The Cement Garden

Rating:
Summary: It's a 1st-person, urban, erotic Lord of the Flies!
Review: "I did not kill my father," this slim novel begins, "but I sometimes felt I had helped him on his way." Soon the mother is dead as well, and four children are left to fend for themselves in a secluded house in a dying part of the city.

There's Julie, the eldest, a ripe & willful beauty who's almost a woman; there's Jack, the narrator, a boy bewildered by his growing body & appetites; there's Sue, bookish & ever-observant; and then there's Tom, the baby of the family, who actually seems to get younger, regressing as the days go by. These four form an uneasy family, slowly learning to be self-sufficient in this strangely apocalyptic setting.

But an intruder in the form of Julie's new boyfriend threatens their fragile stasis by asking too many questions. How long have the four of them been alone? And just what is buried under the crumbling pile of cement in the basement?

This book has been mistakenly marketed as a horror novel; it's horrific, sure, but not as horrible as the pulp that defines the genre. What makes it particularly good is its characters, the children who are both recognizably sympathetic and exotically extraordinary.

Ian McEwan has created a taut & provocative thriller written in pitch-perfect and stripped-down prose. Beyond being a macabre morality tale, The Cement Garden is a psychological-suspense yarn, a perceptive portrayal of adolescence that will keep you riveted up to the final, climactic scene in an upstairs bedroom.

Rating:
Summary: Plot-driven novella
Review: "The Cement Garden" is one of the early novellas by Ian McEwan, a winner of the 1998 Booker Prize for his novel "Amsterdam". Perhaps there is a reason why this book is not as popular as it might be, given the later-day success of this writer, as indicated by the awards. "The Cement Garden" is a plot-driven story with a great potential which nevertheless has never been exploited.

The family of a marriage with four children falls apart when both parents suddenly die. Even here, in the very beginning of the book the storyline is unconvincing. After the father dies from stroke, the mother follows him in short order, apparently from incurable illness. In the very first chapter, the very first page even, when this information is passed to the reader - I wish the author had given some more thought to the actual events. The coincidence of their passing away is too artificial for my liking. Even the dysfunctionality of the family does not ring true. Of four children, only one appears to be sane, and what exactly is the probability that out of three teenagers and one toddler - one will turn out to be an early transvestite, and two others incestuous? The plot itself was bland, everything might be intuited right away. If only there was more to this book that the aforementioned storyline, that wouldn't hurt. Sadly, it isn't the case, as McEwan hints at the upcoming events in a bold fashion.

The potential of the tale was not explored, and McEwan seemed to hesitate as to the actual course of the story. Circling around the seemingly unexpected solution to the situation the four children found themselves in, McEwan never dared deliver what he undoubtedly wanted to. This novel was hailed as the second Lord of the Flies (originally written by William Golding), and it just might have been, but wasn't, when all is said and done. In the writing itself, there is no hint that the author would one day win the Booker Prize. Having just closed the last page I have not retained any memory of anything original to the writing style of McEwan. All faults of this book combined together give an impression of a forced work, where everything seems to be stretched and artificial.

Rating:
Summary: It's a 1st-person, urban, erotic Lord of the Flies!
Review: "I did not kill my father," this slim novel begins, "but I sometimes felt I had helped him on his way." Soon the mother is dead as well, and four children are left to fend for themselves in a secluded house in a dying part of the city.

There's Julie, the eldest, a ripe & willful beauty who's almost a woman; there's Jack, the narrator, a boy bewildered by his growing body & appetites; there's Sue, bookish & ever-observant; and then there's Tom, the baby of the family, who actually seems to get younger, regressing as the days go by. These four form an uneasy family, slowly learning to be self-sufficient in this strangely apocalyptic setting.

But an intruder in the form of Julie's new boyfriend threatens their fragile stasis by asking too many questions. How long have the four of them been alone? And just what is buried under the crumbling pile of cement in the basement?

This book has been mistakenly marketed as a horror novel; it's horrific, sure, but not as horrible as the pulp that defines the genre. What makes it particularly good is its characters, the children who are both recognizably sympathetic and exotically extraordinary.

Ian McEwan has created a taut & provocative thriller written in pitch-perfect and stripped-down prose. Beyond being a macabre morality tale, The Cement Garden is a psychological-suspense yarn, a perceptive portrayal of adolescence that will keep you riveted up to the final, climactic scene in an upstairs bedroom.

Rating:
Summary: STRANGELY DARK AND DISTURBING NOVEL
Review: "The Cement Garden" took me exactly two hours to read, and in that time I never been subject to a more disturbing novel so deeply intent in it's power to shock and astonish the reader. What strikes me about this novel is the deadpan tone the author adopts to convey an array of taboo subject matter, ranging from death to, more importantly, incest. Everything is detailed in a simple, matter-of-fact tone that one would perceive as being from an adolescent. The families 'secret' made known to the world through Derek yet we arent given full detail of his horror at the discovery and the children never seem to fully comprehend the consequences of their actions. The fact we never find out what happens to the children once they have been discovered heightens the fact that this novel is unlike any other, which would almost allude to the idea that the novel is largely lacking a sufficient closure. The allusion to a dream in the closing words of the final chapter, coupled with the various dreams of the protagonist scattered throughout the novel makes the reader think that maybe the entire events of the novel is just one mere daydream. The novel, like a dream itself never seems to end, and the reader is left at their discrtion to almost imagine typical scenarios that give answers to their unanswered questions. I think the novel serves as an accurate characterisation of the modern working-class family (although events for the average modern working-class family WOULD differ considerably) and embodies everything that is quintesssentially english about being English, ranging from the various attitudes to setting. In conclusion I would emphasise that the book has many strengths, and should be pursued by many to pass excite and intrigue an otherwise dull afternoon.

Rating:
Summary: Under the surface
Review:

In "The Cement Garden" Ian McEwan's naked prose, stripped bare of all ornamentation, builds a chilling tale of suspense and survival. He wields the serrated edge of language, working it like a shard of cut glass under the skin of the reader.

By manipulating the taboo of incest, he awakens an uneasy awareness of the viscerality inherent in everyday living. Taking cement as his central metaphor, McEwan moulds together associations between denial, restriction and isolation. It is through cementing themselves off from all external interference that Jack, the adolescent narrator, his sisters, Julie and Sue, and their younger brother Tom daydream their way through a nightmarish existence.

As the conventional, familial hierarchy is eroded the children assume new roles in order to survive their pain. The intentionally flat prose heightens the redundant shell of domesticity that forms an increasingly artificial backdrop to the protagonists' gestures.

Rating:
Summary: Things that crack
Review: A haunting, strange, black and funny story about, among other things, the things kids can get into when they don't have video games to keep them busy. It's truly an amazing book that will have you reading slack-jawed. And of course, you'll think about cement in an entirely new way.

Rating:
Summary: A 20th Century classic
Review: A perverse but enchanting book; beautifully written and perfectly constructed. This is a story about a family of children who find themselves orphaned while living in a house surrounded by a wasteland, an image that perfectly reflects the emptiness of their days. Finding themselves without adult guidance, it shows how they slide into sloth and then perversity. Being a writer of consumate skill and a gifted story-teller, McEwan describes this without purple prose but with a sharp eye on human nature. Despite the shocking nature of the story, it has a realistic feel to it - One feels that these events could happen given the circumstances. The characters are delinated so convincingly that the reader, despite the perverse nature of the protaganists actions, is drawn into their dark world and is made to see it from their point of view. A modern classic.

Rating:
Summary: Predictable
Review: Although I'm a big fan of Ian's, I found this book to be predictable. I enjoyed the character development of the main character. This is something that Ian's has developed since in his writing. The story line, however, was totally expected and I was disappointed in it. Although I did expect the ending, the final pages, when the authorities showed up left chills down my spine.

Rating:
Summary: I saw the movie first
Review: And the movie is one of my all time favorites. The cinematography is wonderful, and the story is deeply disturbing. I read the book and found that I didn't get as much out of it as I did the movie. I think the movie shows us how four kids set to making a family to replace the one that fell apart in a very short period of time. The tone of the book did not shed this kind of light on the story. The book seemed to be more about the boy and his world, which is more lecherous, seedy, and selfish. The movie shows us how the oldest girl is trying to keep things together and at the same time trying to enjoy her young adulthood (the sunbathing and the boyfriend with the fancy sportscar). I did not get as much insight from the book, although I think it's important to read it as well as watch the movie.

Rating:
Summary: I feel relieved I don't have a sister...
Review: cause it would probably blur my appreciation of a book that's at times apologetic of brother-sister incest. But the beauty of the book is that what some perceived as 'sick' is shorn of any feeling of guilt. This cement garden is a rather scruffy garden of Eden, but it's one alright: a place where sin hasn't been heard of yet.