Gentlemen and Players |
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Joanne Harris
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Pages: 512 (Paperback)
ISBN: 0552770027
Pub: Black Swan
Pub date: 2006-06-05
Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 5609
Reader Reviews:
Another Turbulent Term of Tyke Tiler (0/0 people found this helpful)
I can't rave about this book as Ms Harris has really stolen Gene Kemp's idea from the wonderful children's classic "The Turbulent Term of Tyke Tiler". If you've read that book then you will see the ending coming from a long long long way off. I do keep trying her books, but I'm afriad there's only been one chocolat for me and nothing else up to the same spec.
Brilliant, gripping with a final twist (0/0 people found this helpful)
My friend lent me this book, knowing I had read all JH's other stories.
I could not put this book down, a refreshingly different story again from all her other novels. An ingenious idea for a story, right from the start I was hooked. I walked the corridors of the school with the main character and could smell the pencils and chalk dust and the dry musty smell only a school class room has, my stomach lurched as I walked the rooftops and felt the dark envelope me with a twisted mixture of fear and excitement. I had sympathy and loathing for the teachers.
The conclusion was totally unpredictable. You will not be disappointed. I just had to buy this book after reading it, just to possess such a fabulous story and be able to lend it to other friends.
Excellent Read (0/0 people found this helpful)
Gentlemen and players is a fantastic read, it is slightly slow to get into. I felt the two separate characters narrative to begin with, although initial unsettling did work out well. There were some major stereotypes but rather than criticise them, I enjoyed them and recognised a few traits in school masters I have met and known. The school with its quirks and traditions was an excellent back drop for the story. As for the twist I never show it for a moment, I do think I was a little slow there though, as friends have said they had a feeling. I am a fan of Joanne Harris and this was no exception, definitely worth a read.
Enthralling (0/0 people found this helpful)
What a really good novel Joanne Harris has written with Gentleman and Players. It is an enthralling and haunting read and in a new direction for this author. It really held my attention from the beginning but the last hundred pages or so I just had to keep going. It deals with deception, betrayal, ambition and forbidden longings, at an exclusive boys' school in the English countryside. The two protagonists are worthy adversaries. One is a revered, slightly eccentric Classics teacher in danger of becoming an unwanted anachronism. The other is a youngster from a working-class background who yearns for the elitism the school represents. The story alternates between the two viewpoints. The child is now an adult, exacting revenge for a devastating childhood experience involving St.Oswald's School - an experience revealed to the reader slowly and tantalizingly as the story unfolds. There is a surprising twist toward the end of the novel which really caught me out as thought I had it all sussed! Well worth reading.
Another twisty turny tale (0/0 people found this helpful)
Miss Harris seems to be pre-occupied with the notion of identity. It's a theme that dominates most of her work, with many layered questions about what identity means, who we really are and so on. That's the case once again with Gentlemen and Players. Like many other reviewers I guessed the twist almost within the first few pages - but I think the author realises that many of us will do just that, and throws in plenty of curve balls to keep us in doubt. In fact, I thought all through the book that in sussing the twist I'd actually fallen for a red herring. But no! Anyway, whether you guess it or not, I found the book really absorbing, and entertaining, right up to the final page. That said, it's not a patch on the five-star 5 Quarters of the Orange which, for me, is JH's dark-hearted best.
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Categories
Amazon.co.uk places this book into the following categories:
Books -> Subjects -> Fiction -> General
Books -> Subjects -> Fiction -> Contemporary Fiction: 1970 Onwards -> Popular Fiction
Books -> Subjects -> Fiction -> Contemporary Fiction: 1970 Onwards -> Women’s Popular Fiction
Books -> Refinements -> Language (feature_browse-bin) -> English
Books -> Refinements -> Age (feature_two_browse-bin)
Books -> Refinements -> Format (binding_browse-bin) -> Paperback