pickLove this. Bumblers into heroes arc, beautiful prose, beautifully paced. Set in Sicily during the Peloponnesian War, but laced with Irish jargon and a stripped-down setting of quarries & markets for a sense of timelessness near the “wine-dark” sea. Brutality & art. Preservation of culture. Entertaining the enemy. Funny & sentimental. Crazy premise (stage Medea with actors now prisoners of war) becomes a beautiful mediation on art & freedom. 2024
so-soIt's won awards & everyone is raving about it - so it was fairly obvious I wouldn't rate it! (Seriously, why IS it always me?!) The Irish voice is irritating, a gratuitous gimmick for the sake of novelty, a cheap "unique selling point". Lampo is initially such an unpleasant character it's hard to warm to him during his redemption. I found the writing stodgy & the pace draggy. It wasn't as witty as it thought it was. It gets better at the end.
pickThis was a good balance of funny and horrific, the narrator Lampo both a tragic hero and a bumbling fool. The tone was perhaps a bit too modern, Lampo sounded like an Irishman, but in a way it added to the sense of theatre. (Who knows what a potter in ancient Syracuse sounded like anyway?) And fortunately it is not (post-post-post?) modern in its ending. On the contrary, the final sentence makes you nod in agreement, fully satisfied with the story
Common sense is common, has no imagination, and it only works by precedent. It leaves the man who follows it poorer, if not in pocket, then in his heart. Fuck common sense.
Getting stuck into this one. First few pages didn't hook me immediately, but I'm warming to it
pick7-26-24: My 25th finished book of 2024! Siracusa is a town in Sicily where our 4 narrators travel together one summer. Taylor and Finn and their daughter Snow, and Lizzie and Michael. The four adults tell this story from all their points of view and not one of them is likable. As they travel around Italy and finally Siracusa their stories becomes more intense, their hatred for one another more palpable. The final act was a surprise.
pickFantastic! Such a cool voice for an interesting time in history. The story felt alive (for being centuries old). Probably cool as an audiobook
