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3.54 AVERAGE
3.54 AVERAGE
Non è per la prosa bizzarra e oltraggiosa (che mi intrigava proprio per aver ispirato il buon Welsh). Non è per il personaggio né troppo nero né troppo redento (che comunica bene il turbamento). Non è per il linguaggio scurrile né per il flusso di coscienza (che si amalgamano con risultati alterni). Ma la storia?
challenging
dark
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
N/A
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
challenging
inspiring
This is really not my type of book but I ended up enjoying it a lot - although this was largely down to my Scottish identity. I'll admit that I felt a certain sense of familiarity whilst reading this - Sammy's narration seemed like an elongated version of a facebook status from one of my mutual friends-who-are-not-really-my-friends. The stream of consciousness style was taken to the extreme, with a lack of punctuation, capital letters and lots and lots of swearing. It was a challenge having no chapters in a novel of almost 400 pages, and I think that if I didn't understand the dialogue I wouldn't have liked this at all. Recommend to anyone who likes Trainspotting and wants to know more about how shite it is to be Scottish.
I thought I would really hate it but somehow I don't really do. But I'm not a fan of it either and did not really enjoy reading it. Partly because some passages tended to make me frustrated about all the characters being so damn annoying. At the same time I was not as much bothered by the writing style as I had feared and there was an actual flow while following the stream of consciousness.
Sammy, waking up drunk in public, gets beaten blind by the cops. He stumbles around Glasgow, trying to sign up for the giro and dealing with police who don't tell him why he's being questioned about a drunken night he can't remember, all without the use of his eyes.
I liked Ally, Sammy's advocate at the DSS, whose weird optimism and familiarity with the law and medicine despite a lack of any formal training brought to mind Dr. Reo Symes. It's a shame the character doesn't amount to much.
Think Kafka meeting Irvine Welsh, with a splash of Charles Portis.
I liked Ally, Sammy's advocate at the DSS, whose weird optimism and familiarity with the law and medicine despite a lack of any formal training brought to mind Dr. Reo Symes. It's a shame the character doesn't amount to much.
Think Kafka meeting Irvine Welsh, with a splash of Charles Portis.
dark
funny
medium-paced
Strong character development:
N/A
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
I'm not being biased but Scottish humour surpasses any other sense of humour, fight me if you like but you know I'm right.
Scrambled rambling but I loved it, I struggled not having chapters to begin with as I love having a stopping destination but I slowly got used to the format.
You can't help but feel for Sammy he gets thrown in prison, beat up, thrown out on the street, he's gone blind and lost his girlfriend. Struggling to adapt to the loss of his eyesight we are told often through third person of Sammy coming to terms with this new disability.
Written in Scottish dialect, its quite dark with references towards the welfare state and the politics that come with it. References are made to the working class and their struggle compared to the rich. However it's done in a very humourous way which makes it a very enjoyable read
Scrambled rambling but I loved it, I struggled not having chapters to begin with as I love having a stopping destination but I slowly got used to the format.
You can't help but feel for Sammy he gets thrown in prison, beat up, thrown out on the street, he's gone blind and lost his girlfriend. Struggling to adapt to the loss of his eyesight we are told often through third person of Sammy coming to terms with this new disability.
Written in Scottish dialect, its quite dark with references towards the welfare state and the politics that come with it. References are made to the working class and their struggle compared to the rich. However it's done in a very humourous way which makes it a very enjoyable read
I first attempted to read this book back in 2001 but I got tired and left it unread. As I’ve had very good luck with revisiting the my past reads, I was sure that I would be able to tackle this novel and, furthermore enjoy it.
Unfortunately the things that bothered me the first time round still got to me nine years later. I’ll explain later on. At least I was able to finish the book.
After a rough night and being beaten by police ex-convict Sammy finds himself lying on the ground and blind. After trying to adjust into his new world (and finding out that his partner Helen has disappeared) he gets arrested again by and questioned if the police really did cause his loss of sight. Sammy is a vague about this. Later on he goes to a doctor to get a certificate that he is blind and the doctor refuses. By the end of the book Sammy’s son bails him out and Sammy leaves the country.
How Late…… uses the stream of conscious technique of getting its message across and Sammy (or the narrator) uses working class Scottish dialect. This already made the book a bit dragging. However it’s the complete lack of narrative structure which really made me squirm and angrily close the book at intervals.
I can understand that this is a book which deals with class struggles and the brutality of the police force but I find it way too difficult to cope with a novel that’s so messy. Maybe I am more traditional in my reading habits but I just find books like How Late… just plain irritating.
Unfortunately the things that bothered me the first time round still got to me nine years later. I’ll explain later on. At least I was able to finish the book.
After a rough night and being beaten by police ex-convict Sammy finds himself lying on the ground and blind. After trying to adjust into his new world (and finding out that his partner Helen has disappeared) he gets arrested again by and questioned if the police really did cause his loss of sight. Sammy is a vague about this. Later on he goes to a doctor to get a certificate that he is blind and the doctor refuses. By the end of the book Sammy’s son bails him out and Sammy leaves the country.
How Late…… uses the stream of conscious technique of getting its message across and Sammy (or the narrator) uses working class Scottish dialect. This already made the book a bit dragging. However it’s the complete lack of narrative structure which really made me squirm and angrily close the book at intervals.
I can understand that this is a book which deals with class struggles and the brutality of the police force but I find it way too difficult to cope with a novel that’s so messy. Maybe I am more traditional in my reading habits but I just find books like How Late… just plain irritating.
When I started reading this book I thought the author was just trying to be Irvine Welsh, so it took me a little while to get into it. Sammy grew on me though and the stream of consciousness was really well done. The character's emotional swings and paranoia were fantastically crafted. If I was being picky about it I would say that there needed to be either more Scots dialect or none at all, the middle ground didn't quite work for me. Wasn't a huge fan of the ending, but that didn't detract too much from my enjoyment of the book as a whole. Also (this is more of a comment on Scottish than the book) 'how' does not mean 'why'! They're completely different words, you cannot use them interchangeably. Silly Scots.