Note: Spoilers contained in this review.
This book was Neil’s choice from a
shortlist of his favourite books that he had read as part of his book club in
Dubai. Neil introduced the book by
saying that he had been drawn to it by it’s setting in Beirut, a city he has
visited many times for work, and was held by the fascinating account of what
war, and particularly a civil war where normal conventions are almost
completely ignored, can do to two teenagers such as George and Bassam, the
central characters of the book. He found
the book to be packed with drama and detail considering the relative brevity of
it, which allowed him to re-read the book for the purposes of the meeting, something
he hadn’t initially been sure he would.
Furthermore he found the mix of bloody action and lyrical prose to be
quite interesting in its contrast.
This feature of the language used turned
out to be one of the key talking points as some felt it jarred heavily, while
others appreciated it much more. Rob for
instance commented that it was “disjointed, staccato and almost contemptuous
use of language” while Richard felt that Hage “has a really interesting way
with words and expressions” “and some of his sentences are almost
Joyceian”. And while Steve found the
streams of consciousness passages quite enjoyable, Mark found himself irritated
by the writing style which he found rather clunky. Chris B also thought that some of the
descriptions were almost cartoon-like.
There was more consensus about the engaging
interest of the book and what it told us
about Beirut, the civil war, the horror of war and the experience of growing up
through adolescence in this environment.
There was plenty going on and for people like Steve and Mark it brought
back images from TV news or, in Mark’s case, a visit to Israel and the border
with Lebanon while shelling had been going on.
However, despite this Mark found that after 2 weeks he had already
forgotten parts. For Chris B it illuminated certain facts, such
as the Israeli involvement in training, while for Rob it didn’t tell him enough
about the conflict in Lebanon or explain enough about what was going on. The sexual awakening of Bassam was quite well
observed, but several felt that the mistreatment of women in the book belied
cultural differences rather than circumstances of war and children left
orphaned without good role models.
There was further disagreement about the
relative parts played by Paris and Beirut in the book. For Chris W he found the contrast of the two
fascinating and was disappointed that the French section of the book was
relatively short, while Richard found the Parisian setting much less
interesting than Beirut. In between the
two Steve found the transition between the two rather clumsy and lacking
something.
Overall it was generally felt to be an
interesting, reasonably engaging if not great or particularly memorable book,
while it’s brevity bordered between being a plus to being too short with Chris
W being keen to know what the next chapter in Bassam’s life would have been
like. Probably only Neil will go on to
read another book by the author (this was his first novel by the way and a
prize-winning one at that). But for the
group as a whole it seems that the literary style was not quite to their tastes
and scores ranged between 6.0 and 7.2.
