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stephrampton's review against another edition
3.0
It started off well but tailed off towards the end. There were also a couple of clunky plot devices which were disappointing. However, some great character descriptions and very evocative of 1960s London.
joecam79's review
3.0
Peter Ackroyd's fascination with London borders on the obsessive. The larger part of his eclectic and prolific output is haunted by the city, and particularly by a quasi-mystical sense - shared by other authors, particularly [a:Iain Sinclair|6851|Iain Sinclair|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1261049079p2/6851.jpg] - that every place has an underlying character that survives societal and topographical changes. Ackroyd has been the city's chronicler in his magnum opus - [b:London: The Biography|107400|London The Biography|Peter Ackroyd|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1348728966s/107400.jpg|695097] - and its sequels [b:Thames: Sacred River|928796|Thames Sacred River|Peter Ackroyd|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1320486977s/928796.jpg|913789], [b:London Under: The Secret History Beneath the Streets|10783451|London Under The Secret History Beneath the Streets|Peter Ackroyd|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1320524407s/10783451.jpg|15695572] and the upcoming Queer London. The city provides the backdrop to several of his biographies (for instance the volumes dedicated to Dickens and Wilkie Collins). In his fiction, it not only serves as a setting but is treated almost as another protagonist, equal to the living characters.
Ackroyd's latest novel, Three Brothers, in some ways sums up concerns found in several of Ackroyd's earlier London books. The siblings of the title were, like the author, born and brought up in post-World War II London in (it is suggested) a Catholic household. It is indeed tempting to read their intertwined life stories as a sort of fictional autobiography - particularly in the case of Daniel, the shy literature graduate turned author/critic who slowly comes to terms with his homosexuality.
I read this novel, quite appropriately, over a two-day visit to London. It certainly gripped me. Yet, it felt strangely slight, and I suspect that it is not a book which will stay long with me. Part of its problem is that it tries to be too many things at the same time. At its heart it is a realist novel, which depicts the tough day-to-day life in the years after the war. This realism is reflected in the matter-of-fact third person narrative - detached to the point of blandness. Yet, true to Ackroyd's "psychogeographical" outlook, the plot is driven by remarkable coincidences and by the strange visions of the past experienced by the youngest brother Sam. This technique is not new - Ackroyd himself has used it in [b:Hawksmoor|67729|Hawksmoor|Peter Ackroyd|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1411397981s/67729.jpg|65684] and, a similar approach (translated to Prague) is found in [a:Miloš Urban|1737540|Miloš Urban|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1375650126p2/1737540.jpg] 's The Seven Churches. Yet, whereas this supernatural element fits those novels' Gothic atmosphere like a glove, here it just feels out of place.
Other elements jostle for the readers' attention. There's a hint of satire of the journalistic world which is vaguely reminiscent of Waugh (although good old Evelyn is much funnier), there is a nod to thriller and crime fiction. At one point there's even a cameo for a poltergeist, which causes a couple of pages of mischief before being dispensed with completely. I tend to like genre-bending fiction, but I ultimately felt that there was too much going on for a novel a mere couple of hundred pages long.
Ackroyd's latest novel, Three Brothers, in some ways sums up concerns found in several of Ackroyd's earlier London books. The siblings of the title were, like the author, born and brought up in post-World War II London in (it is suggested) a Catholic household. It is indeed tempting to read their intertwined life stories as a sort of fictional autobiography - particularly in the case of Daniel, the shy literature graduate turned author/critic who slowly comes to terms with his homosexuality.
I read this novel, quite appropriately, over a two-day visit to London. It certainly gripped me. Yet, it felt strangely slight, and I suspect that it is not a book which will stay long with me. Part of its problem is that it tries to be too many things at the same time. At its heart it is a realist novel, which depicts the tough day-to-day life in the years after the war. This realism is reflected in the matter-of-fact third person narrative - detached to the point of blandness. Yet, true to Ackroyd's "psychogeographical" outlook, the plot is driven by remarkable coincidences and by the strange visions of the past experienced by the youngest brother Sam. This technique is not new - Ackroyd himself has used it in [b:Hawksmoor|67729|Hawksmoor|Peter Ackroyd|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1411397981s/67729.jpg|65684] and, a similar approach (translated to Prague) is found in [a:Miloš Urban|1737540|Miloš Urban|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1375650126p2/1737540.jpg] 's The Seven Churches. Yet, whereas this supernatural element fits those novels' Gothic atmosphere like a glove, here it just feels out of place.
Other elements jostle for the readers' attention. There's a hint of satire of the journalistic world which is vaguely reminiscent of Waugh (although good old Evelyn is much funnier), there is a nod to thriller and crime fiction. At one point there's even a cameo for a poltergeist, which causes a couple of pages of mischief before being dispensed with completely. I tend to like genre-bending fiction, but I ultimately felt that there was too much going on for a novel a mere couple of hundred pages long.
ladygeeke's review
3.0
I normally enjoy Ackroyd's books, which tend to be serpentine and mystical histories of a bygone London. This one interested me in particular because it is set in the place and time I grew up, 1950s-60s Camden in North London, and I hoped it would provide some additional insights for me into my own childhood and influences. I have to say, I was a little disappointed.
The story dips in and out of the lives of three brothers very different in temperament, encompassing journalism (Fleet Street, where my own father worked), academia, politics, and the criminal underworld of petty thieves and corrupt landlords. There is an undercurrent of mystical events, visions, and synchronicities that lead the family in a kind of criss-crossing dance through time which none of them survive intact.
Probably for legal reasons, Ackroyd has changed history and geography slightly, so I learned less about my past than I would have wanted. But he did capture the "feel" of the time, and some of the characters that populated the book seemed familiar.
It was an enjoyable read, but not a memorable one.
The story dips in and out of the lives of three brothers very different in temperament, encompassing journalism (Fleet Street, where my own father worked), academia, politics, and the criminal underworld of petty thieves and corrupt landlords. There is an undercurrent of mystical events, visions, and synchronicities that lead the family in a kind of criss-crossing dance through time which none of them survive intact.
Probably for legal reasons, Ackroyd has changed history and geography slightly, so I learned less about my past than I would have wanted. But he did capture the "feel" of the time, and some of the characters that populated the book seemed familiar.
It was an enjoyable read, but not a memorable one.
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