Absolution
by Patrick Flanery
- Percentage of approved critics who have given this book a positive review.
Critic Rating
85%
Critic Reviews: 20
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- User rating from iDreamBooks & iTunes
Reader Rating
88%
Reader Ratings: 20
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Synopsis
A bold and exciting literary novel that contemplates the elusive line between truth and self-perception.Ambitious and assured, Absolution propels the reader to the final page in a drive to discover the secrets and truths at its core. How or why did a young antiapartheid activist disappear twenty years earlier? How does that event link the present-day characters? And how does it explain the choices they have made or the lies they may tell themselves?Set in... more
About Patrick Flanery
- All Critics: 20
- Positive: 18
- Negative: 2
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New Statesman | 29 Mar 2012
Flanery is a warmer writer than Coetzee, his relationship with the reader more conventional, and the book's flaws are generally earthbound ones - flaws of craft rather than vision.
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The New York Times | 27 Apr 2012
Flanery has talent to spare, and he’s a talent to keep an eye on. My bet is he’ll be back. And he’ll be even better next time.
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The New Yorker | 30 Apr 2012
He brings the book’s many stories together at last, but there is no pretense that they are over. Leaving them unresolved may be the most hopeful ending possible.
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The Independent | 27 Mar 2012
Flanery's portrayal of South Africa is explosively powerful... This is an exceptionally intelligent, multi-layered novel encompassing politics, history, a gripping storyline and complex characters.
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The Star | 11 May 2012
Flanery’s decision to forego any kind of portrayal of black South African culture sits uneasily.
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The Guardian | 16 Mar 2012
One of the constant strengths of this novel is the way it faces the violence of everyday life and the unpalatable reality...
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Boston Bibliophile | 26 Apr 2012
Patrick Flanery may be a debut author but he tackles these prickly, unpredictable people and writes about difficult social, political and personal issues like a seasoned veteran.
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The Telegraph | 6 Mar 2012
The prose surges with enjoyable debate about the slipperiness of truth, the nature of forgiveness, and whether fiction is more honest than non-fiction.
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Literary Corner Cafe Blog | 23 Apr 2012
It’s a book, that like South Africa, itself, contains a beauty – and a horror – that’s truly overwhelming.
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Kirkus Reviews | 1 Apr 2012
Complex in theme, complex in narrative, this is a masterful literary exploration of the specter of conscience and the formidable cost of reconciliation.
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BookPage
Absolution is a must read for anyone interested in South Africa, or in literary fiction of the finest kind.
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Just William's Luck | 28 Feb 2012
...the skill with which Flanery constructs the novel around those details makes this a rewardingly adult read...
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Publishers Weekly | 16 Apr 2012
Adeptly orchestrating multiple points of view, Flanery builds intrigue by allowing his characters’ unreliable interpretations of history
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Selections from My Tower of Shame | 30 Apr 2012
It is wonderfully written and quite clever with two terrifically compelling narrators.
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The Guardian | 25 Feb 2012
At times Flanery's prose evokes Graham Greene; but Wald's search for profundity can feel a little contrived.
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Shelf Awareness
Patrick Flanery's nuanced, multilayered narrative unravels the mysterious pasts of two South African writers embroiled in their country's political conflict.
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The South African | 15 Feb 2012
Mature, fascinating and precise, this is not the friendliest novel, but nonetheless grips you to pursue it to the end.
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The Rumpus | 7 May 2012
Flanery’s triumph in Absolution is not in the writing, which is crisp, precise, and wholly a pleasure to read.... It is a novel about the guilt that we all share, and the absolution that we are all seeking...
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Edmonton Journal | 24 Mar 2012
The brilliance of this novel lies in its exquisite use of language...Its beauty is overwhelming, but so is its horror.
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The Wall Street Journal | 13 Apr 2012
With a sure grasp amazing in a neophyte novelist, he manages to navigate his narrative through twists and turns and stunning revelations that cast new light on characters and situations already delineated with insight and subtlety.
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