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pris_asagiri 's review for:
Winter's Tale
by Mark Helprin
I finished this, in 10 days. Two more than planned but I'm okay with that. I got a bit bogged down in book 3.
This is the kind of magical realism I like best, the kind that forces you to suspend all practicality and common sense and rely solely on faith to see you through. In large parts modern day fairytale, in smaller parts magical fantasy, the story weaves a dream that for the most part I really enjoyed sharing. It lost a star because Helprin likes to meander to his ending, which at times makes the story lag unnecessarily. I like to take the highway, despite the traffic. My parents liked to take the county back roads. Helprin writes for the county back roads-lovin' folk.
Note: What caught my attention was that this was first published in 1983, when NYC was in desperate need of reinvention. And yet, one cannot help today to see the mirror images of a city burning in 2001 (some might argue the true start of a new millennium). Time will tell if NYc exists in a golden age.
This is not a book for everyone. I've read a lot of negative reviews and I can't say I don't agree with a lot of their points, particularly the ones about Helprin's wording. But I am less fussy about that sort of thing. You write "18th century knoll" and I am not going to be irritated by it because I have a tendency to skim adjectives and I don't question what makes a knoll 18th century. I can see how it would really bug some readers, and if you're one of those people, this is not the book for you as Helprin is that kind of writer. That said, I do enjoy the mood that Helprin sets with his words. And mostly, I can feel his deep and abiding love for NYC. This book is an homage to that great city and the characters are merely players on that great stage.
I also have to mention the movie. I saw the movie before I read this book. I saw it without realizing what the movie was (it was on a ship and I caught it 1/3 of the way in--took me 5x before I could see the whole thing). So I pretty much compared the two the whole time I read this. The movie stayed pretty true to Book 1. After that they redid the whole thing, I'm guessing for brevity' sake as well as to give Russell Crowe a bigger role. So because they eliminated 2/3 of the book and pretty much the point of it being written (Bevrly Penn and Peter Lake are not the heart of this story--sorry ladies), the movie went in a totally different direction. And that actually is fine because I think the book's direction would have been really hard to translate on the big screen. But, BUT, why oh why did they have to go and change the women of the story from being these incredibly strong and intelligent and gifted women to simpering, weak decorations? You would have never known how much Helprin appreciates a real woman based on the movie version. Movie Virginia Gamely is a horrific tragedy to female characters.
All in all, it was a fun read. I prefer [b:In Sunlight and in Shadow|13391073|In Sunlight and in Shadow|Mark Helprin|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1338566074s/13391073.jpg|18622061], but not by much (the ending In Sunlight was anticlimactic for me). But I enjoyed reading this and can see why so many friends love it.
This is the kind of magical realism I like best, the kind that forces you to suspend all practicality and common sense and rely solely on faith to see you through. In large parts modern day fairytale, in smaller parts magical fantasy, the story weaves a dream that for the most part I really enjoyed sharing. It lost a star because Helprin likes to meander to his ending, which at times makes the story lag unnecessarily. I like to take the highway, despite the traffic. My parents liked to take the county back roads. Helprin writes for the county back roads-lovin' folk.
Note: What caught my attention was that this was first published in 1983, when NYC was in desperate need of reinvention. And yet, one cannot help today to see the mirror images of a city burning in 2001 (some might argue the true start of a new millennium). Time will tell if NYc exists in a golden age.
This is not a book for everyone. I've read a lot of negative reviews and I can't say I don't agree with a lot of their points, particularly the ones about Helprin's wording. But I am less fussy about that sort of thing. You write "18th century knoll" and I am not going to be irritated by it because I have a tendency to skim adjectives and I don't question what makes a knoll 18th century. I can see how it would really bug some readers, and if you're one of those people, this is not the book for you as Helprin is that kind of writer. That said, I do enjoy the mood that Helprin sets with his words. And mostly, I can feel his deep and abiding love for NYC. This book is an homage to that great city and the characters are merely players on that great stage.
I also have to mention the movie. I saw the movie before I read this book. I saw it without realizing what the movie was (it was on a ship and I caught it 1/3 of the way in--took me 5x before I could see the whole thing). So I pretty much compared the two the whole time I read this. The movie stayed pretty true to Book 1. After that they redid the whole thing, I'm guessing for brevity' sake as well as to give Russell Crowe a bigger role. So because they eliminated 2/3 of the book and pretty much the point of it being written (Bevrly Penn and Peter Lake are not the heart of this story--sorry ladies), the movie went in a totally different direction. And that actually is fine because I think the book's direction would have been really hard to translate on the big screen. But, BUT, why oh why did they have to go and change the women of the story from being these incredibly strong and intelligent and gifted women to simpering, weak decorations? You would have never known how much Helprin appreciates a real woman based on the movie version. Movie Virginia Gamely is a horrific tragedy to female characters.
All in all, it was a fun read. I prefer [b:In Sunlight and in Shadow|13391073|In Sunlight and in Shadow|Mark Helprin|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1338566074s/13391073.jpg|18622061], but not by much (the ending In Sunlight was anticlimactic for me). But I enjoyed reading this and can see why so many friends love it.