The Melting Pot: Amazon.co.uk: Martin Cororan: Books

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Customer Reviews

9 Reviews

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
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Average Customer Review

4.6 out of 5 stars (9 customer reviews)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Work in progress, 9 Oct 2007

By	primitivegrrl "primitivegrrl" (Glasgow, Scotland) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

The Melting Pot has a head start on a lot of self published authors as the book is well-presented, good cover and totally readable. Many self-published works are of really poor quality and really badly proof-read if proof-read at all.

The story itself was not really my bag at all, I am not a huge thriller/political reader, or even of books set in foreign climes. But I did keep engaged in this book, which tells the story of an age-old Southern American city called Cordello, heavy with corruption, violence and greed. The novel clearly researched with a thought out long history for the fictional town which is quite well realised.

The problems I had with the book, however, are all technical issues. The writing suffers from Cororan trying too hard to write well, rather than just go along with natural ability. Far too much time is spent on creating backgrounds, and I don't think it was until page 164 that I felt I was at last getting to the essential plot of the story. Little things like too many italics, too many unnecessary (and sometimes clumsy) translations of Spanish names/phrases, and tired cliches were really distracting and emphasised the fictionality of the book. Sometimes the narration didn't quite know its place and flitted in and out of tenses. Occasionally, the dialogue didn't ring quite true either - would a South American really refer to himself as "half-cut"? Or from pigeon-English to use the word "cumbersome" two lines later?

I think the novel had a good story to tell and unfortunately Cororan's enthusiasm and passion for that story got in the way of the story-telling.

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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Top Read, 11 Jun 2007

By	K. OToole - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is a real page-turner - I read it in a couple of long sittings and thoroughly enjoyed it; couldn't put it down.

Cororan has created a seething, volatile environment for his characters - the city itself is alive, and has a turbulent, violent history. The great dialogue keeps the narrative moving, sometimes funny, brutal, yet always gripping.

Great, solid debut from this promising young English author.

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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Melting Pot, 28 Jun 2007

By	Sally Panayiotou - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The Melting Pot is finely constructed, effortlessly weaving together the stories of the main characters as we're taken through the charged history of Corderro. To me Cororan writes with the skill of Douglas Coupland in novels like 'all families are psychotic', or 'hey nostradamous', where the tragedy of the protagonists seems impossible to cope with, yet the situations and characters are so real and believable that as a reader we're convinced.

Cororan's flowing narrative and gripping pace creates an engaging book that had me hooked. His dialogue is fantastic. The pace of the last few chapters was spot-on and he managed to reach a highly touching conclusion without the use of obvious sentimentality.

I'd definitely recommend a read.