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3.34 AVERAGE
3.34 AVERAGE
Atonement is one of my all time favorite books, and I live McEwan's On Chesil Beach, so I was excited to read his newest. As always, I expected the twist at the end, but on the whole, this novel was a disappointment. I found the characters and storyline predictable and unengaging.
I powered through it out of a sense of duty rather than enjoyment.
I powered through it out of a sense of duty rather than enjoyment.
The only reason I did not give this book five stars was because I found the beginning 50-90 pages slow and hard to get into, but the middle and end of the book definitely made up for that. I love the way that Ian McEwan writes. He's almost poetic in his discriptions and I don't know how to describe his style other than beautiful. I loved the ending of this book. It left me day dreaming about what happened after Serena read the letter from Tom. I like books that keep you thinking and I did not see the ending coming.
It all makes sense at the end but I felt manipulated by a too clever premise. Unfortunately, clever is working out for McEwan too well.
In brief: Ian McEwan’s newest novel is a sexy literary espionage, guaranteed not to leave you paralyzed with grief, rage, or sorrow at the futility of existence—unless, of course, you don’t happen to like literary espionage.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned about reading an Ian McEwan novel from my previous four experiences, it’s that you should approach with caution: the man has an almost unparalleled ability to decimate his readers intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually; sometimes, if he’s on a role, he does all three at once. But his newest novel, Sweet Tooth, is also his most fun: a sexy literary espionage, guaranteed not to leave you paralyzed with grief, rage, or sorrow at the futility of existence—unless, of course, you don’t happen to like sexy literary espionage.
Set in Cold War London, Sweeth Tooth follows Cambridge graduate and avid reader Serena Frome as she begins a thankless, anonymous desk job at the English intelligence agency MI5. But everything changes when her reputation as a girl who knows her way around a novel brings her to the attention of the MI5 higher-ups, who give her an assignment of her very own: promising young writer Tom Haley, whom MI5 is considering for inclusion in a top-secret arts funding program. Serena’s assignment is to familiarize herself with Haley’s work, then approach him and serve as a liaison of sorts, all while concealing the fact that she works for the government. But the assignment is jeopardized when, despite herself, Serena develops feelings for her asset, and the two become involved in a relationship that ruins both of their careers. (For the record, that’s not a spoiler: the novel says as much in the first paragraph.)
I’ve already called this McEwan’s “fun” novel, and I stand by that assessment, though you may not believe it based on the synopsis. But because it is an Ian McEwan novel, there are still weighty ideas in play, including Cold War politics, gender dynamics in the 1970s workplace, and generous amounts of literary theory. Mercifully, McEwan resists the temptation to become aggrandizing or sentimental about the Importance of Literature, and doesn’t strain credibility too terribly— Serena and Tom do not solve the Cold War with fiction. But Sweet Tooth is without question a book for book lovers, and McEwan’s own appreciation for the pleasures of reading shines through. In this sense, Sweet Tooth functions as a companion of sorts to McEwan’s most well-known novel, Atonement, in which he deals with, among other things, the challenges, seductions, and limitations of writing fiction. Sweet Tooth even comes with its own postmodern twist, a polarizing effect that will either delight or infuriate, depending on your attitude toward postmodern twists.
There are other McEwan hallmarks on display in Sweet Tooth as well: he continues to be a master of psychology, and, as ever a skilled ventriloquist, he gives a surprisingly convincing performance as a twenty-something woman (though, because of the above mentioned postmodern twist, that performance is ultimately on trial here). He also proves himself yet again to be a fearsomely excellent prose stylist—elegant but efficient, meticulous but evocative. There are those who might accuse McEwan of a certain amount of narcissism, since the career of the fictional writer Tom Haley so closely mirrors his own early days. But I’m willing to give him a pass for that, because it seems like a waste of effort to invent an entire literary career from scratch when you have a perfectly respectable model under your belt. And anyway, McEwan does not exempt Haley from his customary razor-sharp character dissections; if anything, his willingness to put a fictionalized version of himself on the page suggests more self-deprecation than narcissism. Even in his “fun” novel, McEwan’s insight into the human condition, and particularly its shortcomings, is formidable; I certainly wouldn’t want the force of it turned on me if I could help it.
Review originally posted at bookwurst.blogspot.com
If there’s one thing I’ve learned about reading an Ian McEwan novel from my previous four experiences, it’s that you should approach with caution: the man has an almost unparalleled ability to decimate his readers intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually; sometimes, if he’s on a role, he does all three at once. But his newest novel, Sweet Tooth, is also his most fun: a sexy literary espionage, guaranteed not to leave you paralyzed with grief, rage, or sorrow at the futility of existence—unless, of course, you don’t happen to like sexy literary espionage.
Set in Cold War London, Sweeth Tooth follows Cambridge graduate and avid reader Serena Frome as she begins a thankless, anonymous desk job at the English intelligence agency MI5. But everything changes when her reputation as a girl who knows her way around a novel brings her to the attention of the MI5 higher-ups, who give her an assignment of her very own: promising young writer Tom Haley, whom MI5 is considering for inclusion in a top-secret arts funding program. Serena’s assignment is to familiarize herself with Haley’s work, then approach him and serve as a liaison of sorts, all while concealing the fact that she works for the government. But the assignment is jeopardized when, despite herself, Serena develops feelings for her asset, and the two become involved in a relationship that ruins both of their careers. (For the record, that’s not a spoiler: the novel says as much in the first paragraph.)
I’ve already called this McEwan’s “fun” novel, and I stand by that assessment, though you may not believe it based on the synopsis. But because it is an Ian McEwan novel, there are still weighty ideas in play, including Cold War politics, gender dynamics in the 1970s workplace, and generous amounts of literary theory. Mercifully, McEwan resists the temptation to become aggrandizing or sentimental about the Importance of Literature, and doesn’t strain credibility too terribly— Serena and Tom do not solve the Cold War with fiction. But Sweet Tooth is without question a book for book lovers, and McEwan’s own appreciation for the pleasures of reading shines through. In this sense, Sweet Tooth functions as a companion of sorts to McEwan’s most well-known novel, Atonement, in which he deals with, among other things, the challenges, seductions, and limitations of writing fiction. Sweet Tooth even comes with its own postmodern twist, a polarizing effect that will either delight or infuriate, depending on your attitude toward postmodern twists.
There are other McEwan hallmarks on display in Sweet Tooth as well: he continues to be a master of psychology, and, as ever a skilled ventriloquist, he gives a surprisingly convincing performance as a twenty-something woman (though, because of the above mentioned postmodern twist, that performance is ultimately on trial here). He also proves himself yet again to be a fearsomely excellent prose stylist—elegant but efficient, meticulous but evocative. There are those who might accuse McEwan of a certain amount of narcissism, since the career of the fictional writer Tom Haley so closely mirrors his own early days. But I’m willing to give him a pass for that, because it seems like a waste of effort to invent an entire literary career from scratch when you have a perfectly respectable model under your belt. And anyway, McEwan does not exempt Haley from his customary razor-sharp character dissections; if anything, his willingness to put a fictionalized version of himself on the page suggests more self-deprecation than narcissism. Even in his “fun” novel, McEwan’s insight into the human condition, and particularly its shortcomings, is formidable; I certainly wouldn’t want the force of it turned on me if I could help it.
Review originally posted at bookwurst.blogspot.com
Enjoyable throughout. The perfect, spine-tingling ending makes it brilliant in retrospect. What is not to like about a novel about a beautiful woman who is an obsessive self-described "middle-brow" reader of fiction, who is a math major in college and becomes a spy in MI5? Set in the early 1970s as Britain appears to be coming apart from strikes, the IRA, and a collapsing economy, Sweet Tooth provides glimpses of literary London and a society in flux as both the WW II generation is still strong and a newer generation, with new mores, are emerging.
Sweet Tooth begins: "My name is Serena Frome (rhymes with plume) and almost forty years ago I was sent on a secret mission for the British security service. I didn't return safely. Within eighteen months of joining I was sacked, having disgraced myself and ruining my lover, though he certainly had a hand in his own undoing." The rest of the book tells this story, with much of it appearing to a be a straightforward story about coming into adulthood and falling in love, but there are odd glimpses here and there that don't completely add up, all of which make sense by the end.
Serena's relationship is with a young writer and as she reads his stories, they are described in great detail along with her reaction to them. These story interludes themselves are interesting and they serve to better flesh out the two characters, both the writer who wrote them and the reaction of the reader reading them. Ultimately, many of these stories come together in helping you to understand the full novel itself.
Sweet Tooth begins: "My name is Serena Frome (rhymes with plume) and almost forty years ago I was sent on a secret mission for the British security service. I didn't return safely. Within eighteen months of joining I was sacked, having disgraced myself and ruining my lover, though he certainly had a hand in his own undoing." The rest of the book tells this story, with much of it appearing to a be a straightforward story about coming into adulthood and falling in love, but there are odd glimpses here and there that don't completely add up, all of which make sense by the end.
Serena's relationship is with a young writer and as she reads his stories, they are described in great detail along with her reaction to them. These story interludes themselves are interesting and they serve to better flesh out the two characters, both the writer who wrote them and the reaction of the reader reading them. Ultimately, many of these stories come together in helping you to understand the full novel itself.
This just wasn't my cup of tea. I was excited to read another McEwan book, but the subject matter wasn't that gripping and the main character was annoying. As always, his writing was lovely, but there was too much trickery for me.
My favorite book of the year. McEwan understands more about why we read novels, and how seductive relationship between readers and writer, than any critic or an other novelist I know. Like "Atonement," this novel is a high wire act, playing with the acts of reading and writing while simultaneously offering a richly imagined world and compelling characters; also like "Atonement," it is a vivid exploration of the possibilities of happy endings. He pokes fun at his early work; the young novelist is writing a bleak work that sounds more than a little like McCarthy's "The Road." But while many critics have rejected this "autobiographical novel" as somehow beneath McEwan's talents, he tells a very compelling story about powers and limits of postmodern play and cynicism in the novel since the 1970s. It's both highly readable and very smart. The last novel I read straight through in a matter of 2 or 3 days.
I did not love this, but it gradually picked up speed, and I ended up liking it more than I thought I would. It was super interesting to read a book set in London in the 70's.