This book is about a seventeen year old boy living in typical Victorian England who learns the complexities of religion and morals from his Uncle who is cynical and anti-religious and his uncle's best friend who believes deeply in saints. At the same time you get to sit in a séance with the Queen Mother, get some pretty biting social commentary, and enjoy the fairly awful femme fatale tactics of Ms Thwale.

Someone who likes bitter social commentary mixed with philosophy, art, literary comments, a smattering of French, German, and possibly Latin sayings and someone who enjoys reading about Victorian England. This book is however pretty depressing and the twists are enough to make your heart sink so it's not for the faint hearted or anyone that doesn't like books with a great amount of reference to things like fine art, poetry, etc.

How brutally cruel the commentary was. At one point the Queen Mother looses her lap dog to poisoning and as soon as she's handed a new puppy the old dog falls to the ground, completely discarded.

The depiction of what death was like to those that die was fascinating and Ms Thwale tormenting all the men around her delighted me to no extent.

The fact that it was so negative. Usually the author tosses a bone here and there but this one was just thoroughly negative. He torments the main character and all those around him and seems to delight in ruining the lives of his creations... at the same time I think that's what made the book so brilliant.

However I don't suggest this book to people who like to use the word presumptuous when there's references that they don't understand. This book doesn't explain it's references so readers should be forewarned.

sigh with relief? The ending is bittersweet. It depressed me but it could have been worse I suppose.

like laughing and then being depressed before becoming a bit ponderous of the philisophical aspects.

has written some other good reads that are a lot less tumultuous.

it creates a pretty vivid picture of upper middle class and upper class Victorian society in a unique perspective.

it's a bit awkward if you don't know the basics of some of the things it talks about. It's also a bit strange in set up. I would have liked to have read at least one more from Sebastian's uncle's point of view.

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Created Aug 26, 2005 at 8:16pm • Submit your own review...