| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Product details
Would you like to give feedback on images?
|
Gilbert Joseph was one of the several thousand Jamaican men who joined the RAF to fight against Hitler. Returning to England as a civilian, he finds himself treated very differently. Gilbert's wife, Hortense, too, had longed to find a better life in England. But when she joins him, she is shocked that London is far from the golden city of her dreams. Even Gilbert is not the man she thought he was.
Through the stories of these characters, Small Island explores a point in England's past when the country began to change. Andrea Levy handles the weighty themes of empire, prejudice, war, and love, with a superb lightness of touch and generosity of spirit.
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. |
The 'today' of the novel is 1948, when Queenie Bligh has given up waiting for her husband Bernard to come back from his service in the Second World War, and to make ends meet has let rooms in her house out to immigrants from Jamaica, among them Gilbert Joseph and his wife Hortense. And that is Small Island in a sentence. But it takes us back through the four main characters' lives before and during the war, each speaking to us in their own voice. The ventriloquism is elegant and brilliantly managed, making us sympathetic to all the characters in turn, and gripped by their flowingly told stories; so much so that when they come into conflict at the end of the novel, we are as torn as they are, and don't know which way to turn.
There is tragedy and comedy everywhere in Small Island, and Levy seems incapable of misjudging the tone, whether she wants to depict casual racism, tender young friendship, cold middle-class romance, or the numb relentlessness of twentieth century warfare. The writing is frequently beautiful, and she has a way of approaching a new scene sidelong, rather than head-on, that brings the reader into it with freshness and curiosity. Minor characters come alive. If she puts a foot wrong, it may be in the particular details (can't give it away) of the central coincidence which drives the major 'twist' of the book - the world's not that small an island, surely - but if you already love the book by then, you'll shrug and let it go.
Small Island, then, is an exceptional achievement, an outright, downright, upright, leftright masterpiece. There's something for everyone - the formal artistry of the four voices, the back-and-forward structure, the crossing and recrossing of fates, the heartwrenching losses, the sparky dialogue. I'm just sorry that it's only the 18th of January as I write this because then it sounds like a gag when I say it's the best book I've read all year. But you know what I mean.
| |||||
Amazon Home | |
| International Sites: United States | Germany | France | Japan | Canada | China | |
| Business Programs: Sell on Amazon | Fulfilment by Amazon | Join Associates | Join Advantage | |
| Customer Service | Help | View Basket | Your Account | |
| About Amazon.co.uk | Careers at Amazon | |
| Conditions of Use & Sale | Privacy Notice © 1996-2012, Amazon.com, Inc. and its affiliates |
