Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by mehrangezmr
Gnomon by Nick Harkaway
3.0
I truly, truly wanted to love this. Instead I finished the book fed up and with a mild headache (to go with the major arm-ache involved in wrangling with this 700+ page hardcover behemoth). It started out so tight and promising, a noir detective novel set in a dystopian near-future Britain which is overseen by an omniscient AI, with a hardboiled inspector investigating the death of Diana Hunter, who seems at first glance to be a wacky old lady-type but turns out to be .
The story splinters off into discrete narratives, each telling a portion of the story. When viewed laid over each other like a palimpsest, they tell the full story of Diana Hunter and the System... OR DO THEY??
I think what I found terrifically frustrating about this book is that the author does not seem to know where to draw the line. He overeggs and overeggs his central conceit until you're just like, "Wait, what is this story meant to be about again?" I enjoy dense books that make the reader work for it. But there needs to be something to be worked for, and I wasn't really sure that Nick Harkaway himself knew what that core of the story was by the time he finished writing this.
Overall, I don't regret reading this book. It's better than many other books I've read and the author's ambition and chutzpah is to be commended. Harkaway is a talented author with a plethora of interesting ideas and the characters are skilfully drawn: my personal favourite was hardboiled Inspector Neith. But this was definitely not the unmitigated awesomeness that I was expecting when I pre-ordered. The middle sagged, and it only really picked up towards the end.
To anyone planning to read this book, I would say, wait for the paperback or spring for the Kindle version. Not only was the story hard work, but the hardback weighs a ton and is murder to read or carry around comfortably.
Spoiler
a revolutionaryThe story splinters off into discrete narratives, each telling a portion of the story. When viewed laid over each other like a palimpsest, they tell the full story of Diana Hunter and the System... OR DO THEY??
I think what I found terrifically frustrating about this book is that the author does not seem to know where to draw the line. He overeggs and overeggs his central conceit until you're just like, "Wait, what is this story meant to be about again?" I enjoy dense books that make the reader work for it. But there needs to be something to be worked for, and I wasn't really sure that Nick Harkaway himself knew what that core of the story was by the time he finished writing this.
Overall, I don't regret reading this book. It's better than many other books I've read and the author's ambition and chutzpah is to be commended. Harkaway is a talented author with a plethora of interesting ideas and the characters are skilfully drawn: my personal favourite was hardboiled Inspector Neith. But this was definitely not the unmitigated awesomeness that I was expecting when I pre-ordered. The middle sagged, and it only really picked up towards the end.
To anyone planning to read this book, I would say, wait for the paperback or spring for the Kindle version. Not only was the story hard work, but the hardback weighs a ton and is murder to read or carry around comfortably.