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3.78 AVERAGE
3.78 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
A slow, slow burn of a book, all embers and low smoke until the fuel hits the flame near the very end. Lovely prose, evocative dialect, fairly minimalist story.
The only fault I would have is that, spare at it is, I could have felt more empathy for the characters.
Q: 3
E: 4
I: 3
QxE + I = 15
The only fault I would have is that, spare at it is, I could have felt more empathy for the characters.
Q: 3
E: 4
I: 3
QxE + I = 15
Elmet starts as a slow burner, painting an intimate portrait of a family building a home near a copse of trees. As their world expands, the action and tension build, slow at first, then accelerating deliciously toward the climax. Enthralling work.
dark
reflective
tense
slow-paced
Rating: 4.0/5.0
This was part of my Man Booker Prize TBR. It is a beautifully written gritty story of a father (John) and his two children Cathy (15 years old) and Daniel (14 years old). The story is told from Daniel's perspective. The book focuses on their unusual lifestyle, how the daddy (as Daniel calls him) built their home and been fighting for their land. Also, there is a major part of it focusing on the dad's fighting skills and how he used that skill for a living.
From the epigraph, in the book, we understand that Elmet is the last independent Celtic kingdom in England. It is where the whole story takes place. This is a debut novel for Fiona Mozley and I have to say it doesn't feel as one. It feels you are reading a book by an experienced author. That is a great thing to accomplish. Will be looking forward to more books from this author in the future. The book contains violence so be warned about that but nonetheless, it is very delightful to read the story and life with the unique characters.
This was part of my Man Booker Prize TBR. It is a beautifully written gritty story of a father (John) and his two children Cathy (15 years old) and Daniel (14 years old). The story is told from Daniel's perspective. The book focuses on their unusual lifestyle, how the daddy (as Daniel calls him) built their home and been fighting for their land. Also, there is a major part of it focusing on the dad's fighting skills and how he used that skill for a living.
From the epigraph, in the book, we understand that Elmet is the last independent Celtic kingdom in England. It is where the whole story takes place. This is a debut novel for Fiona Mozley and I have to say it doesn't feel as one. It feels you are reading a book by an experienced author. That is a great thing to accomplish. Will be looking forward to more books from this author in the future. The book contains violence so be warned about that but nonetheless, it is very delightful to read the story and life with the unique characters.
dark
emotional
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
The action in Fiona Mozley's debut novel, 'Elmet', is often restrained and reticent, even fully hesitant. It is a book about remembering specific moments and all the intricacies that compose them, a book about experiences and emotions set against a natural Yorkshire landscape that is depicted in florid, near-poetic language. It focuses more on reactions rather than action, narrated from the perspective of a young boy, Daniel, who has very close yet also distant relationships with his Daddy and sister Cathy. The result is a sombre book that teases out its plot for the reader, leaving them to work out much of what is left unsaid before it arrives at its rather shocking conclusion.
"Elmet", rather impressively for a debut novel, was shortlisted for the 2017 Man Booker Prize, and it is not hard to see why it was nominated. Mozley's prose is able to evoke the wild countryside of the north of England with a sharp, magnetic clarity and such vividness that, like Egdon Heath Thomas Hardy's novel 'The Return of the Native', the landscape seems to come alive and become its own character. Likewise, Daniel's narration is gripping and well-constructed, and creates much of the tension and mystery of the novel because it infers and speculates and comments without ever openly declaring things. The novel takes on gothic and noir tones which combine to create a work that is memorable, like its characters backstories and intentions, for just how sinister it can be, despite its calm, apparently benign surface.
However, the novel is perhaps somewhat held back its focus on maintaining too much mystery. For example, the events behind its rather unexpected conclusion - one which forever shatters the seemingly-idyllic existence of Daniel and his family - are hinted at throughout the novel, yet not in a way that sufficiently sets up the climax, which as a result seems somewhat illogical, even implausible. The reader sees the actions of other characters through Daniel's eyes, but though he sees a lot, he cannot see everything, and the book suffers for it. For some readers, the ambiguity may work well, but for me personally, it often feels like Daniel is not even a character in the book, that he has no real influence on the events and is just there to report on more interesting characters like Daddy and especially Cathy. The result is that, while the book is undeniably written well, it is hard to connect with it on an emotional level and grow to really care about the characters because so much of their personalities, bar Daniel's, remain hidden.
'Elmet' is thus a book that, despite its flaws, succeeds in creating a suitably moody atmosphere in which to examine its themes of home and belonging. For a debut novel, it is certainly impressive, and hints that Mozley's talents as a writer are sure to develop well in the years to come.
"Elmet", rather impressively for a debut novel, was shortlisted for the 2017 Man Booker Prize, and it is not hard to see why it was nominated. Mozley's prose is able to evoke the wild countryside of the north of England with a sharp, magnetic clarity and such vividness that, like Egdon Heath Thomas Hardy's novel 'The Return of the Native', the landscape seems to come alive and become its own character. Likewise, Daniel's narration is gripping and well-constructed, and creates much of the tension and mystery of the novel because it infers and speculates and comments without ever openly declaring things. The novel takes on gothic and noir tones which combine to create a work that is memorable, like its characters backstories and intentions, for just how sinister it can be, despite its calm, apparently benign surface.
However, the novel is perhaps somewhat held back its focus on maintaining too much mystery. For example, the events behind its rather unexpected conclusion - one which forever shatters the seemingly-idyllic existence of Daniel and his family - are hinted at throughout the novel, yet not in a way that sufficiently sets up the climax, which as a result seems somewhat illogical, even implausible. The reader sees the actions of other characters through Daniel's eyes, but though he sees a lot, he cannot see everything, and the book suffers for it. For some readers, the ambiguity may work well, but for me personally, it often feels like Daniel is not even a character in the book, that he has no real influence on the events and is just there to report on more interesting characters like Daddy and especially Cathy. The result is that, while the book is undeniably written well, it is hard to connect with it on an emotional level and grow to really care about the characters because so much of their personalities, bar Daniel's, remain hidden.
'Elmet' is thus a book that, despite its flaws, succeeds in creating a suitably moody atmosphere in which to examine its themes of home and belonging. For a debut novel, it is certainly impressive, and hints that Mozley's talents as a writer are sure to develop well in the years to come.
What a haunting book. Definitely focuses more on character exploration than on plot, but that's the way I like it. The writing was just gorgeous and despite being told through the eyes of a 14-year-old boy, it had really striking things to say about growing up as a woman through the narrator's sister. I wanted to savor every word of this!
Daniel is searching for someone and on his travels he recalls his childhood with his sister, Cathy, and daddy. They lived a simple life in the woods, trapping and living off the land. But anger rumbles deep in this small town and it bubbles over to violence. This was a lot harder to read than I was expecting, still a great book, just probably wasn’t the right time. There was one passage spoken by Cathy that killed me: “It is my life and my body and I can’t stand the thought of going out into the world and being terrified by it all, all of the time because I am Danny. I am. And I don’t want to be. I don’t want to feel afraid. All I kept thinking about was Jessica Harmon thrown into that canal and all those other women on the tv, in newspapers found naked covered in mud, covered in blood - blue - twisted -found in the woods, found in ditches, never found. Sometimes I can’t stop thinking about them. Sometimes I can’t stop thinking about how I’m turning into one of them. I’m older now and soon my body will be like theirs. I didn’t want to end up in a ditch.” And that’s the truth of it right there.
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes