Reviews and Comments

I tend not to like books I feel I could have done a better job writing myself and 'My Father's House' is no exception.

What it amounts to is a good third draft in need of a hard pruning. Too often the author's descriptions grasp for quantity over quantity; using similes as if each came with a monetary commission. We are treated to superfluous descriptions of places and actions so much so that the first half of the book is nothing but.

Despite this, the characters wind up feeling half-baked even though they are allocated copious pages to tell their story. At a point in the middle it seems they've been rounded out enough that the reader can comprehend them, but then they unravel again by the end into little more than pastiche cliches.

The plot itself was also rather doddering. The main action doesn't begin until well into the book and even then it is not told consecutively! It is interspersed with more character statements. It became hard to know if the book was about the whole 'Escape Line' itself or just this one operation; as if the author himself couldn't decide.

Most jarring of all though, is that the book presents what it postulates as historical material but while reading, it is hard not to wince at language and attitudes more at home in the 21st century than 1940s wartime, and especially the Vatican City. The author also attempts to showcase the writing of multiple characters but can't quite pull it off. They all appear too similar in style and tone for all the diversity the characters are supposed to portray. It jolted me completely out of the story early on and once I was out, I was out. The rest of the book was merely reading words.

Overall, I felt the book was taking a far more mundane (yet no less interesting true story) and stretching out into something contemporary readers might identify better with by riffing off something Dan Brown would write. It's a cat-and-mouse tale when it should have been a political thriller. One star for the source material.

Perhaps I was looking for more out of this book than what I actually got. If you're in any way familiar with gender fluidity, fashion, or even the tastes of Generation Z, it's unlikely you'll find this book particularly informative or inspiring. It is a treatise of sorts on gender fluidity, but the book is neither a comprehensive history or a critical look at it in the context of contemporary society. Rather, it is a coffee table book all about Reed and his work.

That isn't surprising given the author, but then it does fall into the trap of many books from those in the fashion world where they attempt to (and believe they do) extrapolate their perceptions into wider society but in reality never leave the walled garden of the fashion industry. It is one thing to defy expectations on the catwalk and something entirely different to do it in say, an office. Reed's book doesn't attempt to tackle the latter and so it comes across as yet another fashionista waxing lyrical on big social and cultural questions but who ultimately can't provide any answers that work outside of the fashion world and its inhabitants.

I really wanted to add this tome to my bookshelf but it unfortunately doesn't provide enough food for thought to make it worthwhile.

This was a fascinating book. Yes, really. Obviously it's a thinly veiled facsimile of Joyce's own life but that's makes it all the more intriguing. It also casts a critical eye over Ireland at the turn of the 20th century (a tear has shed from my eye that I feel the need to clarify that now; time marches ever on). So I can understand some readers who come away confused or irritated that the book is a bit hard to 'get'. Context is everything and this book is set in a specific time and place. If you've never lived in Ireland you're already hamstrung. If you're not familiar with Irish history and culture, you're at a disadvantage. If you're not familiar with, and do not understand, the immense wrangling that Ireland was having with itself at the time, then the book will come off as the work of an arrogant writer inflated full of their own ego.

I didn't find it that way though. I found it a very forceful book whose title is completely accurate as to its contents. This is Joyce as he transforms from being one with Ireland, to being one apart from it. It details his slow progress and explains (quite well too) how various factions of society from the people, to the history, to the [British] government, to the church engaged in a conspiracy to prevent Stephen (i.e. Joyce) from fulfilling his true potential. That is, until his epiphany.

Certainly easier to read than 'Ulysses', 'Portrait' is still quintessentially a Joyce novel with its delicious use of the English language and a narrative that is segmented but never disjointed. I thoroughly enjoyed it and glad I did so given many surprise parallels that appeared between myself and Joyce which are quite amusing (if not thrilling) since we are so separated by time, place, and person among many other things.

First, a disclaimer, I went into this book almost completely blind and knowing nothing except it was set on a particular day and one of the main characters is called Leopold Bloom. Now on the other side, I can see why it gets the acclaim it does. It's a masterful book that makes almost every other book look like cheap pulp fiction.

I quickly realised that this was not going to be an easy book to read and yet I had no difficulty reading it. Comprehending it was hard for sure. So much so that I had to read a synopsis afterward to be sure I hadn't missed something along the way. Letting the words just wash over me as I read was a method that worked for me though.

As for the story, it's amazing how Joyce was able to take an otherwise ordinary day and wring 800-odd pages out of it. What an amazing (if lamentable) cast of characters he infuses the book with not least of which is Dublin city itself. Drifting into that world from 1904 felt effortless every time I picked up the book.

The characters were also unlike any I'd encountered in fiction. It helps that Joyce makes liberal use of the 'stream of consciousness' form to allow us to act as voyeurs in their minds. The last chapter in particular can be contrasted with that character's silence throughout the rest of the book.

Overall, I liked 'Ulysses' far more than I ever thought I would. It was completely different from my expectations and yet it exceeded them anyway. It has made more more aware of early 20th century Irish literature so I'm sure this is far from the last Joyce book I read.