Showing posts with label reincarnation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label reincarnation. Show all posts
Sep 8, 2017
Jan 1, 2016
Life after life - Kate Atkinson
Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* In a radical departure from her Jackson Brodie mystery series, Atkinson delivers a wildly inventive novel about Ursula Todd, born in 1910 and doomed to die and be reborn over and over again. She drowns, falls off a roof, and is beaten to death by an abusive husband but is always reborn back into the same loving family, sometimes with the knowledge that allows her to escape past poor decisions, sometimes not. As Atkinson subtly delineates all the pathways a life or a country might take, she also delivers a harrowing set piece on the Blitz as Ursula, working as a warden on a rescue team, encounters horrifying tableaux encompassing mangled bodies and whole families covered in ash, preserved just like the victims of Pompeii. Alternately mournful and celebratory, deeply empathic and scathingly funny, Atkinson shows what it is like to face the horrors of war and yet still find the determination to go on, with her wholly British characters often reducing the Third Reich to "a fuss." From her deeply human characters to her comical dialogue to her meticulous plotting, Atkinson is working at the very top of her game. An audacious, thought-provoking novel from one of our most talented writers. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Atkinson's publisher is pulling out all the stops in marketing her latest, which will no doubt draw in many new readers in addition to her Jackson Brodie fans. Copyright 2012 Booklist Reviews.
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Dec 2, 2013
Life after life - Kate Atkinson
Summary: "What if you could live again and again, until you got it right? On a cold and snowy night in 1910, Ursula Todd is born to an English banker and his wife. She dies before she can draw her first breath. On that same cold and snowy night, Ursula Todd is born, lets out a lusty wail, and embarks upon a life that will be, to say the least, unusual. For as she grows, she also dies, repeatedly, in a variety of ways, while the young century marches on towards its second cataclysmic world war. Does Ursula's apparently infinite number of lives give her the power to save the world from its inevitable destiny? And if she can -- will she? Darkly comic, startlingly poignant, and utterly original -- this is Kate Atkinson at her absolute best"-- Provided by publisher.
Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* In a radical departure from her Jackson Brodie mystery series, Atkinson delivers a wildly inventive novel about Ursula Todd, born in 1910 and doomed to die and be reborn over and over again. She drowns, falls off a roof, and is beaten to death by an abusive husband but is always reborn back into the same loving family, sometimes with the knowledge that allows her to escape past poor decisions, sometimes not. As Atkinson subtly delineates all the pathways a life or a country might take, she also delivers a harrowing set piece on the Blitz as Ursula, working as a warden on a rescue team, encounters horrifying tableaux encompassing mangled bodies and whole families covered in ash, preserved just like the victims of Pompeii. Alternately mournful and celebratory, deeply empathic and scathingly funny, Atkinson shows what it is like to face the horrors of war and yet still find the determination to go on, with her wholly British characters often reducing the Third Reich to "a fuss." From her deeply human characters to her comical dialogue to her meticulous plotting, Atkinson is working at the very top of her game. An audacious, thought-provoking novel from one of our most talented writers. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Atkinson's publisher is pulling out all the stops in marketing her latest, which will no doubt draw in many new readers in addition to her Jackson Brodie fans. Copyright 2012 Booklist Reviews.
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Oct 1, 2013
The gargoyle - Andrew Davidson
Summary: "A very contemporary cynic, physically beautiful and sexually adept, crashes his car into a ravine and suffers horrible burns over much of his body. As he recovers in a burn ward, undergoing the tortures of the damned, he awaits the day when he can leave the hospital and commit carefully planned suicide--for he is now a monster in appearance as well as in soul. Then a beautiful and compelling, but clearly unhinged, sculptress of gargoyles by the name of Marianne Engel appears at the foot of his bed and tells him that they were once lovers in medieval Germany."--From publisher description.
Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* Davidson's stunning debut opens with a hedonistic porn star drinking bourbon as he drives, until a vision of burning arrows rushing at his car causes him to crash through a guardrail and careen down a ravine. He awakens in a hospital, burns covering most of his body. Friendless, he loathes the doctors who are working so hard to heal him and plots his suicide. Into this husk of a life walks Marianne Engel, a beautiful sculptress whose first words to him are, You've been burned. Again. Over time she tells him the story of how they first met and fell in love 700 years ago at a German monastery. His initial skepticism over the improbability of her tale, given the fact that she's been in the psych ward, gives way to curiosity and eventually love. He still isn't sure he believes her, but her tale and her presence in his life give him something to live for. There's pure magic here, a classic redemption story with a hero so cynical, so damaged that it seems so unlikely that he'll ever reach for or even believe in salvation. When he does, the reward is immeasurable. Davidson's Gargoyle is a rare gem: completely engrossing, wholly unforgettable, and utterly transcendent. Copyright 2008 Booklist Reviews.
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