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arp_3103's review against another edition
challenging
dark
funny
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
airplex's review
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.0
drdreuh's review against another edition
mysterious
medium-paced
2.5
I wanted to read Martin Amis because he died last year, and suddenly the literati were all atwitter with odes for an author I had never heard of. I stumbled on "London Fields" in a used bookstore in Barcelona. Is it representative of his work? Where does it sit in his portfolio? No idea.
"London Fields" is a man's book. A weird thing to write, but nonetheless true. Raging hard-ons abound. Dirty and sometimes violent sex, and women, and bars and cigarettes, and a long drawn out competition of a "sport" I couldn't care less about, darts. Gritty. Reminds me a bit of T.C. Boyle's style. And Elmore Leonard. Vonnegut, maybe. So aggressively misogynistically male that I wonder if you could get this book published today. No relationship that is not abusive. Freudian. Everything that is taboo, really.
But its also very smart. A book within a book full of literary references and funny Briticisms. Multiple point of view. Multi-class. Writing about writing.
Astronomical events and the threat of world war burbling in the background seemed unnecessary.
Structurally interesting, and the whodunit energy hooked me, even though we were told from the start who done it. But otherwise I'm glad to have the reading of this Amis, anyway, behind me.
Lines I loved:
Countries go insane like people go insane ... Some had been insane all their lives, and some had gone insane and then gotten better again and then gone insane again.
Most places just are something, but America had to mean something too ...
He thought of straw: was this the kind you clutched at, or the kind that broke your back?
Curious how madness and obscenity go together.
"London Fields" is a man's book. A weird thing to write, but nonetheless true. Raging hard-ons abound. Dirty and sometimes violent sex, and women, and bars and cigarettes, and a long drawn out competition of a "sport" I couldn't care less about, darts. Gritty. Reminds me a bit of T.C. Boyle's style. And Elmore Leonard. Vonnegut, maybe. So aggressively misogynistically male that I wonder if you could get this book published today. No relationship that is not abusive. Freudian. Everything that is taboo, really.
But its also very smart. A book within a book full of literary references and funny Briticisms. Multiple point of view. Multi-class. Writing about writing.
Astronomical events and the threat of world war burbling in the background seemed unnecessary.
Structurally interesting, and the whodunit energy hooked me, even though we were told from the start who done it. But otherwise I'm glad to have the reading of this Amis, anyway, behind me.
Lines I loved:
Countries go insane like people go insane ... Some had been insane all their lives, and some had gone insane and then gotten better again and then gone insane again.
Most places just are something, but America had to mean something too ...
He thought of straw: was this the kind you clutched at, or the kind that broke your back?
Curious how madness and obscenity go together.
mrlivia's review
dark
funny
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
A very funny book
yash590's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
The book is engaging but the writing style is not for me, I believe. Before reading the book, I read that the narrator is an unreliable one. That got me confused as I was not sure whether I was learning about the characters or about the narrator. Which parts of the book should I believe to be true and which ones are figments of the narrator's imagination?
From that perspective, it was engaging but it led to too much confusion when reading the book. On top of that, the writing is too steeped in British culture and I had trouble figuring out what a lot phrases meant. The book, I think, is to be read like a dream, or a nightmare, (similar to how the characters in the book look at life) without trying to make too much sense of the story and letting it flow at its own pace, even if you may feel that you are left behind at times.
From that perspective, it was engaging but it led to too much confusion when reading the book. On top of that, the writing is too steeped in British culture and I had trouble figuring out what a lot phrases meant. The book, I think, is to be read like a dream, or a nightmare, (similar to how the characters in the book look at life) without trying to make too much sense of the story and letting it flow at its own pace, even if you may feel that you are left behind at times.
erboe501's review against another edition
4.0
I immensely enjoyed reading this book. The influence of Spark's The Driver's Seat was obvious, but LONDON FIELDS is different from Spark's 'minor novel' in so many ways. I was actually surprised by the ending. The character sketches in this novel are fantastic, particularly Marmaduke (I just can't figure this kid out) and Keith (the darts, innit?). I laughed a lot.
thisisstephenbetts's review
5.0
A hyperbolic sledgehammer of a book, vicious and vitriolic. It is a wonderfully inventive post-modern crime story, with a broad and vivid cast of London life, that sadly rings a little too true. I'm not a big Amis fan, but I loved London Fields.
While written in the late 80s, it still feels highly relevant today. Perhaps it would have seemed less so in the middle of Blair's premiership, but the new age of austerity suits book just fine. The dread of imminent apocalypse (a touch of JG Ballard there, particularly The Drowned World with its relentless sun), may have a different flavour these days but it still resonates - perhaps that's just the age I'm at. Certainly, despite the political backdrop, the real apocalypses tend to be personal. I think that's what makes it such a existential, misanthropic and desperate cri de coeur. The plot is clear and bleak (and telegraphed, in all the book's post modern flourishes), but the struggle with the modern human condition is a constant. Which, through the course of the book, you might become convinced is worse than the looming global catastrophe.
It may be slightly overlong, or at least I felt it sagged a touch in the middle middle. The repetition of one incident through three of the players' eyes didn't feel like it repaid the effort. That said, it does have the feel of a book that could stand a second run at it, so maybe that section would open up.
On a personal note, it is particularly interesting to read it, working, as I have been for the last 6 months, around Westbourne Park (I know exactly what he means, 20 years on, about the difficult junction by the canal bridge and bus station on Great Western Road). And my trips to the falafel stand on Portobello Road now have me looking out for Keith Talent-alikes, and Black Cross pub archetypes (it's not a fruitless search).
A good part of the enjoyment of London Fields derives from the cheerfully grotesque characters. The main figure is like a hyper-real Del Boy - bits of it read like an extreme reaction to Only Fools and Horses and the lovable cockney rogue archetype. I would have relished an adaptation featuring the casts and sets from that sitcom in its heyday.
Well, an astonishing searing hurricane of a book, that blows you away in the reading and leaves you feeling worn out and dessicated. That said, for me the final resolution didn't quite satisfy. Clearly you know that not everyone was going to play their roles as scripted, but the climactic switcheroo left some important arcs dangling disconcertingly and also felt a little implausible. I feel like I understand why Amis resolved it as he did, just that it could have been handled a little better. While it was all foreshadowed (a little too) neatly through shoals of red herrings, even that foreshadowing seemed a little too manufactured (a criticism that Amis deftly and disingenuously heads off by his narrator pointing out what he didn't go back and change the beginning to fit his resolution). While his murderee convinced, it was as if, despite the ingrained misanthropy on every page, he couldn't quite conjure up what would bring someone to murder. I guess that's somehow encouraging.
Despite my slight dissatisfaction at the resolution, this is one of the best and most engrossing books I've read. If you were to read only one Martin Amis book (and, honestly, I think that may be enough (though Money is a lot of fun)), make it London Fields.
While written in the late 80s, it still feels highly relevant today. Perhaps it would have seemed less so in the middle of Blair's premiership, but the new age of austerity suits book just fine. The dread of imminent apocalypse (a touch of JG Ballard there, particularly The Drowned World with its relentless sun), may have a different flavour these days but it still resonates - perhaps that's just the age I'm at. Certainly, despite the political backdrop, the real apocalypses tend to be personal. I think that's what makes it such a existential, misanthropic and desperate cri de coeur. The plot is clear and bleak (and telegraphed, in all the book's post modern flourishes), but the struggle with the modern human condition is a constant. Which, through the course of the book, you might become convinced is worse than the looming global catastrophe.
It may be slightly overlong, or at least I felt it sagged a touch in the middle middle. The repetition of one incident through three of the players' eyes didn't feel like it repaid the effort. That said, it does have the feel of a book that could stand a second run at it, so maybe that section would open up.
On a personal note, it is particularly interesting to read it, working, as I have been for the last 6 months, around Westbourne Park (I know exactly what he means, 20 years on, about the difficult junction by the canal bridge and bus station on Great Western Road). And my trips to the falafel stand on Portobello Road now have me looking out for Keith Talent-alikes, and Black Cross pub archetypes (it's not a fruitless search).
A good part of the enjoyment of London Fields derives from the cheerfully grotesque characters. The main figure is like a hyper-real Del Boy - bits of it read like an extreme reaction to Only Fools and Horses and the lovable cockney rogue archetype. I would have relished an adaptation featuring the casts and sets from that sitcom in its heyday.
Well, an astonishing searing hurricane of a book, that blows you away in the reading and leaves you feeling worn out and dessicated. That said, for me the final resolution didn't quite satisfy. Clearly you know that not everyone was going to play their roles as scripted, but the climactic switcheroo left some important arcs dangling disconcertingly and also felt a little implausible. I feel like I understand why Amis resolved it as he did, just that it could have been handled a little better. While it was all foreshadowed (a little too) neatly through shoals of red herrings, even that foreshadowing seemed a little too manufactured (a criticism that Amis deftly and disingenuously heads off by his narrator pointing out what he didn't go back and change the beginning to fit his resolution). While his murderee convinced, it was as if, despite the ingrained misanthropy on every page, he couldn't quite conjure up what would bring someone to murder. I guess that's somehow encouraging.
Despite my slight dissatisfaction at the resolution, this is one of the best and most engrossing books I've read. If you were to read only one Martin Amis book (and, honestly, I think that may be enough (though Money is a lot of fun)), make it London Fields.
vanib's review against another edition
1.0
This was by far one of the worst books I've read. The writer/narrator as part of the story? Why? Why so overly complicated? And I've never seen the use of SO MANY words that got you nowhere. Seriously. How can I come away from such a word-dump of a book and still have questions? What the heck WAS the "crisis"? And don't even get me started on the one-dimensional purpose of every single female characters. Horrible, horrible, horrible.
darcislibrary98's review
3.0
London Fields
Book Number: 74
‘Written Samson Young is staring death in the face.
Void of ideas and on the verge of terminal decline, Samson’s dash to a decaying, degenerate London has brought him through the doors of the Black Cross pub and into a murder story just waiting to be narrated.
At its centre is the mesmeric, doomed Nicole Six, destined to be murdered on her thirty-fifth birthday. Around her: disreputable men, one of whom might yet turn out to be her killer. All Samson has to do is to write Nicole’s story as it happens, and savour this one last gift that life has granted him.’
I don’t know if it’s because I’ve been in a reading slump or what. But I struggled to get into this book. The chapters just seemed long and the story was hard to follow.
The story constantly switches between characters and an unreliable narrator. I can swear where Amis was coming from, in the sense of wanting the reader to do some of the work. Trying to figure out who the murderer would be, how they all would be tied together. But it just gets tiresome throughout the book.
If you want a straightforward murder mystery plot line, then stay away from this.
3/5*
#books #bookshelf #bookblogger #bookreview #books #bookstagrammer #bookshelves #igreads #goodreads #booklover #reader #londonfields #martinamis
Book Number: 74
‘Written Samson Young is staring death in the face.
Void of ideas and on the verge of terminal decline, Samson’s dash to a decaying, degenerate London has brought him through the doors of the Black Cross pub and into a murder story just waiting to be narrated.
At its centre is the mesmeric, doomed Nicole Six, destined to be murdered on her thirty-fifth birthday. Around her: disreputable men, one of whom might yet turn out to be her killer. All Samson has to do is to write Nicole’s story as it happens, and savour this one last gift that life has granted him.’
I don’t know if it’s because I’ve been in a reading slump or what. But I struggled to get into this book. The chapters just seemed long and the story was hard to follow.
The story constantly switches between characters and an unreliable narrator. I can swear where Amis was coming from, in the sense of wanting the reader to do some of the work. Trying to figure out who the murderer would be, how they all would be tied together. But it just gets tiresome throughout the book.
If you want a straightforward murder mystery plot line, then stay away from this.
3/5*
#books #bookshelf #bookblogger #bookreview #books #bookstagrammer #bookshelves #igreads #goodreads #booklover #reader #londonfields #martinamis