Take a photo of a barcode or cover
.png)
mh_books 's review for:
The Essex Serpent
by Sarah Perry
I am summing this up as a physically beautiful book but a pretty disappointing read.
image:
From my reading of the reviews, the Essex Serpent is a book that divides readers into those loving it (the majority) and those finding it a disappointment (a large minority). For balance I will link to a couple of glowing reviews below and concentrate on what I did not like about the book.
This book has an “ingredient list” of all the things I should have loved.
A gothic sensation tale similar to the Wilkie Collin's [b:The Woman in White|5890|The Woman in White|Wilkie Collins|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1295661017s/5890.jpg|1303710].
Placing characters with contemporary mindsets in a historic setting. Something I did not think would work until I read John Boyne's [b:The Heart's Invisible Furies|33253215|The Heart's Invisible Furies|John Boyne|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1490803456s/33253215.jpg|51438471] but work it does.
A contemporary take on Victorian Literature similar to Michel Faber's [b:The Crimson Petal and the White|40200|The Crimson Petal and the White|Michel Faber|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1408937589s/40200.jpg|1210026].
Themes of Science versus Christian versus Pagan beliefs. A fascinating discussion point to an atheist like me that has studied some Christian and Pagan beliefs.
A fascinating discussion of the current Victorian evolutionary and medical science. Notably, I am a former scientist myself with a small collection of old scientific texts.
Themes of friendship and love and where one becomes the other.
Themes of sexual repression in the Victorian era. A lot of unrequited love (both heterosexual and homosexual).
A lot of social commentary on the dire state of housing in Bethnal Green in London in the Victorian era.
Beautiful (but as I say below) cold prose with some lovely descriptions of landscape
“Essex has her bride’s gown on: there’s cow parsley frothing by the road and daisies on the common, and the hawthorn’s dressed in white; wheat and barley fatten in the fields, and bindweed decks the hedges.”
However, none of the elements worked for me due to the beautiful but cold and distant prose that was used throughout. While reading I felt that that the prose was a crystal cold blue (nods to the character Stella) display glass, that never truly let me see and feel the book's characters and settings. I could see that they were there but they were deliberately being kept from me. Why was this Ms. Perry? After a couple of weeks of thought on the subject, I still cannot say. Here are some of the possibilities I came up with.
This book uses the third person omniscient which often separates the reader from the characters. This may have been true in this case but I note I was concurrently reading two other books that also used the third present omniscient namely Stephen Kings [b:'Salem's Lot|11590|'Salem's Lot|Stephen King|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1327891565s/11590.jpg|3048937] and Larry McMurtry's [b:Lonesome Dove|256008|Lonesome Dove|Larry McMurtry|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1378573063s/256008.jpg|3281465] and didn’t feel separated from the characters in these novels. Infact I rather enjoyed the Texan accent of the narrator in Lonesome Dove going to show that the third person Narrator has his/hers/its own unqiue voice. So maybe the voice of Sarah Perry’s narrator did not engage me?
The other possibility is that the Essex Serpent lacks clear narrative which is the quintessential reason for using third person omniscient in my opinion. It’s one of the best voices to tell an epic story but not a book based upon it’s characterisations and themes such as this one?
In places Perry was jumping around from one character to another too quickly and that did give rise to an unsettled feeling as I was never in one characters “head” long enough.
Too many themes - see above - in too few pages. There is a lot of themes above but in a 400 page novel there is not enough time to settle in and fully explore all the themes. In this case less themes is more. Or maybe more pages per theme?
Everyone is in love with the main protagonist. Though I found that totally forgivable while reading [b:The Clay Girl|28691857|The Clay Girl|Heather Tucker|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1455173005s/28691857.jpg|48888628], though maybe in the case of the Clay Girl I agreed with them?
Overall this book is not going to be for everyone so I recommend checking out a couple of reviews, flicking through some pages on a comfy chair in your library or book store before picking it up or discarding it.
Here are a couple of more positive reviews.
https://thereadheadblog.wordpress.com/2017/01/16/the-essex-serpent-sarah-perry-review/
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2031064885?book_show_action=false
4th February update: Wow I just realised today that not liking this book lost me a Goodreads friend, who's reviews I always enjoyed. This and Sealskin were the only books we had opposing views on. That is a shame and very sad. So rather controversially I guess I now have another reason not to like this book.
image:
From my reading of the reviews, the Essex Serpent is a book that divides readers into those loving it (the majority) and those finding it a disappointment (a large minority). For balance I will link to a couple of glowing reviews below and concentrate on what I did not like about the book.
This book has an “ingredient list” of all the things I should have loved.
A gothic sensation tale similar to the Wilkie Collin's [b:The Woman in White|5890|The Woman in White|Wilkie Collins|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1295661017s/5890.jpg|1303710].
Placing characters with contemporary mindsets in a historic setting. Something I did not think would work until I read John Boyne's [b:The Heart's Invisible Furies|33253215|The Heart's Invisible Furies|John Boyne|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1490803456s/33253215.jpg|51438471] but work it does.
A contemporary take on Victorian Literature similar to Michel Faber's [b:The Crimson Petal and the White|40200|The Crimson Petal and the White|Michel Faber|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1408937589s/40200.jpg|1210026].
Themes of Science versus Christian versus Pagan beliefs. A fascinating discussion point to an atheist like me that has studied some Christian and Pagan beliefs.
A fascinating discussion of the current Victorian evolutionary and medical science. Notably, I am a former scientist myself with a small collection of old scientific texts.
Themes of friendship and love and where one becomes the other.
Themes of sexual repression in the Victorian era. A lot of unrequited love (both heterosexual and homosexual).
A lot of social commentary on the dire state of housing in Bethnal Green in London in the Victorian era.
Beautiful (but as I say below) cold prose with some lovely descriptions of landscape
“Essex has her bride’s gown on: there’s cow parsley frothing by the road and daisies on the common, and the hawthorn’s dressed in white; wheat and barley fatten in the fields, and bindweed decks the hedges.”
However, none of the elements worked for me due to the beautiful but cold and distant prose that was used throughout. While reading I felt that that the prose was a crystal cold blue (nods to the character Stella) display glass, that never truly let me see and feel the book's characters and settings. I could see that they were there but they were deliberately being kept from me. Why was this Ms. Perry? After a couple of weeks of thought on the subject, I still cannot say. Here are some of the possibilities I came up with.
This book uses the third person omniscient which often separates the reader from the characters. This may have been true in this case but I note I was concurrently reading two other books that also used the third present omniscient namely Stephen Kings [b:'Salem's Lot|11590|'Salem's Lot|Stephen King|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1327891565s/11590.jpg|3048937] and Larry McMurtry's [b:Lonesome Dove|256008|Lonesome Dove|Larry McMurtry|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1378573063s/256008.jpg|3281465] and didn’t feel separated from the characters in these novels. Infact I rather enjoyed the Texan accent of the narrator in Lonesome Dove going to show that the third person Narrator has his/hers/its own unqiue voice. So maybe the voice of Sarah Perry’s narrator did not engage me?
The other possibility is that the Essex Serpent lacks clear narrative which is the quintessential reason for using third person omniscient in my opinion. It’s one of the best voices to tell an epic story but not a book based upon it’s characterisations and themes such as this one?
In places Perry was jumping around from one character to another too quickly and that did give rise to an unsettled feeling as I was never in one characters “head” long enough.
Too many themes - see above - in too few pages. There is a lot of themes above but in a 400 page novel there is not enough time to settle in and fully explore all the themes. In this case less themes is more. Or maybe more pages per theme?
Everyone is in love with the main protagonist. Though I found that totally forgivable while reading [b:The Clay Girl|28691857|The Clay Girl|Heather Tucker|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1455173005s/28691857.jpg|48888628], though maybe in the case of the Clay Girl I agreed with them?
Overall this book is not going to be for everyone so I recommend checking out a couple of reviews, flicking through some pages on a comfy chair in your library or book store before picking it up or discarding it.
Here are a couple of more positive reviews.
https://thereadheadblog.wordpress.com/2017/01/16/the-essex-serpent-sarah-perry-review/
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2031064885?book_show_action=false
4th February update: Wow I just realised today that not liking this book lost me a Goodreads friend, who's reviews I always enjoyed. This and Sealskin were the only books we had opposing views on. That is a shame and very sad. So rather controversially I guess I now have another reason not to like this book.