Review : The Ghost Writer

Posted by kay on August 12, 2009 2:32 pm in 3.5 stars reads | 9 comments

The Ghost Writer by John Harwood
Pages : 369
Genre : Mystery, Horror, Ghost story
My Rating : 

Gerard Freeman grows up on the windswept southern coast of Australia in the late 20th century with a controlling mother strangely silent about the details of her childhood in England. His only solace is steadfast English pen friend, Alice, to whom he confides everything. What was Gerard’s mother, Phyllis, hoping to escape when she left England?

The Ghost Writer is a slow, fascinating story where fiction becomes reality. From Australia to England, we follow Gerard Freeman as he discovers his family’s past through stories written by his grand-mother, Viola. It was a good read, very well written and mysterious. I wouldn’t qualify it as an horror ghost story, but rather as a gothic mystery with ghosts in it. It wasn’t scary as much as intriguing and dark. There were only a few scenes that I felt really were scary.

Such a slow-moving story can only work if the writing captivates the reader, and personally I really loved Harwood’s style. His descriptions were not too lenghtly but detailed, creating realistic scenes. I could see the places and characters as if they were before me. I think the best way I can put it is to say that his writing was “precise”. Here’s an excerpt I like from page 99, and that I think illustrates well what I mean :

Even in normal circomstances, the Reading Room has a labyrinthine aspect; some have compared it to a spider’s web; but because it is possible to see over the tops of the rows of desks and across the central bookcases, these sinister possibilities lie mostly dormant. If all light were to extinguished, one might imagine that the regularity of its construction, with the rows of desks radiating out from the centre like the spokes of a wheel, would still render escape relatively straightforward.

I loved how the main story was interwoven with Alice and Gerard’s letters, and his grand-mother Viola’s short stories. The letters gave a more intimate touch to the narration, and the stories were intriguing enough for me to forget that they weren’t the story I was reading. They created the book’s mystery as I tried to figure out what exactly was their relation to Gerard’s story.

There were two things though that prevent me from enjoying this book more. The first one was the pace of the book. I love a slow story, but in some chapters I thought it was a little too much. I was glad it was interrupted by Viola’s short stories, which by themselves were really worth the read.

The second thing is the ending. I liked the idea behing it, but not how it was presented. In the last 50 pages or so, the rythm picks up and we get answers to our questions, but I still felt something was missing for me to feel completely satisfied. On the other hand, the ending had some surprises in it; only a few things I had figured out, but since we don’t have all the pieces until very far into the story, I wouldn’t say it was predictable.

Let’s say I appreciated the journey, but not the destination.