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The Chimney Sweeper's Boy (2006)

The Chimney Sweeper's Boy (2006)

Book Info

Author
Genre
Rating
3.77 of 5 Votes: 4
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ISBN
1416531939 (ISBN13: 9781416531937)
Language
English
Publisher
washington square press

About book The Chimney Sweeper's Boy (2006)

Having never read a Barbara Vine before, but being recommended this book specifically and by someone whose judgement I value, I looked forward to starting it and I wasn't disappointed. The Chimney Sweeper's Boy is an extraordinary, character driven book that tells the story of the Candless family following the death of the patriarch, the famous novelist, Gerard Candless. The hugely successful Candless leaves behind a remote and unhappy wife, Ursula, and two utterly bereft daughters, Sarah and Hope, who simply adored the talented and larger than life man, with a powerful personality, who was their father. But when Sarah is commissioned to write a memoir of growing up with such a literary celebrity as a parent, she uncovers her father's desperate secret, a secret that caused him, many years earlier, to erase his past and identity and create a new one.The way this story unfolds is precise and irresistible. The main characters, especially the spoiled and completely indulged daughters, is sympathetic to people who, in other spaces and places, might even be abhorrent. It's testimony to Vine's power as a writer that we, the readers, nonetheless invest in them and care about the ways the mysterious past of Gerard Candless, and his many secrets, infect the present and who and what his family have become. The novel is also, in many ways, a book about the writing process: about choices, processes, about the dreadful liberties some writers will take and the haughty presumption that all encounters, including with those who share your life, are potential literary fodder. It is also about the power of words (as much as actions), to wound, betray, conceal and, possibly, heal.I found this an astounding book. It will resonate with me for a long time.

Rarely does it happen that I complete a book and come to the conclusion that I didn't like the book. I've tried to come up with reasons to give it the 2-star "it was OK", but I just con't get there. I was going along fine as the story was being set up. Imagine your father is a famous author who adores his daughters and appears to tolerate his wife. Suddenly he dies of a heart attack. His publisher asks one of the daughters to write a biography of her father. So far so good. As she begins doing research for the book, all sorts of "problems" begin surfacing. It appears he's kept lots of "secrets". It's as the secrets get revealed that I find myself wishing there had been a clur of some sort as to what direction the book would take because if I'd known it up front, I wouldn't have read it in the first place. After fnishing the book, I went back to read the FantasticFiction description of the book to see if I'd missed someethiing before I read the book. Nope! It just sounded like a good mystery about dysfunctional man and his wife. This is the first book I've read by Barbara Vine. I liked hewriting style and will read something else by her. I just did not like the direction the book took or the ending of The Chmney Sweeper's Boy.

Do You like book The Chimney Sweeper's Boy (2006)?

Barbare Vine is het pseudoniem dat Ruth Rendell, beroemd auteur van puzzeldetectives, gebruikt voor haar boeken buiten het genre. Dit boek is wel een mysterie, maar het gaat niet over het opsporen van een moordenaar.Als een beroemd schrijver overlijdt, neemt een van zijn dochters de taak op zich zijn biografie te schrijven. Daarbij ontdekt ze echter dat haar vader in 1951 een valse identiteit had aangenomen. Wie hij in werkelijkheid was, en waarom hij het nodig had gevonden alle contacten met zijn familie te verbreken en onder andermans naam verder te leven, is de vraag die zij stapsgewijs probeert te ontraadselen. Haar voornaamste werktuig daarbij is de aanname dat alle passages uit zijn boeken op de een of andere manier een autobiografische lading hebben. Uiteindelijk wordt het geheim pas onthuld op de laatste bladzijde, en is het een bijfiguur die de ontdekking doet.Hoewel de puzzelstructuur uitnodigt tot snel doorlezen, heeft het boek drie nadelen. Het eerste is dat de verrassing aan het eind eigenlijk niet zo groot is: de vermoedens van de lezer worden wel zo ongeveer bevestigd. Het tweede is dat er uitsluitend weinig sympathieke personages in het boek voorkomen, wat de mogelijkheid mee te leven met hun treurige lot beperkt. Tenslotte wil de schrijfster wel erg nadrukkelijk laten weten dat ze niet van de straat is: de tekst is doorspekt met verwijzingen naar en citaten uit de klassieke Engelse literatuur, in een mate die wat lachwekkend aandoet. Maar vermoedelijk is zij zich daar zelf wel van bewust, want de figuren uit het verhaal vragen zich bij voortduring af of ze voor de gelegenheid niet ietwat overdressed zijn.
—Lex Bijlsma

Barbara Vine is rising to the top of my favorite authors list. Her psychological suspense novels are all so individual, so very well written with wonderfully developed characters that I want to know more about....after the novel has ended. This novel is no exception.The Chimney Sweeper's Boy is peopled by an odd assortment of characters whose histories are the fabric of the novel. It's not a standard mystery, not a standard type plot, but you'll find yourself compulsively reading to find out how it ends. Vine really is a master at grabbing the reader and not letting go. Highly recommended to those who enjoy character driven narratives with suspense.
—Sue

I've just finished reading this book for the second time. I first read it about 10 years ago, and realised i could not remember a great deal about the plot, though I could remember particular scenes and places mentioned in the book. It's a mystery novel, but not not a murder mystery. The daughter of a well-known author is asked to write a memoir or biography of her father after his death, but in spite of having enjoyed a close relationship with him as a child, she finds she knows very little about him, and when she tries to learn more, finds that she knew less that she thought she did -- he doesn't seem to be who he claimed to be at all. In that sense it's a mystery novel linked to family history and genealogy, because her search is really a genealogical one, to find who her father really was, and who his family were. So it's the kind of novel that might appeal to family historians.
—Stephen Hayes

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