Every life is both ordinary and extraordinary, but Logan Mountstuart's - lived from the beginning to the end of the twentieth century- contains more than its fair share of both. As a writer who finds inspiration in Paris and London, as a spy betrayed in the war and as an art-dealer in the 60's in New York, Logan mixes with the movers and shakers of his times. But as son, friend, lover and husband, he makes the same mistakes we all do in our search for happiness.
This is very good, very entertaining and has good social history and as the blurb states, Logan mixes with painters, writers and royalty. The only problem I have with this is three weeks ago I read Boyd's 'The New Confessions" a book with an identical conceit:
Beginning with his bizarre boyhood and schooldays in Scotland we move on to his incredible experiences of the First World War , and from there we follow his fretful progress through the Berlin of the Twenties, Mexico in 1939 and the Allied invasion of St Tropez and Los Angeles of the McCarthy era.
This problem is mine, just my bad luck to have picked up both books within a month but it was a distraction.
As I said its interesting, and moves along nicely. It's a better book than 'Confessions' which is to be expected given the author had a further 15 years experience before writing this.
Recommended as a novel and of course this is the book that gave the world CAUC. ( Look it up )
No comments:
Post a Comment