REMEMBERING BABYLON
2 journalers for this copy...
A white man who has lived with a group of aboriginals since childhood stumbles back into the white man's world, where he finds love and loyalty but also fear and petty loathing. Not so much about the re-integration of Gemmy into society as a character study of the society which may or may not accept him - of the whites and the aboriginals, who are the more civilsed or the more savage?
It took me a couple of chapters to get into this book, but I was surprised by how powerful I found it by the time I had finished. There are moments of beauty in the prose:
"But what his stilled blood saw was the bird's beak drawing long silver threads out of the water, which was all a tangle of threads, bunched or running..."
but the biggest strength for me was the evocation of place (Gemmy's British childhood, for instance, was vivid) and more importantly the people within those places.
A motley assortment of characters who seemed one-dimensional caricatures at the start, slowly become living, breathing, flawed human beings. We don't learn whole life stories, just enough to provide a sense of reality.
I really liked this novel. The sense of minimalism in the story-telling (not that the prose was spare, but that we were told what we needed to know) gave a tremendous sense of everything that was left unsaid, a sense of something left hanging in the air.
It took me a couple of chapters to get into this book, but I was surprised by how powerful I found it by the time I had finished. There are moments of beauty in the prose:
"But what his stilled blood saw was the bird's beak drawing long silver threads out of the water, which was all a tangle of threads, bunched or running..."
but the biggest strength for me was the evocation of place (Gemmy's British childhood, for instance, was vivid) and more importantly the people within those places.
A motley assortment of characters who seemed one-dimensional caricatures at the start, slowly become living, breathing, flawed human beings. We don't learn whole life stories, just enough to provide a sense of reality.
I really liked this novel. The sense of minimalism in the story-telling (not that the prose was spare, but that we were told what we needed to know) gave a tremendous sense of everything that was left unsaid, a sense of something left hanging in the air.
I am starting a bookring to release this book – please send me a Private Message including your screen name and country if you would like to join (I will assume you are able to ship overseas unless you tell me otherwise).
*I will make a list below of members in the order the book will circulate (this may be amended later depending on shipping preferences/location etc).
*The current owner of the book will be shown on the list in bold and marked with an arrow (>).
*Please make a journal entry when you receive the book, then read, review and release the book within 1 month of receiving it, to keep the circle turning.
*When you are ready to release the book, send a PM to the next member on the list asking for their postal details.
*When the last person on the list receives the book, please send me a PM for my postal details, for the book’s return journey.
BOOKRING MEMBERS
1. TangledThreads (UK)
on way to
2. adah-price (USA)
3. Ramya (USA)
4. BecFromMD (USA)
5. SmilingSun (USA - prefer to ship within US)
6. cisco (USA)
7. YowlYY (UK)
back to me,
8. tangledthreads (UK)
(Shipping order not yet finalised so above sequence may/will probably change)
*I will make a list below of members in the order the book will circulate (this may be amended later depending on shipping preferences/location etc).
*The current owner of the book will be shown on the list in bold and marked with an arrow (>).
*Please make a journal entry when you receive the book, then read, review and release the book within 1 month of receiving it, to keep the circle turning.
*When you are ready to release the book, send a PM to the next member on the list asking for their postal details.
*When the last person on the list receives the book, please send me a PM for my postal details, for the book’s return journey.
BOOKRING MEMBERS
1. TangledThreads (UK)
on way to
2. adah-price (USA)
3. Ramya (USA)
4. BecFromMD (USA)
5. SmilingSun (USA - prefer to ship within US)
6. cisco (USA)
7. YowlYY (UK)
back to me,
8. tangledthreads (UK)
(Shipping order not yet finalised so above sequence may/will probably change)
On way to first bookring participant, adah-price, by surface mail...
nice little story. my appologies for not journaling sooner--life kinda ran amuck and well.... anyhow, am emailing next on list to sent off.
