- Paperback: 357 pages
- Publisher: Vintage Books USA (22 Feb 1999)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0679743065
- ISBN-13: 978-0679743064
- Product Dimensions: 14 x 1.9 x 21.6 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 5,522,903 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
| ||||||||||||||||||
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
Product Description
a political fund-raiser in New York becomes the setting for a brazen act of sexual display by young lovers. Watching them is Santiago Diaz, the benefit's speaker, who is running for the presidency of his native Mexico. Aroused and disturbed, he later befriends the couple and draws them into his entourage, his marriage, and into the vortex of trans-American politics. There Andrew and Edith discover a world where plunder dictates policy, friendship is a devalued currency, and the future of nations is determined by talk shows and acts of terror.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
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. |
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
Format:Hardcover
While I usually don't buy the books I read, Ted Mooney's - Singing into the Piano makes me feel obligated to directly support the author's work. Give me more Ted! This erotic tale is both dark and luminous. It captures the essence of desperate, unshakable romance and explores the theme of borders <<social acceptability>>. The story begins in a New York ballroom where Santiago Diaz, candidate for the Mexican Presidency is scheduled to speak. At a table near the front a pair of educated and aroused gringo yuppies engage in digital love-making - a great distraction to the speaker. The narrator follows this pair who descend into a bachanal of public display, their mutually destructive and soul-binding fetish. Slowly their lives become intertwined with those of the presidential candidate and his fair wife. These are normal people with an unusual and, to me, evocative preoccupation with public sex. As a student of the Spanish language I could not help but be impressed by the seamless way in which Mr. Mooney interweaves these two languages. The author's frequent use of Spanish terminology serves to enrich and enliven the already vibrant text. (Some ideas are better expressed in a foreign language where the breadth of their meaning and depth of nuance is greater.) Never does he descend to the level of definition. To me his usages of Spanish words was intelligent and should be contextually understandable to even non-Spanish speaking readers. Mooney's style deserves emulation. Bravo! Ted Mooney drew me in. The story; its crisp pace and elegant imagery held my attention. But I found the conclusion somewhat less coherent and gripping than the novel in general. The characterization, from the outset excellent, seemed to diminish in quality toward the end. The plot takes a bizarre turn to Mexico (where Mooney's knowlege and references made me long to return) and towards the end of the novel... peters out. In the book's conclusion I believe Mooney's exploration of the 'borders' theme, the physical , the perceived, the imagined is a bit overt. But if I had to recommend one book to my friends, 20-something, educated, adventuresome all, I wouldn't hesitate to write 'Singing into the Piano' at the top of my list.
Format:Hardcover
This book is best read as a thriller that links sexual psychology and politics with a contemplation of the ethics of friendship and capitalism. But it's not as dry as all that---in fact, it's pretty hot stuff in places. Though the dialogue can be more than somewhat contrived (the author has a bad habit of speaking his prose style through his characters mouths in an implausible way), the complexity of the plot and its implications, plus the unusual and charged relationships among four (!) protagonists, make it well worthwhile.
Format:Hardcover
One of the worst books I have encountered in the past year. There are a host of technical problems, especially with regard to point of view, which is rarely clear. The characters are utterly unbelievable. (Confronted by a violent animal rights activist, Mercedes hands him her fur jacket, suddenly agreeing with him that "It is stupid!") Most unforgivable is the use of the f-word in the authorial voice, as in "They resumed f***ing." This book was silly and ultimately boring.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
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.
