Posts Tagged ‘love story’

  • Book Review – The Swan Thieves

    Date: 2010.03.24 | Category: Reviews | Response: 0

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    As you all know from my previous post, I only had a week in which to read this book. Well, it only took me two and a half days to finish it. (I did however read at all available times, as well as having an evening off in which to get a head start!)

    The Blurb:

    Psychiatrist Andrew Marlowe has a perfectly ordered life – solitary, perhaps, but full of devotion to his profession and the painting hobby he loves. This order is destroyed when renowned painter Robert Oliver attacks a canvas in the National Gallery of Art and becomes his patient. Desperate to understand the secret that torments this genius, Marlowe embarks on a journey that leads him into the lives of the women closest to Oliver and a tragedy at the heart of French Impressionism. Kostova’s masterful new novel travels from American cities to the coast of Normandy; from the late nineteenth century to the late twentieth, from young love to last love. The Swan Thieves is a story of obsession, history’s losses, and the power of art to preserve hope.

    This was a beautiful book. I enjoyed it thoroughly. I liked the way the author managed to combine art with pyschology and the past with the present. It brought back to mind ‘The Time Traveller’s Wife’ by Audrey Niffeneger.

    Not that it was in any way the same,but the two different stories within The Swan Thieves,  which were connected by a love story was reminiscent of The Time Traveller’s Wife. (If you didn’t enjoy it, don’t be swayed by my thoughts).

    The second novel by Elizabeth Kostova, her first being ‘The Historian’ are similar in that they combine the past with the present, but whereas I felt ‘The Historian’ was quite eerie (for my review head here) her second one was beautiful and filled with a type of longing. Sadness too but definitely less intense.

    I can certainly recommend this book, I think it is the perfect read to take you away to the distant past. It is a quiet book with none of the immediacy of The Historian and perfect to curl up with and savour.

  • ‘Where rainbows end’ review – Cecilia Ahern

    Date: 2010.02.03 | Category: Reviews | Response: 1

    000037fc10dryTruth time here on The Book Club Blog.

    I found this book at the library and picked it up because I needed some light- hearted entertainment, and where better, than chick lit?

    I haven’t read any of her books before, but decided to give her a go. For some reason, I just haven’t ever ‘felt’  it when picking up her books. And I’m sure you know what I mean by it. That feeling of knowing you’re going to enjoy a particular book, or not even enjoy it, but its going to nab your attention. That magical feeling when you know you have found something that appeals to that secret reading part of you. But, I ignored the fact I hadn’t felt anything and checked it out of the library anyway, I was desperate for a ‘non thinking’ book!

    Well, a non thinking book it is indeed. I read it in one sitting. Or should I be more clear in that when I say read, I mean skim read. This book is written in the format of emails and text messages, which I don’t mind at all, in fact a story can be told extremely well in this way, remember this review? But I found this one to be very long winded. I don’t suppose it helps that the story line was fairly long winded too.

    ********************** Spoiler alert************************

    In a nutshell:

    Rosie and Alex are childhood friends, thick as two thieves and do everything together.  They grow up from naughty children to rebellious teenagers until Alex’s family moves from Dublin to America. Rosie stays behind and on the eve of her departure from Dublin to meet up with Alex and go to college, she falls pregnant.

    Here starts the story of how Rosie and Alex keep missing each other due to marriages and missed flights and divorces and more marriages. It is a typical case of  ‘fate meddling’, ‘not taking the bull by the horns’ and ‘keeping ones feelings to oneself’.

    Then at the end, they manage to get together. And the story starts again with Rosie’s daughter having a similar but not so drawn out experience with her childhood friend.

    I cant say this book blew the wind up my skirt, but for an evening of not thinking, it worked very well.

    If you like this type of story, you will most likely enjoy this book, if you are a fan of Cecilia Ahern, you will probably love it. But, considering I have never read any of her books before, I couldn’t honestly say.

  • The Gargoyle – Andrew Davidson

    Date: 2009.11.03 | Category: Reviews | Response: 2

    51fwzv1xmzl_ss500_The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson is a beautiful book!

    I discovered this book about a year ago, when I was wondering through Waterstone’s in the UK, but at the time, it just wasn’t what I was looking for. Even having read the first few pages ( I always read them to see if I am going to ‘get into’ the book) and knowing that it was something that I would like to read at some point, I didn’t buy it. In a way I am glad I didn’t, else I wouldn’t have recently rediscovered it! But on the other hand, I can’t believe I waited this long to read it!

    The writing is beautiful, the story is interesting, the characters are larger than life. There are stories within stories and the opening chapter begins with how one of the main characters got burned, in a car accident. At times during the reading of this chapter, it was a bit hectic, because the way he describes the burning, is enough to make anyone cringe.

    Ultimately, this story is a love story, a 700 year old love story between a man and a woman. But the telling of it, includes the present day through the past. It is fantastically done and extremely well written. I don’t want to tell you all the other details as it will detract from the telling of the story line, just be sure that if you are a romantic at heart (even if you don’t admit it to anyone!) and enjoy a well written novel, then this I cannot recommend enough.