Claudia Hampton is dying. As memories crowd in, she re-creates the mosiac of her life, her own story enmeshed with those of her brother, her lover and father of her daughter, and the centre of her life, Tom, her one great love both found and lost in the "mad fairyland" of war-torn Egypt.

Winner of the Booker prize in 1987
My book has a different cover to the one above.
Learn more about the author at her website
The painting above shows a WW2 battle scene.

I enjoyed this book, it was beautifully written and you really got to know the character/s well. I liked the way that significant scenes in Claudia's life were told from several points of view, it was a bit like watching a movie scene from different camera angles. Claudia came across as a person with a strong sense of individualism, she also seemed very self centred -she reminded me of Iris Murdoch for some reason.

This book is being offered as a bookray in tantan's Booker prize rings and rays. More details Here
The participants in the ray can be found
Here

RELEASE NOTES:

Posted to Tantan who is first participant in the bookray for this book.
Enjoy!!

Received im the mail today. It's a couple down on the pile, but it looks like it'll be a quick read when I get to it.

I finished this whilst on my honeymoon on Norfolk Island, and I must say that I really enjoyed it. I thought that Claudia would not really be the nicest person if you were to meet her in real life, but the writing in the novel captured me and drew me in. Like boreal I also enjoyed seeing the different stories from different angles - that's always one of my favourite styles in books.

This will be heading off to meganh as soon as I confirm her address.

Posted to meganh today.

Received in the mail yesterday. This is #5 for me in the Booker prize ring. Thanks for including this book boreal (yet another one of your books on my shelf) and for setting up the ring tantan. I look forward to reading this soon.

What a wonderful book, I enjoyed Penelope Lively's writing immensely! Claudia wanted to write a history of the world and I think she covered it very well from a personal perspective with her ramblings about ancient fossils, ancient Egypt, the war and her knowledge of history. Such intense relationships too - I felt uncomfortable about her incestuous relationship with her brother and grieved with her over her lost lover and unborn child.
I thought this a very worthy Booker prize winner.
I already have dodau's address, so will put this in the mail today.

Received this morning.

I really wonder sometimes just what criteria they use to choose a Booker prize winner. Do they just go for the most boring book of the year. This is the story of Claudia. Dying in a nursing home she looks back to how she loved and lost during WWII. But by about page two I realy had no interest in anything that had happened to her. I finished the book because it was a thin one but didn't enjoy it at all.

RELEASE NOTES:

popped through the letter box the other day when we were away.
Thanks Dodau and Boreal

mmm
Perhaps there is just too much going on in my life at the moment but I just could not relate to this book at all. It took me six weeks to struggle through all of the 200 pages and I just found it boring. Yes some lovely descriptions but basically I didn't like the main characters and didnt really care what happened to them.

I knew I was lost on page 2 when Claudia says "My readers know the story,of course ........I shall omit the narrative."

I must be the one person who doesn't know the story and wanted narrative.

In terms of the Booker I thought it was similar to Offshore.
Anyway another 1 crossed off my Booker list and thanks Boreal for sharing

zzz has asked to skip so Ill send a note to Lillyanna

zzz
Lillyanna (Spain)
lady-anglophile (Kuwait)
blurbren (Malaysia)
NeedSun (Ontario, Canada)
tania-in-nc (North Carolina, USA)
Neuilly (Maine, USA)
Jazz-ee2
Off into the wild

Received yesterday morning. I have some brings to read before this one but I will look forward to read it as soon as possible.

Thanks very much!

Just interrupting the journals to update the reading list for this book. After Lillyanna it is as follows:

lady-anglophile (Kuwait)
dospescados (New York, USA)
tania-in-nc (North Carolina, USA)
Neuilly (Maine, USA)
jazz-ee2 (United Kingdom)
zzz (Serbia)
Off into the wild!

Thanks so much! :-)