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Review
"'A heartbreaking book... the love story seems to mirror the complicated political struggle surrounding it and the ending is so painful, like Romeo and Juliet... A huge achievement.' Joanna Lumley 'A rare book - subtle, sensitive, sensual' Achmat Dangor 'Hardy's evident intimacy with and affection for the troubled landscape and people of her novel lend The Wonder House an air of distinction' The Times 'Brilliant... each of the characters is wonderfully crafted' Easy Living"
Product Description
Three women live on The Wonder House, a boat moored on Nagin Lake, and carved from the great cedars that watch over the Kashmir Valley. Suriya is mute, and carries a terrible secret. Her daughter, Lila, wants to escape the past, and live a different kind of life. But together, they tend to Gracie, a defiant Yorkshirewoman living out her widowhood by the lake. A military coup over the border brings violence crashing back into the Valley. When an English journalist arrives to report on the conflict, Gracie invites him to stay on The Wonder House. But, Hal is a man adrift, and his love for one of the women threatens more than just the fragile peace on the houseboat.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The power of love is a Wonderful thing,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Wonder House (Paperback)
Curiously affecting, this book had me completely gripped from about page 60 on. It's beautifully written and repays careful reading. Be warned though: it spoiled me for anything else for some time afterwards. I found it lingered long after I had finished it, and I kept on wondering about the characters who inhabit this wonderfully evocative world. I've never been to India, but it is clear that the author knows the area she is writing about well and loves the country and people there deeply. Her sense of place is powerful. She also effortlessly helps to explain some of the tensions of the area. But you don't read this book for that, you read it for the powerful characerisation, the unfolding drama and the love stories beneath. There are incidents aplenty in this moving novel, but the author unravels them with a patience that is enviable. And the end, boy, is the end moving. This book is fascinating and absorbing, and I am sure that anyone who enjoys reading will love this book. For a first novel it is assured and potent. I highly recommend it and hope it reaches the wide reading audience it deserves.
10 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Simply gorgeous and deeply moving,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Wonder House (Paperback)
This is THE novel about Kashmir. No traveller should go to the region without it. Salman Rushdie's "Shalimar the Clown" may have got all the publicity, but if you want to understand what life is really like in beautiful beleagured Kashmir today -- and if you want a wonderful, heartrending read -- then this is the novel you should get. It catches it all: from the way the mountain light hits the water on Nagin lake to the clumsy brutality of the Indian Army to the way the fundamentalists exploit the young men of the valley. Kashmiri culture was was wonderfully humane and jolly and very far from fundamentalist before this conflict. And Justine Hardy, a journalist who has spent more than a decade living and reporting in Kashmir understands and loves that culture. She takes you behind the veil, under the burqua and even into the training camps where young boys are turned into killers, without ever losing sight of the humanity of her finally drawn, utterly believable characters. Everybody I know who has read this book has been gripped and found themselves crying. I cannot recommend it too highly.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
3.0 out of 5 stars (3 customer reviews)
3.0 out of 5 stars
Fictionalized account of Kashmir conflict,
By asiana - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: The Wonder House (Paperback)
Ms. Hardy's previous non-fiction books are the reason I purchased The Wonder House. Although the characters are depicted accurately, the book jumps around too much and the reason for one character's deafness is unclear until the very end of the book. I'd like to see more non-fiction from Ms. Hardy rather than another novel.
5.0 out of 5 stars
A stunning, deeply moving novel of Kashmir,
By Gotham Indophile - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: The Wonder House (Hardcover)
More vivid, and yet more true to life than any non-fiction account of the war torn mountain paradise of Kashmir this extraordinary book brings the place alive in all its beauty and horror. You get a visceral sense of the gorgeousness of Kashmir: the mountain light on the lakes, the scent of the pine forests, the handsomeness and humor of the people. But it also takes you deep into a brutal counter-insurgency war in a way that is fair to all sides but brings home the human cost of violence. Indeed there are times in 'the Wonder House' when it's all but impossible not to cry. This is one of the most important and powerful novels written about South Asia in many years.
4 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Extremely disappointing,
By bookreader "nq" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: The Wonder House (Paperback)
My eyes happened to caught the cover of The Wonder House as I made my way out of the bookstore. I was elated to discovery that the story took place in my homeland- Kashmir. However, I was throughly disappointed after finishing the book at the complete lack of historic accuracy and the biased against the Indian army. Besides the factual portion of the novel, I wasn't impressed by the writing style- at certain times extremely noncongruent, choppy sentences. The jumping around of different viewpoints made the novel diffiult to follow.
Also I wish the author had concluded the novel with a little more death. The murder of the main character was left completely unresolved. |
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