How to write a 2,000-word review of a book like Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell without being over-expository and, inevitably, over-analytical? This is a book that must simply be opened to page one, and read, without the weight of reviews dragging it down.
Unlike Cloud Atlas, a novel with reviews that merit reviews of their own. Examples:
"...makes almost everything in contemporary fiction look like a squalid straggle of Nissen huts compared with its vertiginous edifice..."
"...a Rubik’s cube structure that repays closer attention with still more puzzlement...as with the most perplexing dreams and riddling rides [??!!!] Cloud Atlas courteously sets us down where we began... [no, really? Like in Pulp Fiction, huh? Who plays John Travolta in this?]
...like a Venn diagram spread across centuries and continents... [dude, you’re good and ready now to write your own book]
"David Mitchell may well be possessed of genius. Even if he isn’t, there is no doubting that he is talented in the extreme..."
"Mitchell has been edging towards a masterpiece for some time now..." [and now he’s gone right over...]
Wednesday, 20 October 2004
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