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Title: The Stranger's Child
Author: Alan Hollinghurst
Narrator: James Daniel Wilson
Format: Unabridged
Length: 19 hrs and 56 mins
Language: English
Release date: 10-14-11
Publisher: Random House Audio
Ratings: 3.5 of 5 out of 64 votes
Genres: Fiction, Contemporary
Publisher's Summary:
From the Man Booker Prize-winning author of The Line of Beauty: a magnificent, century-spanning saga about a love triangle that spawns a myth, and a family mystery, across generations.
In the late summer of 1913, George Sawle brings his Cambridge schoolmatea handsome, aristocratic young poet named Cecil Valanceto his familys modest home outside London for the weekend. George is enthralled by Cecil, and soon his sixteen-year-old sister, Daphne, is equally besotted by him and the stories he tells about Corley Court, the country estate he is heir to. But what Cecil writes in Daphnes autograph album will change their and their families lives forever: a poem that, after Cecil is killed in the Great War and his reputation burnished, will become a touchstone for a generation, a work recited by every schoolchild in England. Over time, a tragic love story is spun, even as other secrets lie burieduntil, decades later, an ambitious biographer threatens to unearth them.
Rich with Hollinghurst's signature giftshaunting sensuality, delicious wit and exquisite lyricismThe Strangers Child is a tour de force: a masterly novel about the lingering power of desire, how the heart creates its own history, and how legends are made.
Critic Reviews:
Brilliantly written, intricate and wide-reaching . . . An almost century-long cavalcade of changing social, sexual and cultural attitudes, exhibited in sensuously imagined scenes and scrutinized with ironic wit . . . Marvelously acute in its attention to idioms and idiosyncrasies, tone and body language, psychological and emotional nuances, the book gives intensely credible life to its swarm of characters. (Peter Kemp, The Sunday Times, London)
Not only Alan Hollinghursts most ambitious novel to date, but also his funniest since The Spell . . . Hollinghurst is perhaps our most literary contemporary novelist, in the sense that his books are . . . playfully, but never merely flippantly, studded with allusions. . . . The principal theme of the workings of time and memory [is] brilliantly embodied in the books structure, with its bold narrative leaps forwardBeautifully written, ambitious in its scope and structure, confident in its execution, The Strangers Child is a masterclass in the art of the novel.(Peter Parker, The Times Literary Supplement, UK)
Highly entertaining and, as always with Hollinghurst, the dialogue is immaculate and the characterization first class. . . . Every Alan Hollinghurst novel is a cause for celebration, and this spacious, elegant satire is no exception.(David Robson, Sunday Telegraph, UK)
Members Reviews:
I Hated For It To End
What did you love best about The Stranger's Child?
I loved both its characters and the way the writer explores how and what is remembered.
What other book might you compare The Stranger's Child to and why?
I could loosely compare it to A.S. Byatt's Possession or Tennysons' "In Memoriam" (where the story got its title from.) Like Possession, we see biographers trying to unravel the mystery of what a famous poet was really like and who he was romantically involved with. Unlike Possession, the story isn't centered on "who dun' it" (although there are some surprising twists at the end), but rather who is remembered, how they are remembered, and who is forgotten. It's very poignant to see who and what is lost.
Which scene was your favorite?
The ending left me with chills.