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Spies (Hardcover)

by Michael Frayn (Author)
3.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (57 customer reviews)

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Paperback (New edition) £7.99 £5.49 454 used & new from £0.01

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Product details

  • Hardcover: 302 pages
  • Publisher: Faber and Faber (4 Feb 2002)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0571212867
  • ISBN-13: 978-0571212866
  • Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (57 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 320,073 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #34 in  Books > Fiction > Authors, A-Z > F > Frayn, Michael

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Product Description

Amazon.co.uk Review
In Michael Frayn's novel Spies an old man returns to the scene of his seemingly ordinary suburban childhood. Stephen Wheatley is unsure of what he is seeking but, as he walks once-familiar streets he hasn't seen in 50 years, he unfolds a story of childish games colliding cruelly with adult realities. It is wartime and Stephen's friend Keith makes the momentous announcement that his mother is a German spy. The two boys begin to spy on the supposed spy, following her on her trips to the shops and to the post, and reading her diary. Keith's mother does have secrets to conceal but they are not the ones the boys suspect. Frayn skilfully manipulates his plot so that the reader's growing awareness of the truth remains just a few steps beyond Stephen's dawning realisation that he is trespassing on painful and dangerous territory. The only false notes occur in the final chapter when the central revelation (already cleverly signposted) is too swiftly followed by further disclosures about Stephen and his family that seem somehow unnecessary and make the denouement less satisfyingly conclusive. This is a much sparer and less expansive book than Headlong, Frayn's Booker Prize-shortlisted 1999 novel, more understated in its wit, but it is, in many ways, more compelling.--Nick Rennison

Review
'Michael Frayn is the most philosophical comic writer - and the most comic philosophical writer - of our time.' Michael Arditti, Daily Mail 'As you're dragged into his headlong race for fame and riches, you never know what will happen next, only that more torture lies in store.' Blake Morrison, Independent on Sunday

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Customer Reviews

57 Reviews
5 star:
 (16)
4 star:
 (17)
3 star:
 (6)
2 star:
 (10)
1 star:
 (8)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.4 out of 5 stars (57 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Profound denouement is a adaquate compensation, 13 Feb 2006
This review is from: Spies (Paperback)
'Spies' is described as 'beautifully crafted' and I have to agree. Even when I wasn't enjoying what I was reading, which for a large part of this novella I was not, it is stil impossible to deny that it has been formed with a glorious technique.

Until the last 60 pages of Spies I found the overt simplicity of the childhood Stephen's narative rather grating. However, from this point onwards the adult Stephen plays an almost unbroken lead role in narrating the story and once he does, the beauty of the ideas really begins to show.

It is astonishing to anyone who has grown up that Frayn manages to remind us of aspects of childhood that we had forgotton despite his vastly superior age.

It is only in considering the role of the narrator in a story that we can really understand why Frayn was justified in winning the Whitbread prize. The realisation that characters themselves have not changed, merely the Stephen's (the narrator) perspective (and therefore our perspective) is a remarkable transition from the regular narrative method of the omnipotent narrator, one who is unaffected by the narrative, despite playing an integeral role in it. Frayn's perspective on narrative here, and equally his attention to detail is what saves this novel from what might have been a disapointment to what is ultimately, a masterpiece.

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35 of 40 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Always fresh and inventive, Frayn breaks new ground, 3 Feb 2002
By A Customer
I have been comprehensively bowled over by Spies. I have never seen the dilemmas, confusions, excitements, insights, and incomprehensions of childhood better, more truthfully, done; and its balance of comedy and anguish - indeed the blend of comedy and anguish - is handled with exceptional delicacy. The fun is real fun, but it isn't allowed to cheapen or lessen Stephen's anxieties, fears, sense of his own unworthiness. (As an old man, he may have lost two of those, but not the third, I think.) All that would be enough to make this an exceptionally fine and unusual novel.
But Frayn also presents an adult story, imperceptibly humming in the background almost at the start, then thrumming more and more audibly as he brings it to the fore. When finally it declares itself openly, fortissimo and on centre-stage, one realizes that it has (and how it has) been at the centre of the story from the outset, though always - even at the climax - we get it through the consciousness of the boy.
The presentation of the adult story is an astonishing technical feat. Frayn shows superlative skill in the way he paces it - not just the rate at which the story comes forward, but the steps it takes to get there: the thriller-like excitement as it is gradually revealed, the discipline with which the revelation comes entirely through the experience of the boy Stephen, with nothing leaking around the edges, the growing revelation (starting long before we know what the story really is) of its sadness. It is an astonishing achievement.
The central adult story is heart-breaking. One is also sad for others, including the boy Keith and his poor limited frightened frightening father.
Frayn is never sentimental. He allows Stephen to be better in some ways than he thinks he is, and to have some significant decencies. But he also allows him to fail pretty seriously, letting down each of the two adult protagonists. The failures are shown as growing organically out of the condition of being a child, but they are failures nonetheless.
The long list of Frayn's novels has contained nothing else remotely like this. He continues to extend his range, taking new risks, exploring new territory.
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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Great Mystery, 25 Jan 2006
By MrShev "mrshev" (Gloucestershire, UK) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   
This review is from: Spies (Paperback)
I loved this book. I compulsively read this to find out what an earth was going on. Frayn handles the suspense wonderfully and draws the scene of war time with elegance and restraint. He somehow evokes the time without being patronising or simplistic and one felt the people could have existed in any time, except this was theirs and the worries they had were merely compounded by war.

I loved it - recommended.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars A thoughtful story on growing up
It's pretty easy to divide the reviews of this book into two camps: those from teenagers who've been forced to read Spies as an A-level set text and those of us who've read it... Read more
Published 27 days ago by Marcus G

5.0 out of 5 stars I adore this book.
I adore this book. It's moving yet very funny in parts. Frayn's use of language is beautiful, yet the novel is very easy to read. I highly recommend it.
Published 1 month ago by Mrs. P. K. Smith

3.0 out of 5 stars A boy's attempt to understand the adult world
Spies is a short nostalgic novel concerned with a boy's attempt to understand the adult world at a time when adults were doing their best to destroy it. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Trevor Coote

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb Spies
`Spies' starts with an old man heading back to his youth where he tells the tale of Keith and Stephen, two friends who live on `the close' during the Second World War. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Simon Savidge "savidgeread...

4.0 out of 5 stars Alice review
Spies is a nostalgic novel written through the eyes of Stephen Wheatley as a young and old man, following him on his journey from childhood to adulthood, as he uncovers some dark... Read more
Published 6 months ago by Mr. Rm Hawkins

5.0 out of 5 stars Through a child's eyes
A fascinating view of the world through the eyes of a young boy growing up in 1940s suburbia - but the themes explored by Michael Frayn are universal and timeless.
Published 7 months ago by Simon Paul

1.0 out of 5 stars Just boring!
I've just finished reading this book and I'm amazed that it won the Whitbread Prize. From start to finish I was bored and didn't care about the characters or the plot. Read more
Published 8 months ago by Mr. D. Mellor

1.0 out of 5 stars I was actually considering suicide...
We had to read this book as part of AS English Literature course, and in all honesty, it was an awful book. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Booh

1.0 out of 5 stars Pretentious and boring
From the first chapter to the last, this book was painful to read. The plot was ridiculous and the over-used theme of childhood innocence is neither new or exciting.
Published 16 months ago by C. March

3.0 out of 5 stars As a student...
Yes, this book is long-winded, overly nostalgic and pointless, and yes, I hated studying it at A level, but it is that ridiculously over-crafted tone that makes this a perfect... Read more
Published 16 months ago by Claire

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