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A review by anunande
Engleby by Sebastian Faulks
Mike Engleby is a working class boy from Reading who gets admitted to a famous English university on a scholarship. Then something happens. Jennifer Arkland, the fellow student he admires from afar, disappears. This kicks off something that comes to fruition in London, more than 12 years later, though not even Mike knows how.
1) It's part mystery, part evolution of an interesting era - the 1970s (politics, music, culture, fashion, women's rights) - and part slice of life of the first person narrator who immediately strikes us as rather odd but not necessarily in a bad way. More awkward than anything. But it's eventually a portrait of a sociopath.
2) As the story moves forward, the strong sense of things simmering under the surface is starkly evident. The narrative voice reflects this subtly but clearly, and I enjoyed the overall style of writing.
3) Mike's intelligent, strongly opinionated, matter-of-fact and, as becomes clear soon enough, rather troubled. He's unlikeable, unsympathetic, unable to feel empathy or joy, but it initially appears dissociative than worrying. It makes for an uneasy read, especially when he's being particularly honest, but each of these confidences are nothing but engaging, even as they reveal parts of him that are uncomfortable and even disturbing.
4) The sense that he's an unreliable narrator becomes more pronounced in the second half of the book when the narrative really gets going.
5) The only "complaint" for me, personally, was that at times, what was going on in Mike's life otherwise wasn't that interesting and there was a fair bit of rambling. Some of the observations made were spot on, the underlying dark humour well-written, but it dragged on too much while the main thread was at an impasse. It seemed rather pointless.
All in all, an interesting first read by an author whose books have been on my shelf for a few years. I look forward to delving into his French trilogy next.
1) It's part mystery, part evolution of an interesting era - the 1970s (politics, music, culture, fashion, women's rights) - and part slice of life of the first person narrator who immediately strikes us as rather odd but not necessarily in a bad way. More awkward than anything. But it's eventually a portrait of a sociopath.
2) As the story moves forward, the strong sense of things simmering under the surface is starkly evident. The narrative voice reflects this subtly but clearly, and I enjoyed the overall style of writing.
3) Mike's intelligent, strongly opinionated, matter-of-fact and, as becomes clear soon enough, rather troubled. He's unlikeable, unsympathetic, unable to feel empathy or joy, but it initially appears dissociative than worrying. It makes for an uneasy read, especially when he's being particularly honest, but each of these confidences are nothing but engaging, even as they reveal parts of him that are uncomfortable and even disturbing.
4) The sense that he's an unreliable narrator becomes more pronounced in the second half of the book when the narrative really gets going.
5) The only "complaint" for me, personally, was that at times, what was going on in Mike's life otherwise wasn't that interesting and there was a fair bit of rambling. Some of the observations made were spot on, the underlying dark humour well-written, but it dragged on too much while the main thread was at an impasse. It seemed rather pointless.
All in all, an interesting first read by an author whose books have been on my shelf for a few years. I look forward to delving into his French trilogy next.