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3.95 AVERAGE
3.95 AVERAGE
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
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:
Complicated
emotional
hopeful
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
4.6 stars. I couldn’t put it down. It’s a big novel telling the life story of the protagonist, but for me there is a sense of an underlying sadness for all the people David loves and is loved by. Very sophisticated and clever writing.
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Not totally convinced. But not bad.
Most interesting to me was the portrayal of growing up looking different from those around you and the changing social attitudes over the lifetime of my grandparents.
Most interesting to me was the portrayal of growing up looking different from those around you and the changing social attitudes over the lifetime of my grandparents.
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-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
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Presented as the personal memoir of a British actor, Our Evenings is a fragmentary narrative of a gay man’s life from the early 1960s through to the Brexit vote and Covid. David Win combines being working-class and mixed race with having access to privilege, pretension and wealthy friends thanks to a scholarship he gains to a top public school. His story is told through episodes, sometimes years apart, from his days at school and Oxford through to his acting career and love affairs, alongside the discovery and development of his gay identity. These are enjoyable reading and written with craft and beauty but the whole never really hangs together beyond being a life of privilege and prejudice not fully examined. Born in England to a white British mother, David never really engages with his Burmese heritage despite experiencing racism throughout his life — at odds with his sense of having only a white British identity. The whole story is framed by Brexit and resurgent racism, with David’s school contemporary Giles Hadlow — an arrogant, bombastic Boris Johnson-like character — popping up from time to time as he progresses to a career as a Tory politician promoting Brexit, revealing him to be a bully and cheat.
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
emotional
reflective
sad
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:
No