Ginette B. (Niteowl7) reviewed on 5/11/2005 + 242 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 2

This is a very literary book from a British author. It received rave reviews from The New York Times and other notable reviewers. Though it's labeled a "romance" it's much more than that. It's focus is on obsession by modern critics towards a dead poet and the lengths they'll go through for anything written or owned by that poet, especially is it's undiscovered. For those who love poetry and romance this is a great book. However, I only gave it a #7 rating since I'm not a great fan of 19th century poetry, obscure myths and romance. I found it difficult to read since I was pretty bored. It picked up in the middle (there are 555 pages!). I couldn't relate to the characters' obsession with this long dead poet. And there's a lot of poetry in the book, some of the poems are quite long, which I found myself rapidly skimming. But it is a highly literate book, a thinking person's book whose main appeal is to those who relate to the love of poetry and the veneration of poets.

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