The Swimming Pool Season
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Product Description
Mail on Sunday
'Sharp, elegant, pure’
Literary Review
'A love story in the very best sense of the phrase - a very good novel as well as an enjoyable one’
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
22 of 23 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Rose Tremain never fails to surprise me with her ability to write convincingly about different subjects set in different times and different locations. Here it is roughly the present time ;set in academic, sophisticated Oxford and the rural, French small village of Pomerac.
Both locations, populated with a variety of interesting at times outrageous characters, are linked by the main characters; Larry and his wife Miriam. Their relationship is, not for the first time, strained. She takes off to nurse her sick mother in Oxford and he throws himself into the task of building a swimming pool in Pomerac. Perhaps this venture can prove his worth and re-establish his failed business and shakey marriage.
There are plenty of side plots and relationships which keep the reader's interest. There is humor often using the Polish Nadia with her disastrous attempts at English to this end, but behind her comic facade lies sad guilt. It is an old device to have a foreigner speaking funny for comic effect, but when done well, as is the case here, it works and works well.
I have yet to be disappointed by Rose Tremain [see my reports on Sacred Country and The Colour]. I look forward to reading more by her and without reserve recommend this work .
Both locations, populated with a variety of interesting at times outrageous characters, are linked by the main characters; Larry and his wife Miriam. Their relationship is, not for the first time, strained. She takes off to nurse her sick mother in Oxford and he throws himself into the task of building a swimming pool in Pomerac. Perhaps this venture can prove his worth and re-establish his failed business and shakey marriage.
There are plenty of side plots and relationships which keep the reader's interest. There is humor often using the Polish Nadia with her disastrous attempts at English to this end, but behind her comic facade lies sad guilt. It is an old device to have a foreigner speaking funny for comic effect, but when done well, as is the case here, it works and works well.
I have yet to be disappointed by Rose Tremain [see my reports on Sacred Country and The Colour]. I look forward to reading more by her and without reserve recommend this work .
18 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This novel is obviously not one of Rose Tremain's most profound, but her writing is as good as usual, as is her understanding of human nature. In a way, this can be read as a quite light-hearted exploration of different relationships and personalities.
My only complaint is that Tremain provides a comic touch in this novel by using the truly outdated stereotype of the 'foreigner': a Polish character who talks about herself using the third person and makes ridiculous over emotional scenes which would only be credible in a comic book. Truly irritating.
Otherwise, I would recommend this book to people who'd like to have something light to read at the beach.
7 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Tremain in many ways, though a valued writer, is seriously under-rated. She is capable of writing many different books; definitely no one-trick pony. When I started this book I was initially a little wary, the start seemed a little orotund, but fairly quickly I realised this was the 'style' of the first French set section; the writing was rather pictorial, a bit 'Jean de Floret'. The first English section was more cerebral (set in Oxford academia); once again she seems to fit style to subject. The book is an expression of the many varieties of love - for the land, friendship, parental, sexual, for creativity. She has such a light, sure touch, and passages - such as one long sustained section in the third part about 'connectivity' and especially the final section, looking at change and loss, are wonderful.
And she can be both humorous and break your heart, sometimes on the turn of a phrase. Fine, fine writer.
And she can be both humorous and break your heart, sometimes on the turn of a phrase. Fine, fine writer.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
French Countryside and Oxford Academics
Another good read from Rose Tremain, set partly among ex-pats and locals in a small French village, and partly in Oxford. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Kate Hopkins
Couldn't be bothered to finish it
I rarely fail t finish a book but made an exception for this one. I did try, left it, came back to it but life is too short. Read more
Published 7 months ago by Miss J
disappointing
I've really enjoyed Rose Tremaine's books in the past, so grabbed this one from the library purely on the strength of her name. Read more
Published on 26 Jan 2010 by Matthew Parker
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