Reviews

The Field by Robert Seethaler

dylankakoulli's review against another edition

3.0

“The Field” is made up of a patchwork of people. Their collective voices, stories, emotions and quite literally their bodies too!

Seethaler once again subtly reminds of the beauty, in the ever day mundanity of our unremarkable, yet whole lives.

My only nit-pick if I had to have one, was that this doesn’t quite flow as smoothly as previous works I’ve read by him have. Perhaps it’s the constant alternating narrative, which just came across a trifle too stilted at times.

Nevertheless, I am constantly in awe of how this man can encapsulate so much, especially in so few pages!

3.5 stars

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sowievorher's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

mariannelwnicholson's review against another edition

emotional reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

julag003's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

engyz's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective sad fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

3.0

chris_tyson's review

3.0

Hit or miss for me. At points this book is very poignant, at others it reads more like something written for a creative writing class. His work “A Whole Life” is so perfect I keep reading his other works, but so far nothing has come close.

lieowl's review against another edition

emotional reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

bookshopjuliet's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

anorthernreader's review against another edition

hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated

3.0

thebooktrail88's review against another edition

3.0

Booktrail the locations in The Field

Interesting premise but a bit morbid. In the fictional town of Paulstadt in Germany, a patch of land has been set aside to bury its dead. These people then rest there at the heart of their community and through their voices from beyond the grave tell the stories you discover in this book. It’s not really a novel, more a series of vignettes of lives lived, histories shared and a display of how time and place passes and changes each and every one of us.

It’s clever how Paulstadt is fictional as this helps to ground the novel in a place, any place, so that this novel transcends both its fictional and physical borders. The emotional borders are the most heartbreaking though.

The reading experience was unique but fleeting. It’s akin to wandering in a cemetery and having each of the people buried below tell you their story. Brief and affecting but once you leave that cemetery, the mist descends and you are left with an overall picture of lives lived and faded memories fluttering in the air.