• About
  • Listening
    • Baroque
    • Bluegrass and Country
    • Classical Fusion
    • Classical Period
    • Early Music
    • Film soundtracks
    • Folk Music
    • Jazz
    • Modern Classical
    • Modern Pop Fusion
    • Musicals
    • Romantic Classical
    • Spoken word
    • World Music
  • Reading
    • Fiction
      • Children’s and Young Adult Fiction
      • Classic writers and their works
      • Contemporary Fiction
      • Crime and Detective Fiction
      • Fictionalised Biography
      • Historical Fiction
      • Horror
      • Lighter-hearted reads
      • Literary Fiction
      • Plays and Poetry
      • Romance
      • SF
      • Short stories
      • Western
      • Whimsy and Fantastical
    • Non-Fiction
      • Arts
      • Biography and Autobiography
      • Ethics, reflection, a meditative space
      • Food and Drink
      • Geography and Travel
      • Health and wellbeing
      • History and Social History
      • Philosophy of Mind
      • Science and nature
      • Society; Politics; Economics
  • Reading the 20th Century
  • Watching
    • Documentary
    • Film
    • Staged Production
    • TV
  • Shouting From The Soapbox
    • Arts Soapbox
    • Chitchat
    • Philosophical Soapbox
    • Science and Health Soapbox
  • Interviews / Q + A
  • Indexes
    • Index of Bookieness – Fiction
    • Index of Bookieness – Non-Fiction
    • Index of authors
    • Index of titles
    • 20th Century Index
    • Sound Index
      • Composers Index
      • Performers Index
    • Filmed Index

Lady Fancifull

~ adventures in a mainly literary obsession

Lady Fancifull

Daily Archives: June 25, 2013

Ian McEwan – Sweet Tooth

25 Tuesday Jun 2013

Posted by Lady Fancifull in Fiction, Literary Fiction, Reading

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Book Review, Ian McEwan, Sweet Tooth

Into the labyrinth

Sweet ToothI was left triumphally shouting `YES’ at the finish of this gorgeous and playful weaving of the personal and the 1970’s political, and the centre stage placing of the art of narrative fiction itself.

In Saturday, McEwan was sombre, dark, reflective and brilliant, ultimately presenting literature with the power to redeem.

Here, with a novel set in the shadowy reaches of MI5 in the early 70’s, Heath, the miners, spiralling oil prices, the Cold War – and the emergence of 70’s feminism – his central character is a young mathematics student at Cambridge, with a love of literature, and of men.

Saltley Gates Picket

              Saltley Gates Picket

Educated by an older lover into a greater degree of external sophistication than she otherwise would have, she enters the Civil Service at a lowly grade. These are not spoilers, so much is explained by the book’s publicity material. More I won’t really say about the plot – its clearly about the Secret Service, about the 70s, has a female protagonist and the art and craft of narrative writing itself is at the heart. So expect issues of trust, duplicity and honesty, masks and roles, the battleground and fields of Ian-McEwanpeace between the sexes, and these issues of truth and duplicity explored as part of the relationship between literature and life. All to be woven – brilliantly – into the mix.

Sweet Tooth Amazon UK
Sweet Tooth Amazon USA

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Print
  • Email
  • More
  • LinkedIn
  • Reddit
  • Pocket
  • Pinterest
  • Tumblr

Like this:

Like Loading...

Page Indexes

  • About
    • Index of Bookieness – Fiction
    • Index of Bookieness – Non-Fiction
    • Index of authors
    • Index of titles
    • 20th Century Index
  • Sound Index
    • Composers Index
    • Performers Index
  • Filmed Index

Genres

Archives

June 2013
M T W T F S S
 12
3456789
10111213141516
17181920212223
24252627282930
« May   Jul »

Posts Getting Perused

  • Alan Sillitoe - Saturday Night and Sunday Morning
    Alan Sillitoe - Saturday Night and Sunday Morning
  • William Butler Yeats - Vacillation
    William Butler Yeats - Vacillation
  • Zhu Xiao-Mei - The Secret Piano
    Zhu Xiao-Mei - The Secret Piano
  • Judith Kerr - A Small Person Far Away
    Judith Kerr - A Small Person Far Away
  • Alex Grey - Sacred Mirrors
    Alex Grey - Sacred Mirrors
  • Emmi Itäranta - Memory of Water
    Emmi Itäranta - Memory of Water
  • Barbara Vine - House of Stairs
    Barbara Vine - House of Stairs
  • John Steinbeck - The Grapes of Wrath
    John Steinbeck - The Grapes of Wrath

Recent Posts

  • Bart Van Es – The Cut Out Girl
  • Joan Baez – Vol 1
  • J.S.Bach – Goldberg Variations – Zhu Xiao-Mei
  • Zhu Xiao-Mei – The Secret Piano
  • Jane Harper – The Lost Man

NetGalley Badges

Fancifull Stats

  • 154,022 hits
Follow Lady Fancifull on WordPress.com

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Follow on Bloglovin

Tags

1930s setting Adult Faerie Tale Andrew Greig Arvo Pärt Autobiography baroque Beryl Bainbridge Biography Biography as Fiction Bits and Bobs Bits and Pieces Book Review Books about Books Cats Children's Book Review Classical music Classical music review Classic Crime Fiction Colm Toibin Cookery Book Crime Fiction David Mitchell Dystopia Espionage Ethics Fantasy Fiction Feminism Film review First World War Folk Music Food Industry France Gay and Lesbian Literature Ghost story Golden-Age Crime Fiction Graham Greene Health and wellbeing Historical Fiction History Humour Humour and Wit Ireland Irish writer Irvin D. Yalom Janice Galloway Japan Literary Fiction Literary pastiche Lynn Shepherd Marcus Sedgwick Meditation Mick Herron Minimalism Music review Myths and Legends Neil Gaiman Ngaio Marsh Novels about America Other Stuff Patrick Flanery Patrick Hamilton Perfumery Philip Glass Philosophy Police Procedural Post-Apocalypse Psychiatry Psychological Thriller Psychology Psychotherapy Publication Day Reading Rebecca Mascull Reflection Robert Harris Rose Tremain Russian Revolution sacred music Sadie Jones Sci-Fi Science and nature Scottish writer Second World War SF Shakespeare Short stories Simon Mawer Soapbox Spy thriller Susan Hill Tana French The Cold War The Natural World TV Drama Victorian set fiction Whimsy and Fantasy Fiction William Boyd World music review Writing Young Adult Fiction

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.

Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy
  • Follow Following
    • Lady Fancifull
    • Join 770 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • Lady Fancifull
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...
 

You must be logged in to post a comment.

    loading Cancel
    Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
    Email check failed, please try again
    Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.
    %d bloggers like this: