Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Winter's Tale
Book Review: One of my top 10 all time favorites
Summary: 5 Stars
Okay, I can't add anything new, really, but to say that this book, some of its images and moments, stay with me even now. This book is written with such LOVE of New York, and of magic and light...
A friend of mine did not like this book, laughingly told me that he didn't know there were so many ways and words to describe light and its effects...
...and that is one of the things I love about it. That, and Lake of the Coheeries...
Peer to Rushdie and Marquez
Summary: 5 Stars I had no idea what to expect from Winters Tale, but I was amazed by the beauty of this book. Helprin is the only American author I can recall (or that I have read) that rivals the wonder, creativity and ambition of theme of authors like Salman Rushdie and Gabriel Garcia Marquez, both of whom are among my favorites. Parts of the book are absolutely magical and unforgettable, including the very beginning in which we are introduced to Peter Lake (and all others involving the fight between Peter and Pearly Soames) and the descriptions of New York winters and of the scenes that take place therein, be they journeys or battles or parties. It is a book most cleary deserving its place among the New York Times best American novels of the past 25 years.
Book Review: Promising Start -> Eventual Disappointment
Summary: 3 Stars
The introductory portion of the work, prior to the transition to 'modernity', was oddly satisfying; a curious amalgam of Tim Powers and Gabriel García Márquez. My fascination ended after the first 200 pages or so, as a string of poorly represented and not particularly sympathetic characters are introduced. The 'last' 550 pages of the novel were irritating enough to me that I'll actually _admit_ to having read Ayn Rand (I was young, I needed the money etc) simply so that I can compare her work with 'Winter's Tale'. The strident tone of the moralizing and method of idealization which Helprin uses in elaborating his somewhat murky ethical predilections smacks of Rand's horrid little tomes, and many of his characters (especially Praeger de Pinto) end up resembling the very worst of Rand's libertarian atrocity exhibitions (albeit with much more flare). He places his ideal characters in ideal situations so that a few poorly developed ethical conceits can be displayed, nestled amongst the many baubles of prose.
More over, this method of idealization coupled with some fairly shoddy character development renders his characters not only more or less invulnerable, but also indistinguishable (the majority of the personalities in the novel use much the same voice and act in much the same manner). None of the characters in the novel ever appear to be truly challenged, and this lack of tension or suspense leads to a fairly uninteresting narrative, despite all of the (ostensibly exciting) magical occurrences.
Of course, Helprin is a word smith at the very height of his powers. There's no doubt that some of the sentences in this book literally sing as they are read; unfortunately, much of the time the prose becomes a bit too self-involved and renders itself turgid and gaudy. Still, there is much beauty to be found in the structure and syntax of the thing.
Book Review: Still Haven't Finished It After Three Years
Summary: 3 Stars
I picked this up after reading "Freddy and Fredericka," hoping that it would be as good. It is now three years later. I have re-read F&F three times, "Memoirs From an Antproof Case" once, and have started this book four times and can't get past the first two sections.
So why am I reviewing this and giving it three stars before I finish it? Well, I may never finish it. The writing is superb. At first the story is compelling. But if you look at the spine of my paperback copy, you'll note that somewhere around page 250 I just stop caring. Why? Let me use this analogy. There is a bakery in my hometown that sells the most wonderful birthday cakes with sinfully delicious buttercream frosting. Knowing that I love the frosting more than I love the actual cake part, my parents would get me one of these every year and have the bakery cover it top to bottom with frosting roses. But as much as I loved the icing roses the richness would eventually get to me and I would be literally sick of them by the time half of them are gone and the rest of the cake would be thrown away. There was nothing wrong with the cake - who knows, maybe the uneaten part is even better than the first - but it was impossible to enjoy the rest of the cake once the sweetness of the icing has overwhelmed everything else. The bakery is still open and I have to re-learn this lesson every September 28th. Maybe it's time to learn that lesson with this book.
Book Review: Strange and Not So Wonderful
Summary: 1 Stars
As a big fan of Mark Helprin's Freddy & Fredericka and A Soldier of the Great War, I was excited about this novel. I was prepared to employ some "suspension of disbelief" and was not suprised to encounter flying horses and mythical tribes in the first few chapters. Unfortunately it didn't end there. The story became SO abstract and convoluted that It was distracting. Some of the other negative reviews of this book indicate that the readers didn't finish it. I was determined not to give up and now wish I had followed their lead.