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'Never has Dibdin's polished prose been so probing and delicate.' Guardian
Product Description
Thanksgiving is a novel about love, sex, death at midlife, and the power of the past. Anthony is a British journalist whose American wife, Lucy, has suddenly died. Grieving and haunted, he becomes obsessed with her youth and the years he missed before he met her. To find out more, he travels to a remote part of the Nevada desert to meet Lucy's first husband. Their encounter is the beginning of a journey that takes him across the world, to the edge of madness, and into the corners of the human heart. It is a journey in which he is never at peace and never far from the woman he still loves.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Michael Dibdin is one of genre fictions great writers. And as well as being a fine prose stylist Dibdin is versatile. He has written a fine modern series, the Aurelio Zen books, which concluded with the near perfect Blood Rain; has written witty (and erudite) parodies such as The Last Sherlock Holmes Story and The Dying of the Light; and atmospheric thrillers, such as The Tryst. His recent work has suggested a certain tiredness with genre. In some ways the elegiac Blood Rain almost seemed a goodbye to genre. That background has led to his latest novel, Thanksgiving. It is a slight book in size (less than 180 pages) but deals majestically with large themes.
The premise is simple : a widower attempts to find out about his late wife's life before she met him. He is a British journalist, she an American previously married to a redneck. To prepare for his meeting with the first husband, the protagonist takes a pistol.
The opening chapter is a tour de force. Atmosphere is convincing, and the tension of the meeting between the two men linked only by their late lover is cranked up through Dibdin's typical mastery of dialogue.
The confrontation with the past permeates the rest of the novel, and throughout Dibdin deals with love, loss, memory, and identity.
As with all his work the characterisation is deftly drawn. Particularly noteworthy are the first husband, and the protagonist's stepdaughter. The relationship that provides the hub of the novel is convincing, and the grief, and bereavement, are touchingly illustrated. One of Dibdin's merits as a stylist is his tendency to show and not tell and at times this can lead to some writing appearing obtuse. This is no fault, and in a book such as this the dreamlike quality that pervades the novel is reminiscent of other great studies of longing, love, and desire such as Schnitzler's Dream Story.
The territory covered in this novel was also that of Julian Barnes witty novel, Before she met me. It says much of modern British fiction that it is the well-known genre writer's novel that will live long in the memory, and that the much-feted Barnes' work seems slight in comparison.
Format:Paperback
This is a diversion from MD's series about Aurelio Zen, an Italian police detective ordered to solve crimes in unfamiliar cities (and then being transferred to other unfamiliar cities for thanks). It has had mixed reactions from readers. This reader likes it.
This short, cleverly composed novel with plenty of erotic scenes was written in 2000 and is situated mainly in the US. Its main theme is how to deal with the past. Say, you have a new lover. Are you indifferent about her/his former partners or is it slowly becoming an obsession for you to know about them?
In 1982 Julian Barnes published "Before She met Me" about Graham, a historian, who finds out his new wife once acted in `blue movies'. He laughs it off, but soon, for the sake of science (history), he dives into her history...
In "Thanksgiving", British freelance journalist Anthony meets Lucy, an export promoter for apples from the state of Washington during a transatlantic flight. An erotic play begins which later on leads to marriage. But Lucy has two teenage children from a man about whom she does not say much. Years later, when Lucy dies in a plane crash, Anthony starts a search much like Graham's...
The first person he visits is Darryl Bob Allen, the father of Lucy's children, in a remote part of Nevada. Unsure of his safety, Anthony quickly arms himself, which is easy in this state and sets off. This occurs at the beginning of the book. A train of dramatic events follow, which readers must discover and interpret for themselves.
This reader grasped MD's enjoyment of making fun of a slowly dissembling British hero in America and beyond. A warm, always funny, but also re-readable novel, because many readers may think they have missed something, somewhere when they have read the last page.
This short, cleverly composed novel with plenty of erotic scenes was written in 2000 and is situated mainly in the US. Its main theme is how to deal with the past. Say, you have a new lover. Are you indifferent about her/his former partners or is it slowly becoming an obsession for you to know about them?
In 1982 Julian Barnes published "Before She met Me" about Graham, a historian, who finds out his new wife once acted in `blue movies'. He laughs it off, but soon, for the sake of science (history), he dives into her history...
In "Thanksgiving", British freelance journalist Anthony meets Lucy, an export promoter for apples from the state of Washington during a transatlantic flight. An erotic play begins which later on leads to marriage. But Lucy has two teenage children from a man about whom she does not say much. Years later, when Lucy dies in a plane crash, Anthony starts a search much like Graham's...
The first person he visits is Darryl Bob Allen, the father of Lucy's children, in a remote part of Nevada. Unsure of his safety, Anthony quickly arms himself, which is easy in this state and sets off. This occurs at the beginning of the book. A train of dramatic events follow, which readers must discover and interpret for themselves.
This reader grasped MD's enjoyment of making fun of a slowly dissembling British hero in America and beyond. A warm, always funny, but also re-readable novel, because many readers may think they have missed something, somewhere when they have read the last page.
5 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
After the disappointment at the end of Blood Rain, I was intrigued to see what the new Michael Didbin would hold. Having read most of his non-Zen books I had found his form whilst not in Italy a bit hit or miss but this was delightful. It was stirring, passionate, heartbreaking. A study in pain. Dashiell Hammett always wanted to write'propernovels' but could never make the switch, Dibdin has and credit to him for that.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Moving study of grief.
A brief book which poignantly examines the mental twists that can occur after the loss of a loved one. Quite different to the Zen books but well worth reading.
Published on 29 Mar 2008 by Manfred
Brief, but well constructed
This is a brief but well thought out and structured novel by Michael Dibdin. The book focusses on the quest of an Englishman in the USA to track the early life of his recently... Read more
Published on 16 Jan 2004 by M. V. Clarke
disappointing offering from a writer who can do so well
Michael Dibdin strikes off in a new direction in this tale of a British man in the United States tracing the history of his recently deceased American wife, finding himself... Read more
Published on 26 Oct 2001 by Dr. Sn Cottam
Total waste of time
This novella is such a waste of time and energy, one wonders why Dibdin bothered. After his only work of any note, Dirty Tricks, this attempt is feeble, mysognistic, unrewarding... Read more
Published on 31 May 2001
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