The Pope's Rhinoceros: A Novel

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Summary: The Pope's Rhinoceros
Review: The opening pages which take the reader through the centuries of the ice age were indicative of what was to follow. The prose was compelling but very descriptive and I felt this was at the expense of narrative drive. I did not emerge from the book with a much clearer idea about what drove Niklot/Salvestro, or indeed many of the other characters in the book. While true life is often confusing, I would have welcomed a bit more "glue" holding the many different episodes together. Full marks to an earlier reviewer's dissection of the plot, much of which I missed---I don't think I'm particularly slow, and I like to be kept guessing, but not to the point where I forget which country I'm in. I skimmed the last hundred or so pages, feeling that I'd not taken adequate notes as I read it. I began to flounder in a welter of details quite early on in the process, so I'm not the best qualified judge, but the ending seemed anticlimactic. Plenty of brilliant scenes throughout the book, which was populated with a gallery of fantastic grotesques and others, and many of the scenes would have made great short stories. But ultimately the lack of narrative and construction made the book unwieldy. A pity, since the characters and their time were anyway so fascinating, and not covered so frequently these days.

Rating:
Summary: A little bit of Eco...
Review: With "The Pope's Rhinoceros," a novel I stumbled upon in my early college days while working as a humble bookstore clerk(thanks to a customer's reccomendation, no less), Lawrence Norfolk is clearly driving the same proverbial car as Umberto Eco. However, it feels as though the story is going in a wildly different direction than such titles as "Foucault's Pendulum" and "Name of the Rose." Indeed, this is more playful and feels almost like a post-modern interpretation of the more longwinded brands of historical fiction out there.

Think of it as "Baudolino" meets "The Princess Bride,"(Just look at Salvestro and Bernardo and if you do not see the obvious similarities you're looking too hard) with a heavier dose of rhetoric than both combined.

All in all it is entertaining, particularly for the ex-humanities majors out there and does a better job of painting the absurdities of the Renaissance than it does to tell an actual technical story.

Then again, I've spent a better time with this book than I'd had in a while.