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Climbers: A Novel (Paperback)

by M. John Harrison (Author)
4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
RRP: £6.99
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Product details

  • Paperback: 224 pages
  • Publisher: Phoenix; New Ed edition (4 Nov 2004)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0753819554
  • ISBN-13: 978-0753819555
  • Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 12.8 x 2 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 411,644 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Product Description

Review

M. John Harrison has abjured the high-pitched melodramatics of TOUCHING THE VOID for a microscopically observed novel about a group of climbers... descriptions of the various climbs are painstaking and suspenseful, and Harrison has a sharp ear for dialogue. But most impressive is his acute sense of place... the raw beauty of the Pennines. (Sinclair McKay The Daily Telegraph )

'Stunning.... Harrison makes an intensely poetic and evocative brew of the interstices between sport, passion and obsession. Moments of exquisite surreality rub against others in which you can smell the soil and stone'. (The Times )


Product Description

Retreating from his failed marriage to Pauline, Mike leaves London for the Yorkshire moors, where he meets Normal and his entourage, busy pursuing their own dreams of escape. Travelling from crag to crag throughout the country, they are searching for the unattainable: the perfect climb. Through rock-climbing, Mike discovers an intensity of experience - a wash of pain, fear and excitement - that obliterates the rest of his world. Increasingly addicted to the adrenalin, folklore and camaraderie of the sport, he finds, for a time, a genuine escape. But it is gained at a price... This dark, witty and poetic novel is full of the rugged beauty of nature, of the human drive to test oneself against extremes, and of the elation such escape can bring.
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71% buy the item featured on this page:
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Customer Reviews

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

 
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Great Book., 18 Aug 2005
I have been an enthusiast of M John Harrison since I read the incredible 'In Viriconium'. This book captures the single mindedness obsession and isolationism that occurs when you live for a pastime. It is beautifully written. A window into someone else's life. Highly recommended.
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13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Of gritstone and grey days...., 24 April 2006
By Peter Fenelon - See all my reviews
(TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
Mike is a failure in his "real" life; fleeing a loveless marriage he returns to his ancestral North and falls in again with a clique of gritstone climbers; the novel essentially follows a series of tangled, fragmented lives through a year of climbing, contrasting the precision and determination required to master increasingly challenging problems on rock with disorganised, aimless lives. This is a book written by a climber; Harrison has been active in the sport for many years. The descriptions of climbing are powerful and seem authentic; the tales of Northern life just as affecting and powerful.

Harrison is more known for his fantasy and science fiction; this book brings the same cool detachment and eye for detail to a more mundane milieu and works just as well as his more fantastic work. A compelling and powerful novel.
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1 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars The idea appealed but ..., 5 Aug 2005
I was drawn to this by the publishers blurb and a review I read in a paper. I didn't give up but I can't honestly say it lived up to expectations. A pity because it is not badly written and the idea was a good one.
It's not really about climbers although a sort of camaraderie does come through. There is emotion about relationships but somehow it doesn't quite work.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars A glimpse of life hanging on the edge
I knew M John Harrison as a science fiction writer so was intrigued to come across this as I'm a bit of an armchair climber. Read more
Published 6 months ago by Lendrick

5.0 out of 5 stars I'm not a climber but...
Although I've never climbed in my life, I absolutely loved this novel. It described certain aspects of human behaviour - the tedium of daily life, the desire for escapism, and the... Read more
Published 11 months ago by Dan Sumption

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