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A review by podsticles
The Standing Chandelier by Lionel Shriver
3.0
I love Lionel Shriver. I think she is a very clever lady, and anyone who has seen or read her interviews will know this.
I loved, and was shocked by, her most famous novel, ‘We Need to Talk About Kevin’, which was passed from teacher to teacher of the school I worked in at the time, with opinions and thoughts being shared over soup and sandwiches at the staffroom table.
I skipped her follow-up, ‘The Post Birthday World’, but thought the follow-up to that, ‘So Much For That’ was astounding, and almost as horrifiying as ‘Kevin’ in many ways. It was also strangely under-appreciated in my opinion. I thought the writing was sharp, the relationships realistic, and the topic relevant to the time.
Again I missed out her next novel [The New Republic], but was disappointed by its follow-up, ‘Big Brother’.
By pure coincidence I apparently only read her novels alternately, so missed out on ‘The Mandibles’, and landed on this novella, ‘The Standing Chandelier.’
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I really wanted to enjoy this book. I thought the premise was excellent - a man being given the ultimatum to give up his lifelong (and occasionally intimate) friendship with Jillian Frisk for the hand in marriage of Paige Myers. I thought the drama was probably quite realistic. I imagined if I was Paige I would probably have the same conditions. My biggest problem was the ‘standing chandelier’ itself, which was large, unwieldy, awkward, and which sounded quite ugly. But maybe that was the point? Paige will accept anything if it inevitably gets her what she wants.
I loved, and was shocked by, her most famous novel, ‘We Need to Talk About Kevin’, which was passed from teacher to teacher of the school I worked in at the time, with opinions and thoughts being shared over soup and sandwiches at the staffroom table.
I skipped her follow-up, ‘The Post Birthday World’, but thought the follow-up to that, ‘So Much For That’ was astounding, and almost as horrifiying as ‘Kevin’ in many ways. It was also strangely under-appreciated in my opinion. I thought the writing was sharp, the relationships realistic, and the topic relevant to the time.
Again I missed out her next novel [The New Republic], but was disappointed by its follow-up, ‘Big Brother’.
By pure coincidence I apparently only read her novels alternately, so missed out on ‘The Mandibles’, and landed on this novella, ‘The Standing Chandelier.’
~~~~.~~~~.~~~~
I really wanted to enjoy this book. I thought the premise was excellent - a man being given the ultimatum to give up his lifelong (and occasionally intimate) friendship with Jillian Frisk for the hand in marriage of Paige Myers. I thought the drama was probably quite realistic. I imagined if I was Paige I would probably have the same conditions. My biggest problem was the ‘standing chandelier’ itself, which was large, unwieldy, awkward, and which sounded quite ugly. But maybe that was the point? Paige will accept anything if it inevitably gets her what she wants.