Rating: 
Summary: Quattrocento:Mind and Magic
Review: A beautiful tale, rich in both imagery and imagination. Seamlessly, it tells itself, weaving a fine tapestry of past and present, matter and mind, fact and fantasy. Even the distortion & darkness of human nature here clothes itself in grotesque finery, lifting the common above itself, and above the inevitable mud of life.
Rating: 
Summary: Hit and Miss
Review: Although McKean often does a wonderful job describing the signficance (and binding power) of art through the centuries, the mechanisms by which the protaganist travels between our world and that of the Quattrocento are weakly conceived at best. The reader is often left trying to fill in plot construction gaps that the author should have invested more time in developing. The overall result is a short novel that is at times intriguing, but ultimately unfufilling.
Rating: 
Summary: Not Perfect, But ....
Review: As previous reviews note, this is not a perfect book. It is, however, a clever and beautifully written one. The way that Matt - aware of the low-key, easily-overlooked disjunctures occurring around him, but not of their import - eases without intention into his travel through time, is unique and interesting. The smooth interweaving of a wonderful amount of information about music and painting is not only necessary to the story but fascinating, and goes down very easily: no stop-and-lecture points for our hero. And the writing itself asks gently but insistently for one's full attention.I am a high-speed devourer of books who is impatient with excess and who hates bad writing. Even with the best of books, I tend to skip lines or even paragraphs sometimes. But I might have actually read every word of this book; I did not want to miss any of the imagery and the grace of language. While reading, I was even consciously aware of doing something I do extremely rarely: slowing down deliberately in order to picture more clearly the images and ideas Mr. McKean was offering to me. And they were almost never disappointing. In the end, I find myself left with only two concerns: first, what happened to Orlando? and second, will Mr. McKean write again? If he does, I for one will be more than ready to sample his talents again.
Rating:
Summary: A good first novel
Review: I agree with the reviewers that enjoyed aspects of this imperfect novel. The problem with the physics of time travel doesn't bother me, (i) because I don't know physics and (ii) because if time travel is inherently impossible, explanations are also bound to be so. This is no more troubling to me than the standing stone "portal" used by Diana Gabaldon. I very much enjoyed the info about music and painting, as well. Most importantly, I would have preferred a longer book with a more developed story. I liked the jarring temporal disturbances, but would have liked some explanation; I also would have preferred more developed characters. Still, a good first book.
Rating:
Summary: A good first novel
Review: I agree with the reviewers that enjoyed aspects of this imperfect novel. The problem with the physics of time travel doesn't bother me, (i) because I don't know physics and (ii) because if time travel is inherently impossible, explanations are also bound to be so. This is no more troubling to me than the standing stone "portal" used by Diana Gabaldon. I very much enjoyed the info about music and painting, as well. Most importantly, I would have preferred a longer book with a more developed story. I liked the jarring temporal disturbances, but would have liked some explanation; I also would have preferred more developed characters. Still, a good first book.
Rating:
Summary: Imaginative, But a Bit Muddled
Review: Matt is an assistant curator at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art. He is also an art restorer and an expert on Renaissance art. One day while browsing through storage bins in the basement of the Met he finds a painting of a young woman. He is quite taken with the painting and after studying it, and after scientific testing, realizes it is an unknown work by Leonardo Da Vinci. Working day after day to restore the masterpiece he falls in love with the young woman in the painting who he names "Anna". The new discovery is made public to the art world with much fanfare at a ceremony in the museum. Matt is now an art celebrity. Overwhelmed by this turn of events, Matt wants some moments of quiet and retires to another exhibit in the museum, the restoration of a Renaissance 'studiolo'. The money for that restoration has come from a mysterious man by the name of Klein, an expert on physics and other matters. Suddenly Matt finds himself propelled back to the Quattrocento, where he meets the beautiful Anna, and becomes involved in her life. Here things become muddled, as physics, art and the development of the well-tempered clavier become intertwined in the world of time travel. Matt unhappily finds himself returned to the modern world just as his relationship with the beautiful Anna begins to heat up. He seeks out the physicist Klein to see how he can return to the Quattrocento and his beloved Anna. But Klein has disappeared. No one has heard of him. Matt attempts to track him down in Istanbul, and Prague, and finds himself transported back to the 18th century and a performance of Mozart's Don Giovanni. Will he be able to find his way back to Anna in the Quattrocento? That is the question. If it all sounds a bit muddled and confusing it is. But it is still fun as the reader learns about art, music and physics along the way. What does not ring true for me is the underlying love story. There is not much development of the relationship between Matt and Anna. What draws them together? To me Anna is aloof and arrogant. For three hundred pages I was hoping to find out about Da Vinci and the origin of the unknown painting of Anna, but this part of the story is dropped completely until the last line of the last page of the novel. Worth reading if you are a lover of Renaissance art.
Rating:
Summary: Some great parts, but not a coherent whole.
Review: Matt O'Brian is an assistant curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. For about 100 pages, he is in New York in the present. He has discovered a painting in the bins in the basement of the Met that he starts to lovingly restore. Matt feels a connection to the young woman he uncovers from beneath the layers of age and he starts to fall in love with her in spite of the fact that he has a real relationship with a woman named Sally. Matt has delusions or episodes where he sees into the past or beyond this world into another and his reality differs from the experience of those around him. It was confusing to the story and the flow and these parts could have been written more clearly. There were also a couple of transitions between scenes that were awkward and poorly done. And the author has a tendency to overuse similes and metaphors that I found didn't fit with the writing style sometimes. After about 100 pages Matt goes back in time to Quattrocento Italy. There he meets the object of his desire, but the love story is a very small part of the book and very tame. What the author does very well are the great little passages on art, music, physics, falconry, and the manufacture of paint and gunpowder. I loved the bird in flight series of paintings. Some people might find the topics pretentious, but I really enjoyed them. I liked the parts on art the most, but as with all novels that discuss art, it would be beneficial to the reader to see some pictures of the artworks described. There is a studiolo in the novel and if you don't already know what it is, it's hard to visualize from the descriptions. I recommend looking at a photo of the studiolo, Leonardo's Ginevra, Brancacci's chapel and other artworks mentioned. A few quick searches on the internet yielded what I was looking for. At the end of the book Matt is sent back to the present, which he finds different than when he left and Matt struggles to find his way back to the time and place that he truly belongs...to Quattrocento Italy and Anna. I think there are answers to many of the gaps in the story in the author's head that he didn't explain clearly or enough and that this book could have been a lot better with some constructive feedback about the awkward areas. I thought parts of it were quite good, but they didn't add up to a great book.
Rating:
Summary: Some great parts, but not a coherent whole.
Review: Matt O'Brian is an assistant curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. For about 100 pages, he is in New York in the present. He has discovered a painting in the bins in the basement of the Met that he starts to lovingly restore. Matt feels a connection to the young woman he uncovers from beneath the layers of age and he starts to fall in love with her in spite of the fact that he has a real relationship with a woman named Sally. Matt has delusions or episodes where he sees into the past or beyond this world into another and his reality differs from the experience of those around him. It was confusing to the story and the flow and these parts could have been written more clearly. There were also a couple of transitions between scenes that were awkward and poorly done. And the author has a tendency to overuse similes and metaphors that I found didn't fit with the writing style sometimes. After about 100 pages Matt goes back in time to Quattrocento Italy. There he meets the object of his desire, but the love story is a very small part of the book and very tame. What the author does very well are the great little passages on art, music, physics, falconry, and the manufacture of paint and gunpowder. I loved the bird in flight series of paintings. Some people might find the topics pretentious, but I really enjoyed them. I liked the parts on art the most, but as with all novels that discuss art, it would be beneficial to the reader to see some pictures of the artworks described. There is a studiolo in the novel and if you don't already know what it is, it's hard to visualize from the descriptions. I recommend looking at a photo of the studiolo, Leonardo's Ginevra, Brancacci's chapel and other artworks mentioned. A few quick searches on the internet yielded what I was looking for. At the end of the book Matt is sent back to the present, which he finds different than when he left and Matt struggles to find his way back to the time and place that he truly belongs...to Quattrocento Italy and Anna. I think there are answers to many of the gaps in the story in the author's head that he didn't explain clearly or enough and that this book could have been a lot better with some constructive feedback about the awkward areas. I thought parts of it were quite good, but they didn't add up to a great book.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointed
Review: McKean should stick to what he knows best: violinmaking! I picked the book up because the cover portrait of Leonardo's Ginerva caught my eye, having recently visited Florence and studied the quattrocento. I enjoyed the author's depiction of life on a Medici villa and the discussions about art. The time travel and the love story are both unsatisfying, however, and McKean never connects the dots at several points--there are major holes in plot development (unconnected to the time travel) that I found confusing and frustrating. At the same time, his descriptions are overwritten and overwrought. I got very tired of the leadups to the "wolf tone."
Rating:
Summary: Disappointed
Review: McKean should stick to what he knows best: violinmaking! I picked the book up because the cover portrait of Leonardo's Ginerva caught my eye, having recently visited Florence and studied the quattrocento. I enjoyed the author's depiction of life on a Medici villa and the discussions about art. The time travel and the love story are both unsatisfying, however, and McKean never connects the dots at several points--there are major holes in plot development (unconnected to the time travel) that I found confusing and frustrating. At the same time, his descriptions are overwritten and overwrought. I got very tired of the leadups to the "wolf tone."
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