calculatingly mean for a change.
14 of 15 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Canarino interweaves its five protagonists in a exquisitely crafted, linguistically evocative work. The action moves effortlessly from present to past to future, with the reader swept into the emotional cyclone created by the selfishness of the wife and husband.
This portrait of an American expatriate couple living in London in a style exuding material wealth yet emotional poverty evokes simultaneously envy and pity. Money secures power and control, but happiness is more elusive. Financially wanting for nothing, the anti-heroine knows that she is an absentee mother, even when she is at home with her children; knows that she is an absentee wife even when she is in bed with her husband; she is a 'control freak' even to the point of having both her children by caesarean section. Her obsessions are all-consuming. Her husband, who is available always to his clients and his young, attractive investment banking associates, but rarely to his emotionally deprived children, is nonetheless painted with more compassion; when his wife disappears into her neuroses, he tries to compensate his children with the fun he remembers from his childhood family.
The most sympathetically drawn, and in many ways believable, characters in this book are the two gays; the one, a superbly rounded character, the catalyst for the couple; and the other, his partner, skilfully crafted to avoid stereotyping.
Above all, enjoy this book for its poetry; the languid beauty of the Virginia countryside in the heat of the summer; the heady vibrancy of the motor cycle ride through the London night; the traffic on the Embankment which "pauses and shouts, pauses and shouts" and the minutiae of metaphorical detail which infuses the novel throughout.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
It is one of those books which you pick up for the interesting blurb at the back, which didn't really say much but pushed me enough to consider reading it. The first few pages were slow and I thought of giving up on it, but the story was intriguing enough to keep me going, which was good because I ended up enjoying the relaxed yet progressive way the author unravelled the plot and subplots, in a way similar to a calm river flowing towards a waterfall. Aside from the unexpected twists, I especially like the way she brings out the essence of her characters both in dialogue and description, who are hateful and pitiful at the same time. I highly recommend this book. Her style of writing wants me to consider reading others she has written.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Do you like poetry???
I have read quite a lot lately, but found myself with nothing left on my `read' list. My friend offered to lend me a book by an author that I had never heard of. Read more
Published on 12 Feb 2010 by Best Books To Read
canarino
quite a good book i would say. gives a good insight of a modern family life, where most of the upbringing of the kids where left to the hands of the helpers. Read more
Published on 14 Jun 2005
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
