Rating: 
Summary: A beautiful story, rich and many-layered.
Review: This book was truly beautiful. It's true, the last 80-100 pages are written at a very different "pace" from the rest of the novel, but that really serves to demonstrate how relative the passage of time is -- how it can race by, or crawl by...Wonderful characters, very well-rounded and COMPLETE human beings. Nobody is perfect -- but that's life! This is not for the reader who likes straightforward plot-driven stories that are utterly realistic, with predictable endings. Not AT ALL. It's for the lover of magical realism, of blurred realities, of characters who seem to take over from the author, and build their own stories... Definitely worth reading.
Rating: 
Summary: The worst book I have ever had the misfortune to read
Review: This book starts badly and gets progressively worse. By the time I had finished this "book"(!), I just felt compelled to register my disgust throughout the world. I really do not see what all of the fuss is about. It is just too farfetched, I mean, all the book is, is "Romeo and Juliet" set in the backdrop of some God-forsaken island that no-one has heard of. In closing, I would just like to say that I think that this book should be "nitrogenated" over, as Dr Iannis so succinctly puts it.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best books Ive ever read
Review: I had almost forgotten what it is like to be completely hypnotized by a novel. But Captain Corellis Mandoline does exactly that! And yes: its all there: humour, tragic, the lot. But most of all: the supreme beauty of an otherworldly kind, to be found also, for example, in the music of Schubert, Jacques Brel or Billie Holiday. Surely one of the best books I have ever read!
Rating:
Summary: a literary masterpiece
Review: an absolute masterpiece.....i have never read a book which was so rich in its prose, in its content and at the same time unputdownable!
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant, the best book I ever read.
Review: At sixteen years old this book was the first piece of conventional adult fiction that I decided to explore. Although I found it hard to get into I can safely say that this is the best book I have ever read, and I doubt that I will ever find one as good as this. It is very provocative and gives an enjoyable and interesting insight into life and the effects of war. It contains humour, romance, tragedy and enables the reader to identify with the characters. It is compelling from beginning to end and is a veritable piece of art. I recommend it to anyone who has an interest in history, life or wants a good story. I absolutely love it.
Rating:
Summary: A masterpiece.
Review: Apart from his irritating habit of putting six-syllable words into the mouths of peasants, Louis de Berniers has penned a masterpiece. This work is both enchanting and humourous in a bitter-sweet combination of dispair and mirth. This is a story depicting humanity at its best and its worst, lubricated by humour which ranges from dust-dry to slapstick. De Berniers revels in the richness of the English language and like a child shuffling through mounds of autumn leaves, delights in kicking up a flurry of new words and expressions to challenge the reader, but always delivering 'le mot just'. Unlike some authors who delude themselves into thinking that peppering their prose with long words found by thumbing through a thesaurus can pass for literary skill, this author clearly has the warp and the weft of the language at his command. One last point. Those reviewers who whine that the ending is not to their liking should confine their reading to the works of Enid Blyton. Life does not always provide endings that make you go 'ahhh', and neither always should good literature. If you can aspire to good literature, I commend this book to you wholeheartedly.
Rating:
Summary: Well, I LIKED the ending!!
Review: This will go down as one of my all-time favourite books. Such a masterful mix of comedy and tragedy is rare, indeed. In parts I couldn't stop laughing, much to my sleeping husband's annoyance as I read it late into the night. Then unstoppable tears would flow. De Berniers's obvious love of his characters, his painstaking research, his use of challenging vocabulary that often sent me gleefully into the dictionary, his masterful unfolding of plot -- all combined to keep me in continual awe of his writing. And now, about THAT ending: Yes, there was a definite shift from the intricate details of most of the book, which covered a relatively short period of time. But to cover decades in that same detailed style would be utterly impossible! (Unless it becomes a multi-volume epic, which I believe in this case would be unsustainable.) I was impressed, actually, that De Berniers was able to give enough details to make the unfolding of those decades not too rushed. It was like travelling on a speeding train through the landscape, but stopping long enough in some places to get one's bearings, get a decent feel for the time and place, and even go into some shops and have a nice meal and a chat with the locals. I LIKED the way De Berniers constructed the "bridge", then, from the war to the present, to what we can see and experience on the island of Cephalonia today. As far as the culmination of the love-story is concerned, without giving away the ending, I found it satisfying and realistic. The characters remained essentially consistent, although circumstances and their lives had drastically changed. The criteria for a good ending, as far as I'm concerned, is that I feel satisfied, that it feels "right", and that I couldn't completely predict it, although some hints were pointing me in that general direction. It met those criteria for me.
Rating: 
Summary: Enjoyable read, but runs out of steam toward the end
Review: This is an excellent book overall, but I felt the author rushed the last 100 pages or so. They are simply not up to the standard set by the rest of the book. Maybe an editor wrote them? It struck me that somebody said "OK you've got 80-100 pages left, so wrap it up Louis" ...so it ended up a bit flat. However, the first 400 or so pages had everything and I can't remember the last time I enjoyed a book so much up to that point.
Rating:
Summary: An excellent novel!
Review: This story is perhaps one of the finest literary works to emerge this decade, second only to Birdsong. It is a very moving novel, a tribute to the character and bravery of MANY men. The language itself exemplifies a mastery of language, imagery and subtlty of depth. De Bernier uses this skill to craete a beautifully expressionate novel that tells a harrowing tale of War. I would most definately recommend this to any reader, especially those who have been reluctant to read some of the trash produced over the last few years. I thoroughly recommend this with five out of five!
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful read!
Review: Having just finished the book and read the reviews, I wanted to put in my "five stars" worth -- and back up the rave comments of so many other readers. But WARNING! If you haven't read the book yet, then be careful about reading these reviews YET, as some of them give away the ending -- THAT ending, that so many readers found wanting. Actually, I, too, found it somewhat contrived, but was willing to suspend my disbelief, with gratitude to the author, by thinking, that, yes... perhaps... a man of Corelli's deeply artistic temperament, may just have acted as he did. And the final para is a lovely picture of the three young ladies on the scooter. I laughed out loud in many places, so often that I was once kicked out of bed by my wife, for disturbing her sleep! The "eye wars" scene, and the one where Corelli is day-dreaming about Vivaldi's convent girls with Psipsina in his lap, are a scream. I did wonder though why Pelagia could not understand Corelli's wanting to set to music her crocheting fingers, or seeing that a piece of music could be "puce" in colour. Anyway, a deeply satisfying read, that has it all and has stayed with me -- now I'm enjoying its being read on BBC radio, and looking forward to the movie!
|
