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The Death of an Ordinary Man
 
 

The Death of an Ordinary Man (Paperback)

by Glen Duncan (Author)
3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)

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Product details

  • Paperback: 320 pages
  • Publisher: Scribner (5 Jul 2004)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0743252276
  • ISBN-13: 978-0743252270
  • Product Dimensions: 21.4 x 13.6 x 3 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 680,242 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #13 in  Books > Fiction > Authors, A-Z > D > Duncan, Glen

Product Description

Review

Man dies, gets to hover around and check out what the family is up to. In the latest example of our recent obsession with a nonsectarian afterlife, Duncan (I, Lucifer, 2003, etc.) takes your ordinary recently dead schmoe, Nathan Clark, and puts him in the ectoplasmic ether, floating through the lives and thoughts of his family and friends. In a well-rendered but confusing start, Nathan requires considerable time to get his bearings and figure out why all those people are staring at his grave. It takes some time for the reader, too, to get acclimated inside Nathan's head, which is, not surprisingly, buzzing with questions but also seems to be meshing with the thoughts of the people he's watching. With a certain guilty voyeurism, he takes an eye to what his daughter Gina is up to, as to whether she's sleeping with that none-too-trustworthy boyfriend of hers (Duncan makes little attempt to play down the more naturally prurient aspects of Nathan's and in fact seems to revel in them). Nathan also delves into his relationship with his wife, Cheryl, a spiky-tempered ball of trouble whom he hasn't really been able to connect with since the tragic death of their younger daughter, Lois. The men in Nathan's life aren't any easier: his father is a remote and sad fellow, his son Luke a basically good but distant and hard-to-figure kid. There's an affair here for Nathan to uncover, as well as a room in his house he can't quite bring himself to go into-and then, too, there's the matter of the reason behind his restless ghostly wanderings in the first place. Duncan's portrayal of the afterlife is refreshingly unsentimental, and he has plenty of talent to spare on the highs, lows, and everyday frustrations of family life, but it's hard even so for the attention not to wander. The life and times of an ordinary man, with longueurs and lack of drama intact. (Kirkus Reviews)


Guardian

'An appallingly intelligent writer...a dense, subtle, sensitive, perfectly shaped fiction'

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Customer Reviews

7 Reviews
5 star:
 (3)
4 star:
 (2)
3 star:    (0)
2 star:
 (1)
1 star:
 (1)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.7 out of 5 stars (7 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Spellbinding tale, 1 May 2007
By kehs (Hertfordshire, England) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   
We hear about Nathan, who is dead but definitely not at peace. He needs to find out how and why he died and hovers over his own funeral listening in to everyone's conversations. At his wake there are two people he doesn't recognise - who are they and why are they in his house? Also, Nathan needs to find out why his youngest daughter is dead and it's a heartbreaking revelation when he remembers the circumstances that ended her young life. As he begins to get close to remembering his own death the tension is unbearable and absolutely heart wrenching.
Duncan has a great mastery of words and had me spellbound all the way through this book. He did an incredible job in showing the reader the complexities of our relationships and forces us into facing up to unthinkable scenarios and wondering how we would cope with them. The way that he gets under the skin of a bereaved family is astounding and painfully accurate. This book is shocking and at times harrowing, but exquisitely written and I was captivated by it. If you enjoyed Alice Sebold's Lovely Bones then this is one I would highly recommend to you.
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Horrifying horror, 30 Aug 2004
By Mathew P. Wright - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
Has anyone ever read a single scary horror book? I have, Glen Duncan wrote it, and you're reading my review of it right now.

How can I put this eloquently, yet convey my emotion for this book? I loathe and detest it. I hope never, ever to be forced to read a single page of it ever again.

So you may be asking, why did I give it such a high rating? The answer is simple, Duncan is a master wordsmith. The tempo of the sentences match the mood of the book, confused at the start, gradually becoming more understandable as Nathan begins to understand. This is also the reason why it did not get five stars, because it is incredibly hard to get into. Duncan's other books that I have read (I, lucifer and Weathercock) I could not put down for days at a time, but this book took me weeks to read through it. Nevertheless, the thoughts it inspired me with as I gradually got through it were well worth the effort, and I would recommend anyone to read it.

So in summary, this book is bleak, bleaker even than anything by Chuck Palahniuk, but it's a work of genious of words.
This is a book of two horrors (in Duncan's own words):
The first horror is that there is horror, and the second horror is that you can live through it.

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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Harrowing, poignant, unsentimental & brilliant., 15 Oct 2006
By Susan (Hertfordshire, England) - See all my reviews
I had never read anything by this author before and I found this book absolutely fascinating. There are moments of stream-of-consciousness and disjointedness to contend with, but I did not have a problem with it because the overall narrative is the experience of a dead man, so I didn't expect it to follow a linear plot structure anyway. What we do have are dreams, memories, sensations and profound emotion all mixed up with some elements of real-time narrative. To say it is a roller-coaster ride would be to demean it with a cliche, but that is what it's like. I defy anyone, particularly if they are a parent, to come away from this book unmoved. Glen Duncan seems able to express the unexpressable in terms of grief, loss and love without becoming maudlin or sentimental. A fabulous book.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

1.0 out of 5 stars Why did I read it?
Admittedly a departure from the type of book I usually read - but I'm left wondering why I bothered?! Read more
Published 2 months ago by P. A. Williams

5.0 out of 5 stars A departure in style
Not in Glen Duncan's accustomed OTT style, but so successful. This is a serious, moving work, with his trademark intimacy yet it explores a simple man and a simple life affected... Read more
Published 21 months ago by Tricky fan

2.0 out of 5 stars I thought this was very disappointing
After reading the blurb I thought the story sounded fascinating but I only got to page thirty-one before I gave up. It was the style of writing that killed it for me. Read more
Published on 19 Sep 2006 by possiblejersey

4.0 out of 5 stars I think I enjoyed it!
I think that any book that provokes a reaction is a worthy read. The stronger the reaction, the better the writing. Read more
Published on 3 Jun 2005 by markm30

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