My first John Banville read. Winner of the Man Booker Prize 2005. A master of prose, Banville hauntingly paints pictures of memory and grief with words. It is popularly listed at Cliff's 1976 wishlists, so I am releasing it as an international book ray.. check the different reviews in this link:

http://www.reviewsofbooks.com/sea/

1. Upon receiving the book, please make a journal entry. PM also the next person in line for the address to prevent delays later on. PM them again after a week if there is no response.

2. Read the book. Please aim to send on within a month. If you need more time, kindly PM me and you will be given a 2 week extension.

3. Make another journal entry after reading to let us know what you think of it before sending on.

4. Update journal on the last entry on the exact date that you mailed it.

Here is the list of participants

fushmush (UK)
stubee (UK
KT-J (UK)
Griete(Switzerland))<---------book is here
RustyReader2 (Canada)
Bartonz (US))- Asked to be taken off from the ring
KarenZero (US)
indygo88 (US)

Last person in the ray is free to do whatever they wish with the book.


HAPPY READING!!!!
samutsari

RELEASE NOTES:

I am sending this to fushmush as my first international bookray!

Received today. I have one bookray ahead of it. It's next on my TBR pile.

Unfortunately, I'm going to have to send this on unread. I'm off on holidays this saturday for 2 months. Not sure how easy it will be to get to a post office on my hols, so i'm sending the novel on its way to ensure that I don't keep it for too long.

Not exactly an auspicious start to a bookray I know, but better safe than sorry.

Thanks for sharing!

Update: Posted on 03/07/2007

arrived. either KT-J or I will get onto this shortly. thanks samutsari for starting this :-]

I have taken this off Stubee to read first as he is a bit overloaded with bookrings at the moment. I'll be starting this tonight!

I liked this book. It was interesting the way it was written as a narrative but kept going off on a tangent whilst building up the two stories of the main characters recent loss and the childhood trauma.

I thought this was well written and a good exploration of feeling and how memories alter and distort.

I have passed this back to Stubee. Thanks samutsari for including me in this ray!

Finally I hear you all shout. Yes I've finished with John Banville’s The Sea - I must say that I enjoyed the story it was well written and very descriptive, Max is a complex character and it’s interesting that in trying to come to terms with his wife’s death he plunges himself into his childhood to find the answers.

I found the characters very interesting; Myles puzzled me throughout the story. Chloe, so manipulative for such a young age, impress me somewhat. But I didn’t really understand the role of Rose at all until …. ! Well, I’ll leave that for now.

And of course young Max would be infatuated by the older woman in Mrs Grace haven’t we (come on boys admit it) all imagined at least one of our childhood friends mother's as an object for desire? As background figures Mr Grace, the Colonel, Mrs V were intriguing enough.

Well anyway I think it was a worthwhile book – something I wouldn’t normally read but I’m glad I have. Trying to read all of Peter Boxall’s (recommended) “1001: Must Read Books Before You Die” has somewhat broadened my horizons, I doubt I would have read John Banville, Ian McEwan or Neville Shute if it hadn’t been for the list. However I’m getting tired with all the bookrings at the moment and as soon as I’ve finished my current batch (that all seemed to arrive within a short time of each other) I’ll be taking a break from them, it’s got quite stressful as late and I’ve not been enjoying reading as much as I should.

Thanks Samutsari for including me in this ray, I’ve got Griete’s address and this will be in mail to Switzerland tomorrow.

I went to the post office this lunchtime and sent this on it's way to Griete in Switzerland.

Enjoy :-]

Got it today, many thanks!! Will try and read it as quickly as possible.

Sorry for being so late, I have finally managed to send the book further on.
I liked some of it, especially the ending, but I felt it was quite a difficult book to get into.
I also liked that the characters are not really likable or too well-defined.

This was waiting for me when I got back from camping

So it arrived? Did I actually post it in January?
I will send you "Cold Comfort Farm", that is what I promised, right?