Rating: 
Summary: Fine Style; But We Ain't Getting The Whole Story
Review: When I first discovered Martin Amis over a decade ago I devoured his novels like candy. The exhilarating style (a combination of forceful street talk and brilliant elliptical phrasing) and the scabrous humor won me over (the best: "Dead Babies" and "Success".) But with "London Fields" and "Time's Arrow" I began to notice that the style wasn't up to the thematic ambition. "Fields" was hysterical about nukes just as the cold war was winding down, and "Arrow" was gruesomely pointless about Nazism--"those were bad dudes, man!" And "The Information" and "Night Train" didn't end as much as just stop. So to tell the truth I wasn't expecting much from "Experience." But it turns out that Amis is more coherent about reality than he has been in his recent fiction. Much of this book is genuinely moving, especially the parts about his dad, Kingsley. The old devil comes alive in these pages. And as someone who has recently lost a parent, his description of his father's last days rings sadly true. The bits about his teeth and literary politics are interesting. But some of "Experience" makes me dubious. He writes warmly of his murdered cousin Lucy Partington, but doesn't include a single conversation with her (which leads me to believe her family's objections that he really didn't know her as well as he claims.) The whole terrible thing (innocent girl assaulted by lower-class yob) reads like stuff from earlier books. And an explanation for the breakup of his first marriage is entirely absent (which wouldn't be relevant except for the tears he said he shed for doing the same thing to his sons that his allegedly adulterous father did to him.) So there is much to admire in this book, but it leaves you wondering if some of the old Philip Roth style is here--an author who fictionalizes his life. Roth is upfront about it; maybe Amis, the master of words, doesn't even realize he's doing it.
Rating: 
Summary: Funny, sad & brilliant
Review: _Experience_ is a memoir so filled with vital detail and humanity that I really did not want it to end. Amis is charming but also unapologetic, a quality that few writers can genuinely claim.
The book's scope is impressive because aside from Amis's life, it chronicles the lives of his immediate family members, his father in particular. There are a number of fascinating elements to draw in his readers--profane and hilarious letters written mostly in his late teens that serve as chapter entrees, the story of his one stint as a film actor, the parallel discussion of his cousin Lucy Partington's violent death, the affectionate portraits of his parents and friends--Christopher Hitchens and Saul Bellow, most notably. Also some of the most memorable lines I've read: for one, his description of some mouthfuls of bad teeth as a "bag of mixed nuts and raisins."
This is a memoir that challenges and charms us; here Amis is at his most wry and funny and moving.
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