Beautifully written but often slow novel about how a child's misinterpretation of an adult moment and a thoughtlessly spiteful act can echo down decades.
The character of Briony Tallis is brilliantly drawn -- a precocious child of 13, the adored baby of a nouveau riche British family, Briony is also a budding writer whose melodramatic tales of foolish love, betrayal, and ultimate happy-ever-after are praised by her family. When she sees, but does not hear, an exchange between her older sister and the sister's potential suitor, she misunderstands the flirtation for threatening behavior on the part of the young man. Thinking she is protecting her sister, Briony falsely accuses him in an act that destroys the young man's future and puts him on the front lines in Britain's disastrous retreat from Dunkirk.
This is not an easy read. It's dark, and the characters aren't always likable. The descriptions of the Dunkirk retreat and the scenes set in the London hospitals that receive the survivors, is brutal. Still, McEwan's prose drives the story and demands that the reader hang on for the denouement.
The character of Briony Tallis is brilliantly drawn -- a precocious child of 13, the adored baby of a nouveau riche British family, Briony is also a budding writer whose melodramatic tales of foolish love, betrayal, and ultimate happy-ever-after are praised by her family. When she sees, but does not hear, an exchange between her older sister and the sister's potential suitor, she misunderstands the flirtation for threatening behavior on the part of the young man. Thinking she is protecting her sister, Briony falsely accuses him in an act that destroys the young man's future and puts him on the front lines in Britain's disastrous retreat from Dunkirk.
This is not an easy read. It's dark, and the characters aren't always likable. The descriptions of the Dunkirk retreat and the scenes set in the London hospitals that receive the survivors, is brutal. Still, McEwan's prose drives the story and demands that the reader hang on for the denouement.
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