A review by maggieshalloe
Any Human Heart by William Boyd

5.0

What a life Logan Gonzago Mountstuart lived.

The book begins early in Logan’s life, and you find yourself in an intense proximity to his most intimate thoughts via its journal entry style. Logan is not perfect, in fact he acts appallingly often. However Boyd has an incredible ability, in his writing, to make you fond of him. He is deeply flawed, his arrogance and sense of self arguably hinders his career as a writer. He alienates most around him at times. He is a bit of a creepy (old) man at times. On the other hand, he experiences terrible loss. He is clearly traumatized at his experiences during the war, and his time in Switzerland. He rubs shoulders with some of the most famous artists and writers of the time. He somehow manages an impressive string of different careers. In the end you feel like you’ve lived his whole life alongside him. I can’t say I’ll be forgetting this one any time soon.