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kevin_shepherd's review
3.0
“…you see, when the depths stir like this, when a country sets a course for darkness, it comes to you not as horror but as unreality. Reality weighs nothing and everything is allowed.”
An aging political dissident/serial rapist reminisces about quality time spent with his kid brother in an arctic Russian gulag. And if that isn’t enough of a synopsis to send you scurrying over to Amazon.com, credit card in hand, let me risk further plot spoilage by telling you that both brothers are madly in love with the same woman.
“The love story is triangular in shape, and the triangle is not equilateral. I sometimes like to think that the triangle is isosceles: it certainly comes to a very sharp point.”
The title, House of Meetings, actually refers to the building in the prison camp where conjugal visits take place.
“You see, the house of meetings was also and always, the house of partings, even in the best possible case. There was a meeting and there was a parting, and then the years of separation resumed.”
This is my third Martin Amis novel. If he has a book out there where sex and misery are not key elements, I have yet to find it. He certainly doesn’t seem to be afraid of taking chances, and attempting to tell a compassionate tale of love and perseverance through the eyes of a brutal, murderous rapist is, inarguably, taking a big f-ing chance.
An aging political dissident/serial rapist reminisces about quality time spent with his kid brother in an arctic Russian gulag. And if that isn’t enough of a synopsis to send you scurrying over to Amazon.com, credit card in hand, let me risk further plot spoilage by telling you that both brothers are madly in love with the same woman.
“The love story is triangular in shape, and the triangle is not equilateral. I sometimes like to think that the triangle is isosceles: it certainly comes to a very sharp point.”
The title, House of Meetings, actually refers to the building in the prison camp where conjugal visits take place.
“You see, the house of meetings was also and always, the house of partings, even in the best possible case. There was a meeting and there was a parting, and then the years of separation resumed.”
This is my third Martin Amis novel. If he has a book out there where sex and misery are not key elements, I have yet to find it. He certainly doesn’t seem to be afraid of taking chances, and attempting to tell a compassionate tale of love and perseverance through the eyes of a brutal, murderous rapist is, inarguably, taking a big f-ing chance.
essjay1's review
3.0
I liked the sparse language, the depiction of the landscape and the interesting play between the brothers. I like the way Amis has cleverly conveyed the bleak environment, without getting bogged down in description. Reminded me of Coetzee’s Disgrace. Especially the political undertones. Like Coetzee, Amis is using his platform as a soapbox to decry the depravity & atrocities inflicted in the 1950’s by Russia on her own people. For all it’s gloomy outlook, I enjoyed many elements of the novel although it is yet another in the confessional style, the old man (& it’s so often a man) narrating his past sins as if we all cared.
wal_10's review
dark
informative
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.75
fionnious's review against another edition
2.0
Not sure why it’s called House of Meetings when it appears about 4 times in the whole novel.
fnnbnjmnks's review against another edition
2.0
Not sure why it’s called House of Meetings when it appears about 4 times in the whole novel.
redroofcolleen's review
4.0
“It is nothing.”
These were the words uttered rather non chalantly by a Russian neighbor when I expressed my delight at her beautiful carnations. I had some, and they just didn’t look like hers, despite trying several methods to make them flourish. I was bugged by the answer.
Then, I started to notice this was a trend among those I encountered from former Soviet States. It is nothing is like a mantra, the go-to answer for accomplishments large and small. I didn’t really get it until reading The House of Meetings by Martin Amis. The novel describes the life of two brothers in 20th century Russia: their love for the same woman, the wars, life in the gulag, life afterward.
The novel is a long letter from a father to his daughter, confessing his crimes, and describing his love for his brother Lev and his wife Zoya. What really stands out for me is the it is nothing aspect. The lives of the people of Russia have been so tortured (quite literally) and on the precipice for so long that nothing is truly valued, for if this were to happen, it would make the loss more unbearable. There are marriages, children, wars, rapes, thefts, and squalid conditions, but with them only a vague sense of gratitude, joy, remorse, or loss. It’s very strange.
The novel itself is a pretty swift read, smart, well researched, and even humorous at times. Though I did have to make stops at the dictionary for these words: pelf, rictus, cloacal, scrofulous, and lachrymist. Golly, does Martin Amis have an enviable vocabulary – it is something. On the whole, I liked the book it and found it rather enlightening. I appreciated the fact that it was so detached, as, sensitive girl that I am, I certainly could not have stomached the work had the narrator been passionately engaged and vividly describing the events of his life. On the other hand, I cannot help but feel sad that one could live this way, or treat others in such a fashion, as cold as the Siberian plain. I doubt I would last very long.
These were the words uttered rather non chalantly by a Russian neighbor when I expressed my delight at her beautiful carnations. I had some, and they just didn’t look like hers, despite trying several methods to make them flourish. I was bugged by the answer.
Then, I started to notice this was a trend among those I encountered from former Soviet States. It is nothing is like a mantra, the go-to answer for accomplishments large and small. I didn’t really get it until reading The House of Meetings by Martin Amis. The novel describes the life of two brothers in 20th century Russia: their love for the same woman, the wars, life in the gulag, life afterward.
The novel is a long letter from a father to his daughter, confessing his crimes, and describing his love for his brother Lev and his wife Zoya. What really stands out for me is the it is nothing aspect. The lives of the people of Russia have been so tortured (quite literally) and on the precipice for so long that nothing is truly valued, for if this were to happen, it would make the loss more unbearable. There are marriages, children, wars, rapes, thefts, and squalid conditions, but with them only a vague sense of gratitude, joy, remorse, or loss. It’s very strange.
The novel itself is a pretty swift read, smart, well researched, and even humorous at times. Though I did have to make stops at the dictionary for these words: pelf, rictus, cloacal, scrofulous, and lachrymist. Golly, does Martin Amis have an enviable vocabulary – it is something. On the whole, I liked the book it and found it rather enlightening. I appreciated the fact that it was so detached, as, sensitive girl that I am, I certainly could not have stomached the work had the narrator been passionately engaged and vividly describing the events of his life. On the other hand, I cannot help but feel sad that one could live this way, or treat others in such a fashion, as cold as the Siberian plain. I doubt I would last very long.
dithaonth's review
challenging
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.25
rebus's review against another edition
0.25
For the second time in a row, I was very excited to be reading Amis in real time. For the second time in a row, I was gravely disappointed, as he was now displaying the cliched Judaic viewpoint and irrational v hatred toward Russians that doesn't truly fit with the truth of history (I couldn't even get 50 pages into Koba the Dread knowing that the white, western, US and European economies kill over 70,000 on earth DAILY due to starvation and disease, a total of nearly 25 million a year without firing a single shot, which makes every US president a greater mass murderer in one term than ALL of the dictators of the 20th century combined).
I lost interest in him completely at that point, realizing he was as much a brainwashed tool of the establishment as anyone (despite the fact that he has written some truly brilliant and insightful character studies through the years).
Just another product of elite, upper middle class, British education. They kind that the punk rockers and members of Pink Floyd were trying to get away from in the mid 70s.
I lost interest in him completely at that point, realizing he was as much a brainwashed tool of the establishment as anyone (despite the fact that he has written some truly brilliant and insightful character studies through the years).
Just another product of elite, upper middle class, British education. They kind that the punk rockers and members of Pink Floyd were trying to get away from in the mid 70s.
lazygal's review against another edition
1.0
I did try! But the writing and the character just didn't match, which made it difficult to believe in the world that Amis was trying to create.
What I mean is, when your protagonist is a Russian emigree, a former prisoner in Stalin's gulags, you don't expect writing that throws a classical education in your face. Amis does that here, and it just doesn't work. The horrors of the gulag, the mystery of what happened in the House of Meetings and how that affects the future are all interesting, but it didn't matter. The book sounds as though it's set in England, with Oxbridge speakers, despite the setting.
What I mean is, when your protagonist is a Russian emigree, a former prisoner in Stalin's gulags, you don't expect writing that throws a classical education in your face. Amis does that here, and it just doesn't work. The horrors of the gulag, the mystery of what happened in the House of Meetings and how that affects the future are all interesting, but it didn't matter. The book sounds as though it's set in England, with Oxbridge speakers, despite the setting.