Shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction 2011, Nicole Krauss's Great House is a haunting story that explores loss and memory.
In New York a woman spends the night with a young Chilean poet before he departs, leaving her at his desk. Later, he is arrested by Pinochet's secret police. . . In north London, a man caring for his dying wife discovers a lock of hair that unravels a terrible secret. . . In Jerusalem, an antiques dealer reassembles his father's study plundered by Nazis. One item remains missing. . .
Spanning continents and decades, weaving an intricate web of its characters' lives, Great House tells a soaring story of love, loss and survival against the odds.
On day 18 the book club met for the last time this year. I think it's fair to say opinion on Great House by Nicole Krauss was mixed... It was my turn to choose and after reading the blurb I thought that it sounded like a good story... That's what I was after, a story. As a result, my experience of the opening chapter (a very long chapter at that) was a struggle. I wasn't warming to the first character in what would become a series of monologues, she was a tortured poet so her narrative voice was just a bit literary for my liking and all this wasn't helped by the fact I couldn't breathe, my eyes were watering and my throat was burning...
Once I got through this slightly slow start and I started on a chapter where a father was frustratingly trying to get through to his estranged son, I started to get into it. The relationships kept me interested for the most part and the void i had been left with at the end of Ghostwritten where none of the ties seemed to satisfyingly link, was fulfilled step by step in Krauss' narrative.
My problems with the book were firstly its structure. I felt I had to put quite a lot of effort into each chapter and then suddenly it would finish and we would be on to a brand new character and start all over again. I also found the writing, in places, was a little self righteous and, as I Sao before, a little too literary - like it was trying to do more than tell the story. I can't really be doing with that.
Overall though, the thread established in the blurb kept me gripped to the end even if there were parts of the book I didn't quite appreciate...
The book received a 2, 4, 6.5 and another 6.5 from me.
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