The Patrick Melrose Novels: Never Mind, Bad News, Some Hope, and Mother's Milk

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

The Patrick Melrose Novels: Never Mind, Bad News, Some Hope, and Mother's Milk (The Patrick Melrose Novels #1-4)

4.07 of 5 stars 4.07 · rating details · 945 ratings · 217 reviews

NATIONALBESTSELLER

AnAtlantic MagazineBest Book of the Year
APublishers Weekly Best Book of the Year

“The Melrose Novels are a masterwork for the twenty-first century, written by one of the great prose stylists in England.” —Alice Sebold, author of The Lovely Bones

For more than twenty years, acclaimed author Edward St. Aubyn has chronicled the life of Patrick Melrose, paintin...more

ebook, 736 pages

Published January 31st 2012 by Picador

more details... edit details

Get a copy:

More…

Friend Reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

Lists with This Book

This book is not yet featured on Listopia. Add this book to your favorite list »

Community Reviews

(showing 1-30 of 2,615)

filter | sort: default (?) | rating details

Nov 25, 2012 Jessica rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: bad-guys, groups-of-people, here-is-new-york, kind-of-depressing, leetle-boys, substance-related-disorders

So far, reads like Alan Hollinghurst's excruciatingly fucked up and much richer second cousin, in the best possible way. Seems to explore the unstated hypothesis that having to earn a living is what distracts most people from destroying their children, themselves, and everyone around them. Also definitively answers the question of whether the most lurid and cliched subjects can be not just salvaged but made new, relevant, and moving through brilliant English prose. (Spoiler: yes.)

13 likes · like · see review

Nov 16, 2012 Chris marked it as intermittently-reading · review of another edition

A pair of recent reviews of At Last prompted me to take-up this tetralogy that I purchased, on a whim, a couple of months ago. Said whim was driven, in large part, by my attraction to the stark cover; and with the further experience of physically grasping and admiring the thing in my very hands, I find myself beguiled by this book's aesthetics—a cover design as black as Satan's pupils floating box islands of a neon pink that speaks of electrocuted roses or Rosé deepened to a homogenized lacquer...more

7 likes · like · see review

May 14, 2013 Gary McTiernan rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

If you've ever wondered what became of the Dedlocks of Chesney Wold you need look no further than this quartet of novels by Edward St. Aubyn. According to him, they changed their name to Melrose and fled to the South of France. We first meet Patrick Melrose as a lad of five in Never Mind. Poor Patrick battles against a brilliant, criminally-sadistic father and his criminally-negligent, rich American wife, who is capable of mothering only in the abstract. As much as Dickens predicted the decline of the Gentry, even he might be shocked by the antics of the Melrose clan and their guests during a weekend of boozing and debauchery.

In the next book Bad News, we watch in fascinated horror as Patrick grows into adulthood while he sinks into addiction. As he jets between two continents, we marvel at his brilliance and are crushed by his dissolution. This might seem like a journey to avoid, but he is such good company. He shares his attempts to fend off madness by ingesting every mind-altering substance ever invented. He recounts a weekend in Manhattan in his 20's, which could be described as a long day's journey into Disco Hell: Imagine a date between Mary Tyrone and Jay McInerney.

Obviously this can't go on forever, so the third and fourth books, Some Hope and Mother's Milk are concerned with his experiments in sobriety and parenting. His father haunts him throughout, but it is mother who strikes the final blow when she squanders his inheritance. In my efforts at self-improvement (view spoiler), I attempted to highlight particularly brilliant passages to share. I had to abandon this when I counted forty in the first book alone. You're just going to have to discover them for yourself. And after you're completely hooked, as I am, you can console yourself in the knowledge that the fifth Patrick Melrose novel, At Last: A Novel is as close as a click on your kindle.
Here's an excellent review of it:
http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics...(less)

6 likes · like · see review

view all 14 comments

Gary McTiernan Thank you Steve. Read individually each book has merit, but I think it works best to read them as a series.
May 16, 2013 05:02am

Suzanne I've read Never Mind and Bad News, the first two novellas of St. Aubyn's brilliantly written horror story. Eleanor and David are not only unfit parent...more
May 22, 2013 01:02am

Sep 05, 2012 Tara rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

OMG. apparently, the same reactions as many other reviewers, and "stunned" is the main one. have only read the first five chapters, and could hardly put down. and it isn't a quick page turner for plot, but the writing is so exceptionally beautiful that makes it a page turner. and as i was trying to put into sentences all the wonderful words such as enchanted, shocked, heightened senses, lucid, vivid, aesthetic, profound, philosophical, i realized that all the other reviewers have done the very s...more OMG. apparently, the same reactions as many other reviewers, and "stunned" is the main one. have only read the first five chapters, and could hardly put down. and it isn't a quick page turner for plot, but the writing is so exceptionally beautiful that makes it a page turner. and as i was trying to put into sentences all the wonderful words such as enchanted, shocked, heightened senses, lucid, vivid, aesthetic, profound, philosophical, i realized that all the other reviewers have done the very same thing. that is, as a reader and in the presence of st aubyn's writing via the patrick melrose novels, you're elevated to a whole different level of senses, mind and emotions!

if you're interested in english aristocrats (or the many times more intense/dark side of the likes of downton abbey), this would have to be on your reading list, to be read now!

~~~~~review upon completion~~~~~~~~~

There are just too many great things about these stories. They're not for the faint of heart, and not to be read as a source for cheerfulness. If you're someone that wished you were born to different parents, and struggle to be very different from them (and to find out that with the best intentions, you've only changed a bit), then this would be an interesting book for you as well.. it's so that you'll experience the "misery loves company" type of stories, but with a lot more insights and clarity. Perhaps, it'll save you from many sessions with your therapist :)

But all that aside, you could read just to be illuminated by the beautiful prose that carries with it all the ironies, wit, and sharp observations about life in a very intellectual manner. There are just too many great insights and you could go on and on highlighting your book, copy down quotes, etc. I felt that way but didn't want to put down the kindle to jot down notes... and as I come to a close, finishing the last few pages, I realized how the potent language carried its way through to the very end:

"In the end it was unfair on everyone being who they were because they couldn't be anyone else." - thought by Robert, the eight years old son. Really, an eight year old could say this?!

"If she belonged to the tribe who always heard the siren call of the choice they were about to lose.."

"Do nothing!?" said Thomas "I mean, how do you do nothing? Because if you do nothing, you do something!" - said by the three years old son! Isn't that such a perfect statement? LOL!

And by all means, these are not the most lyrical, there're plenty of that throughout, but you'll have to read it to find out for yourself :)(less)

7 likes · like · see review

Apr 23, 2012 Richard Kramer rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

just started. will report in as situation develops. So far witty and dark. And he has the most perfect aristocratic accent I've ever heard (he has been much interviewed). His writer's voice is equally
elegant. I've read five pages, but I'm smelling a five-star horse here.

update April 23

I smelled wrong. It's four stars, and comfortably so. A technically very assured book, that made me want to imitate certain techniques, which is a very fluid, roving point of view, unique in the way it inhabits a s...more

3 likes · like · see review

May 01, 2012 Lauren rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I just began reading this collection of the first four books in the quintet of Patrick Melrose books, and I am STUNNED by what an amazing writer St. Aubyn is. Every paragraph contains a gem, and his characterizations are brilliant, as is his character development... and the way he handles the heaviest subject matter you can imagine.

I've been wondering, "Where has Edward St. Aubyn been all my life?" And then I remember, "Right, right. Pedophiliac, homosexual incest. Not the usual fare of my frien...more

9 likes · like · see review

Feb 04, 2013 George Witte rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I can't recommend this book highly enough...but it's not for every reader. Anyone who writes, or wants to write, should read these four novels and the concluding fifth, At Last. Read with a highlighter in hand because you will want to mark at least one sentence, one line of the cutting, witty, mordant, pitch-perfect dialogue from every single page. Readers of Martin (and Kingsley) Amis, Evelyn Waugh, and the darkest of the John Cheever novels and stories will be utterly gripped by these novels a...more

4 likes · like · see review

Jan 22, 2013 Malena Watrous rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Simultaneously hilarious and devastating--my favorite, brutal combination--wringing out laughter that hurts. As a friend put it, "These are the fucked up descendants of the downton abbey crew." There is this incredible tension between Patrick Melrose's hyper-articulate linguistic self indulgence as he describes the torments of his childhood and subsequent addictions and misery, and the almost inchoate line that he repeats, "No one should do that to another person," this wounded cry at what was t...more

7 likes · like · see review

Nov 08, 2012 John rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, literature

Having seen Edward St. Aubyn referenced in many a past book review (and universally glowingly so) I figured it was time to try one of his novels. This book is a complication of four of his novels all of which track a single character at a very specific point in time through his life.
The first of the four in this compendium was Never Mind, a skillfully told dark introduction to the childhood of Patrick, narrated through his 6 year old self. In it we find the underpinnings of Patricks developme...more Having seen Edward St. Aubyn referenced in many a past book review (and universally glowingly so) I figured it was time to try one of his novels. This book is a complication of four of his novels all of which track a single character at a very specific point in time through his life.
The first of the four in this compendium was Never Mind, a skillfully told dark introduction to the childhood of Patrick, narrated through his 6 year old self. In it we find the underpinnings of Patricks development with a distant, rich, alcoholic, prescription drug abusing mother and a domineering, sexually and verbally abusive power driven father.
The second one, Bad News finds a 20 something year old heroin addicted Patrick traveling to New York from London to claim his fathers remains after his passing. Following him in New York for only 24 hours this is a frenetic drug hazed journey into dark alleys and sumptuous penthouses.
The third is Some Hope which finds a newly clean and sober Patrick, now in his late 20's/early 30's back in London, alternately mourning the rush and excitement of his drug addled youth and his general feeling of being lost with diminished wealth amongst a rich and vacuous coterie in London.
The fourth is Mothers Milk which is told in fragmentary multiple person narratives revolving with Patrick in his late 30's early 40's as he struggles to overcome his past childhood in raising his own children. There are some delightfully different points of view, particularly as some of the story is told through the eyes of his children. This one was on the list for the Booker Prize.
Overall, three things make this collection intriguing; the eerie sense that one gets that most of the narrative is actually pseudo-autobiographical, the pinpoint laser-guided munitions of character sketches that in relatively few words clearly fix a character (many of whom the reader also gets a sense of being actual people the author has known), and a prose style unlike any I have encountered - particularly as it pertains to new, fresh, and entirely accurate similes and metaphors. A delightful collection.(less)

1 like · like · see review

Oct 30, 2012 Anne rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It's difficult to find words which accurately describe the life of Patrick Melrose, a last member of the self-destructing British aristocracy. Largely acknowledged to be autobiographical, St. Aubyn shows the reader that there's very little to like about Patrick and his family and friends although Patrick can be forgiven much about his descent into everything awful after a horrific rape inflicted upon him by his equally horrific father at the age of five. Somehow, Patrick survives and achieves a...more

2 likes · like · see review

Aug 01, 2012 Christian rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The most fun I've ever had reading about incest, heroin addiction, narcissism, cruelty and dementia. The blackest of comedies, written in beautiful, elegant prose, with razor-sharp dialog and heartbreaking, finely-drawn characters.

If, like me, you can't imagine enjoying yet another book about decadent rich Brits, I implore you to set your class prejudices aside and let yourself sink into the lush, awful world of the Melroses. Patrick's journey from child victim, to wanton self-destroyer, to des...more

8 likes · like · see review

Nov 23, 2012 Eugenia rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I avoided reading these for a long while because I had heard about the central event that bifurcates the first novel, the entire series, and Patrick's life -- his violent rape by his sadistic father at the age of five. I had actually forgotten that I knew this when I downloaded the first, and was sucked in by the sarcasm, the wit, and the milieu -- and so the rape completely shocked me when it happened. I had to stop reading overnight but then had to go back because I knew the child would surviv...more

1 like · like · see review

Jan 30, 2013 El rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to El by: The Professor

Shelves: 1001-books-list, 21st-centurylit, late20th-centurylit, library-borrow

Another great recommendation from The Professor. He recommended this specific edition which holds the first four books in the Melrose series (the fifth book, At Last, was published in 2011). He said that he had trouble putting the stories down once he started, and I have to agree with that.

Never Mind - This story broke my heart quite a bit. Patrick Melrose is a five-year-old boy, living in the cold shadow of his disgustingly rich parents who barely know the first thing about parenting. He endure...more

11 likes · like · see review

Mar 14, 2012 Andres rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: sonyreader

I read the whole thing cover to cover in like a week, so it does not bore you. That said, I'm feeling hard pressed to find something fascinating to say about these books. It follows the life of your typical messed up person, starting with early childhood with an abusive father and a disengaged mother, progressing through drug addicted young adulthood, drug-free further adulthood and finally married with children. The many demons that haunt the protagonist never really cease haunting him, they si...more I read the whole thing cover to cover in like a week, so it does not bore you. That said, I'm feeling hard pressed to find something fascinating to say about these books. It follows the life of your typical messed up person, starting with early childhood with an abusive father and a disengaged mother, progressing through drug addicted young adulthood, drug-free further adulthood and finally married with children. The many demons that haunt the protagonist never really cease haunting him, they simply take turns and adapt to his changing situation. There is very little catharsis granted him, not when his father dies, and not when his mother is on the brink, either.

The books showcase what is purportedly the lifestyle of the British upper crust, with its many warts. They are full of vacuous people, betrayals, addictions, abuse, scams and parties, in fact, one of the books takes place almost wholly at a party the protagonist attends.

I kept expecting some point to the whole thing, and maybe I was too busy reading and missed it. Online blurbs state that the series is somewhat autobiographical, in which case I do not envy the author one bit. And perhaps there was no point to the books except to chronicle the protagonist's life throughout the four stages I mentioned before. Which brings me to my final, and main, problem with the series. It is disjointed. The first book shows us the protagonist as a child in an abusive household. The next one jumps us to early adulthood seasoned with a really bad drug habit. The following one jumps again some years and finds Patrick older, still single and suddenly drug-free. Finally we find him married with 2 children.

One is left wondering how, exactly, Patrick transitions from the stage we had left him in at the conclusion of the prior book, and the stage he is magically in, in the subsequent one. I sometimes had the nagging suspicion that these gaps may have been more interesting than the parts the author chose to include in the series.

But you are all getting the impression that there wasn't a whole lot of good stuff, and that's not true. Some of the moments in the books are full of pathos, or triumph, or tragedy or a healthy dose of clueless stupidity. Maybe even a bit of evil in the abusive father, though one gets the impression that he had suffered abuse himself, and as many abuse victims do, they grow up to become perpetrators perpetuating the cycle.

I picked up this series after seeing a favorable review somewhere, and don't really regret reading them. In fact, I am about to pick up the 5th and final volume in the series right now. So I liked it that much.

Anyway, that is my honest opinion of these books. Definitely "liked" them, but can't really go and say I "really liked" them, hence the 3 instead of 4 stars.(less)

4 likes · like · see review

Dec 29, 2012 Mary Wilt rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Quite amazing. Not only a vicious (and often viciously funny) view of the monied classes in both England (mostly) and America, but a harrowing and deeply affecting look at families, at parents and children and the harm that perpetuates when children are not wanted or, worse, abused. Also introspective and perceptive about what it means to be human, to have needs, to be deprived of things you feel entitled to, to fail and then to want to change.

This is a collection of the first four Patrick Melro...more

1 like · like · see review

Feb 19, 2013 Krenner1 rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Four novellas are bound to comprise the Patrick Melrose novels,which follow the son of what should have been wealth (as in upstairs Downton Abbey wealth) if circumstances had been better, through different periods of his life. My five stars are all about the writing, because in the first novella about Patrick as a five-year-old and his father, I almost could not go on. His father is an incestuous monster. But on every page there are words and sentences that take my breath away, they're so beauti...more

1 like · like · see review

Apr 07, 2012 David rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: body_parts, brutal_reality, british, doomed_lovers, frisky, humour, life_as_a_family, nyc, smoking, substances, babies

St. Aubyn writes very graphic semi-autobiographical (by all reports) novels filled with gruesome (and funny) detail and amazingly witty dialogue. Patrick Melrose is the lone child of wealthy self-absorbed parents. In _Never Mind_ we meet an alternately sexually abused and neglected five-year-old Patrick on vacation at the family estate in France. Then, in _Bad News_, Patrick goes to pick up his father's ashes in New York City and, now in his early 20s, spends most of his time mainlining coke and...more

1 like · like · see review

Apr 24, 2012 Bart rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

When these four novels are at their best, they are what might be termed post-Austenian. The rest of the time, they are Brett Easton Ellis' American Psycho with cutting dialogue in lieu of violence.

The third of the four novels, Some Hope, is probably the best of them, as it takes the Austen formula of the big ball and turns it into a vicious affair, complete with a princess and musicians and witty observations such as:

'I don't suppose that forgiveness was uppermost in the minds of people who were...more

2 likes · like · see review

Jul 25, 2012 Judith Hannan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book, as I mentioned in my recent blog, raised the question for me more so than any recent book I have read,of what is means to say a book is good. Without a doubt the writing in The Patrick Melrose Novels (a quartet of novels), an inspection and indictment of the prvileged English class, is exquisite. St. Aubyn is a keen observer but he also delivers his observations to the page in ways that are unique and also serve the story (as opposed to some writing that seems more like decoration.) T...more This book, as I mentioned in my recent blog, raised the question for me more so than any recent book I have read,of what is means to say a book is good. Without a doubt the writing in The Patrick Melrose Novels (a quartet of novels), an inspection and indictment of the prvileged English class, is exquisite. St. Aubyn is a keen observer but he also delivers his observations to the page in ways that are unique and also serve the story (as opposed to some writing that seems more like decoration.) The problem comes when you ask yourself how much you like the characters, can you live with them for over 600 pages, and can they teach you anything about the world and yourself. The reader doesn't so much as like the characters in these novels, as get to know Patrick so well that you it matters what happens tonhim next. The first two books are filled with horrific scenes--a father molesting his son, the now older son's 24-hour drug fueled trip to America to claim his father's ashes. Here is where friends have told me that they have put the book down. But Patrick has something important to say and we are obligated to hear him. Approaching his father's room to be punished Patrick, "... tried to work backward from his father's rage towhat his own crime might be...As Patrick slowly crossed the floor he tried to think of some way to placate his father. Maybe if he said something clever he'd be forgiven, but he felt extraordinarily stupid and could only think over and over: two times to equals four, two times two equals four."

In the final book, St. Aubyn will again get inside the head of children in a remarkable way. Here is a scene from the birth of Patrick's first son from the newborn's point of view. "Why had they pretended to kill him when he was born? Keeping him awake for days, banging his head again and again against a closed cervix; twisting the chord around his throat and throttling him; choping through his other's abdomen with cold shears; clamping his head...dragging him out of his home and hitting him; shining lights in his eyes and doing experiments; taking him away from his mother...Maybe the idea was to destroy his nostalgia for the old world. First the confinement to make him hungry for space, then pretending to kill him so that he would be grateful for the space when he got it,...with only the bandages of his mother's arms to wrap around him, never the whole thing again, the whole warm thing all around him, being everything.

In fact, what St. Aubyn can do so well is be every character,from the most minor to key players. Some of the most compelling and propelling writing infuses the chapter on Patrick's drugged 24 hours. The most complex writing is in the final book, Mother's Milk,where St. Aubyn can be Patrick, his mother, his mother-in-law, his children and his wife Mary, although Mary is probably more archetype than real.

If I were to point out a weakness it would be that, by separating each book by a decade or so, St. Aubyn doesn't have to cover a lot of territory that would have to be covered if his were a single opus, ie, how he got clean, how he met Mary, etc. And the third book, Some Hope, is more intermezzo than story--a review of the privileged class and Patrick's current relationship to it.

My copy of The Patrick Melrose novels is underlined with so many fabulous lines, places where I have gasped because, even in this world, I have found places where I have recognized myself. There are places where I argue with Patrick, question Mary, want to soothe the children. I am looking forward to reading At Last, the final installment in the book of Patrick's life.(less)

2 likes · like · see review

Feb 22, 2012 Howard rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Mordantly funny and desperately sad, these four novels, written -- I'd guess -- over the last twenty some years, trace the life of Patrick Melrose, a member of the English upper class, from when Patrick is a roughly five-year-old boy to when he's become himself the father of two young sons. Melrose's upbringing was unspeakably horrid (probably like St. Aubyn's) and he pays the price as he careens from near collapse to recovery and back to near collapse while living through the death of his hatef...more

4 likes · like · see review

Jan 30, 2013 Michael Berman rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

I'm not sure what I can add that hasn't been said by other reviewers. This series of novels is funny, poignant, searing, and unique. Most of all, it's an unsparing look at the damage that parents bring upon their children, both through their base motivations, but also through their desire to avoid the mistakes of *their* parents.

In lesser hands, the story of the self-loathing Patrick Melrose would be cliched, but St. Aubyn's language and observations are so cutting that the reader understands Pa...more

1 like · like · see review

Aug 12, 2012 Simone rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2012-read

I remember spotting this book on a rainy day while killing some time in a Northampton bookstore with a friend of mine post our five year college reunion. I loved the look of the book (go go book cover design gadget) I loved the pink and the people and the names of the novel's, intoxicating when read all together in one breath - Bad News, Never Mind, Some Hope and Mother's Milk. I took a picture so I could remember to hunt for it at the library. Then I read a recommendation for the book from Ann...more
I remember spotting this book on a rainy day while killing some time in a Northampton bookstore with a friend of mine post our five year college reunion. I loved the look of the book (go go book cover design gadget) I loved the pink and the people and the names of the novel's, intoxicating when read all together in one breath - Bad News, Never Mind, Some Hope and Mother's Milk. I took a picture so I could remember to hunt for it at the library. Then I read a recommendation for the book from Ann Patchett on the Parnassus Blog:

"I wound up reading all five books in five days (each one is short.) The last time I had such an all-encompassing one-author book binge was when I read John Updike’s Rabbit Angstrom novels straight through. Every second sentence in the Patrick Melrose cycle was one that I wanted to write down or read aloud to my husband. These books made me reconsider issues of family, responsibility, entitlement, depression, addiction, and life in general. They also made me think about what makes great writing. They’re brilliant books, especially when read straight through. I would not have been happy to wait years between the publication of each volume. As much as I loved them, I have to warn you: they’re very strong. They’re not going to be for everyone, but they were certainly for me."

And then Ann Patchett's review in the Gaurdian - http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/...

So basically a casual interest in the look of a book turned into a real desire to track down a copy. It took a while to finagle one from Inter-Library Loan, but I'm glad it finally came through. In four novels about one person and ostensibly about the same thing, Patrick and his relationship to his parents, they return to the subject and drill at it from different times and angles. My least favorite was the second novel "Never Mind" which details Patrick's drug use in detail, all those needles makes me nauseous. Aside from that, I really enjoyed the last two novels. Now I want to track down the fifth novel, "At Last." (less)

like · see review

May 02, 2012 Rayme rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Now I've read all five novels (or novellas). I actually finished last week but have been waiting to figure out what to say.

These books are about awful people who do terrible things. It doesn't help that most of them are also insanely rich with the backing of a British title. Even the main character, who is witty and has had everything (and I do mean everything) taken from him, is very hard to enjoy spending 600 pages with.

And yet.....

I'm considering reading the cycle again. There is something w...more

like · see review

Feb 13, 2012 Liz rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I pretty much knew what I was in for in this novel...wealth, British snobbery, awful people, degradation, and I was hoping for just a little redemption, naive reader that I am! All of the above was certainly there, only worse. St. Aubyn inflicts pain on his characters of the worst kind and, of course, some of it comes from his own life, the worst stuff really. St. Aubyn deserves more than a book for his pain, even more than a few books and yet by the time I got to the end of Bad News, I wanted i...more

1 like · like · see review

Apr 07, 2013 Vicki Jarrett rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I read the four books in this collected volume back to back only partly because I wanted to find out what happens to Patrick, mostly because the writing itself is more than a little addictive – clever, insightful, funny, and very dark. I initially doubted I would enjoy this series, although it came highly recommended. The suffering of rich people has, I feel, been given more than enough coverage in literature. It is inevitable, given that the ruling, wealthy members of society tend to be those w...more I read the four books in this collected volume back to back only partly because I wanted to find out what happens to Patrick, mostly because the writing itself is more than a little addictive – clever, insightful, funny, and very dark. I initially doubted I would enjoy this series, although it came highly recommended. The suffering of rich people has, I feel, been given more than enough coverage in literature. It is inevitable, given that the ruling, wealthy members of society tend to be those with access to education, so it follows they are the ones who have the tools, the time, the confidence and so on to write novels, which accounts for the disproportionate amount of books by and about the wealthy. Often, the self-absorption and lack of perspective displayed in such novels gets on my nerves but in this instance, the quality of the writing won me over within a few pages. The characters depicted in these novels are seriously upper-class, the old aristocracy. I guess these people still exist but I don’t think I’ve ever met one, so they were completely alien to me and lent reading the books that detached but fascinated feeling I might experience reading about some lost tribe of the Amazon. These are human beings, but not as I know them. The majority of the characters are so despicable it made me very glad they’re not part of my experience. The first book covers Patrick’s early childhood and the devastating incident which shapes much of his subsequent psychology, although I did suspect that, even without that, his parents were sufficiently awful that it would’ve been unlikely he’d have emerged without serious problems. The second book details his drug addiction. The dissection of the nature of addiction is merciless and contains breath-taking stream of consciousness pyrotechnics . I didn’t enjoy the third book as much as there is simply not enough Patrick and far too much of a cast of over-privileged psychopaths. The writing was still excellent but I found it difficult to care about most of the other characters. It was like visiting a zoo full of strange animals attacking each other and hurting themselves. The fourth book, Mother’s Milk was full of insight from each viewpoint taken. I was most impressed with how accurately and perceptively he handled the emotional landscape of motherhood from Patrick’s wife, Mary’s point of view. I will certainly pick up a copy of the final volume, At Last. (less)

like · see review

Mar 13, 2012 Mary Grace Walsh rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I have mixed feelings about this saga. It's very well written. Never Mind lays the ground work for Patrick Melrose life; or at least gives him all the excuses he procedes to underscore his life with. Bad News is just that in spades. Up close and personal with a drug addict's angst,the desperation of the search for the next fix etc.. Probably more than most of us want to know. My favorite is Some Hope. The house party, in the country of course, is a hoot. Princess Margaret attends and if the port...more

1 like · like · see review

Nov 12, 2012 Jim Leckband rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Overall: Updike's Rabbit Angstrom : The Four Novels : Rabbit, Run; Rabbit Redux; Rabbit is Rich; Rabbit at Rest meets Evelyn Waugh with a dash of Trainspotting.

Never Mind They say the rich are different than you and I. They're bitchier. The Mobius-strip of upper class depravity is savagely closed by the cruelties of the father on the son in this oddly compelling novel. The monster of the book, David Melrose, pretends to be on the same level as Nero and Caligula, but the want of Roman laurels pro...more

like · see review

Feb 04, 2012 Tim rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Written for a publishing trade magazine and not the best use of my time (was paid $25 for this :), but what a book and what a writer! Brilliant, funny, eloquent, and satisfying.

The Patrick Melrose Novels:
Never Mind, Bad News, Some Hope, & Mother’s Milk
Edward St. Aubyn

To coincide with the publication of the newest (and final book) in the personal/family saga of Patrick Melrose, Picador has released an omnibus edition of the first four novels in what may well be one of the most ambitious nov...more Written for a publishing trade magazine and not the best use of my time (was paid $25 for this :), but what a book and what a writer! Brilliant, funny, eloquent, and satisfying.

The Patrick Melrose Novels:
Never Mind, Bad News, Some Hope, & Mother’s Milk
Edward St. Aubyn

To coincide with the publication of the newest (and final book) in the personal/family saga of Patrick Melrose, Picador has released an omnibus edition of the first four novels in what may well be one of the most ambitious novel cycle since Anthony Powell’s A Dance to the Music of Time. But while Powell was writing about a wide swath of English social history in the mid-20th century, St. Aubyn’s milieu is more focused and constrained, detailing the life of the scion of David and Eleanor Melrose, his eccentric, wealthy, and cruel parents.
The first book, Never Mind, introduces the reader to the Melrose family over the course of a day and a half at their home in Provence—Dr. David Melrose, wife Eleanor, the five- year-old Patrick—along with the vast assortment of hangers-on, attracted to the aristocratic David and to Eleanor’s great wealth. It also introduces the author’s chief narrative technique: the foreground action is confined to a day or two, focusing on a party or gathering, and affords opportunities for memories, musings, and asides--conscious introspection rendered into a elegant, epigrammatic prose. In Bad News, Patrick is 22 and headed to New York “to collect my father’s corpse,” as he explains to a customs agent. He is also seriously addicted to heroin and cocaine, and devotes as much time in Manhattan to the search for drugs as he does to coming to terms with his hated father and his death. Eight years later, as recounted in Some Hope, Patrick is studying to be a lawyer--by renting courtroom dramas--and recovering from his addictions and his excruciating personal history: “his past lay before him like a corpse waiting to be embalmed” (the phrase foreshadows a similar thought in the new novel, At Last). And in Mother’s Milk, the most hopeful and positive of the four books in this volume, Patrick is married, somewhat unhappily, and a father himself (the opening pages are written from the newborn Robert’s perspective; hours old, freshly out of the womb, he notes that “he couldn’t live with so much doubt and so much intensity” -- an amazing passage). Still haunted by his own father, Patrick now must deal with his mother’s crackpot philanthropy that will destroy the family fortune.
But this cycle of novels is no ordinary family saga, or even the saga of an extraordinary family (which the Melrose clan certainly is); no plot summary can begin to describe the power of St. Aubyn’s work. The author has clearly mined his own personal experience for this fiction, but he’s also smelted that ore, processed it, and refined it into something exquisite, an exploration of consciousness and the journey from the helplessness of childhood to “the pure inevitability of things being as they were” -- as elegant a definition of acceptance as anyone is likely to formulate. But the seriousness of his purpose cannot hide the books’ abundant wit, laugh-out-loud funniness, and piercing observations into the world of privilege and entitlement.(less)

like · see review

Oct 08, 2012 David rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I see a lot of press about this book stating that St. Aubyn is supposed to be a master stylist. I really don't know what that is supposed to mean. The scope that these four books covers is impressive, along with the psychology St. Aubyn represents of so many different characters with relatively seamless transition. I do have to say that I liked "Bad News" and "Mother's Milk" the best. I don't need to like characters by any means, but "Never Mind" was defined for me by how much I loathed one char...more

like · see review

May 15, 2013 Anna rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I don't think I've ever wanted a book to end as much as I did this one; I literally read two other books once I knew i was reaching the end in order to put off the inevitable. Dark and brilliant, The Patrick Melrose Novels is filled with characters that range from wholly despicable to merely somewhat unlikable and St. Aubyn manages to make you care passionately about every last one. While the main character (not the protagonist because it turns out that Patrick Melrose is the protagonist) in thi...more

1 like · like · see review

« previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 … 87 88 next »

new topic
Discuss This Book

There are no discussion topics on this book yet. Be the first to start one »

Recommend it | Stats | Recent status updates

combine
Other Editions (4)

Genres

European Literature > British Literature

10 users

Contemporary

6 users

Literature

5 users

Novels

4 users

Literary Fiction

3 users

Book Club

2 users

Family

2 users

See top shelves...

Readers also enjoyed similar books

Battleborn
by Claire Vaye Watkins
A Naked Singularity
by Sergio De La Pava
Anglo-Saxon Attitudes
by Angus Wilson
Hot Pink
by Adam Levin
Varamo
by César Aira

About Edward St. Aubyn

Edward St Aubyn was born in London in 1960. He was educated at Westminster school and Keble college, Oxford University. He is the author of six novels, the most recent of which, ‘Mother’s Milk’, was shortlisted for the 2006 Man Booker Prize, won the 2007 Prix Femina Etranger and won the 2007 South Bank Show award on literature.

His first novel, ‘Never Mind’ (1992) won the Betty Trask award. This no...more

More about Edward St. Aubyn...

Books by Edward St. Aubyn

More…

Share This Book

Facebook Twitter Your website

Trivia About The Patrick Melro...

No trivia or quizzes yet. Add some now »

Quotes from The Patrick Melrose No...

“Everything was usual. That was depression: being stuck, clinging to an out-of-date version of oneself.” — 4 people liked it

“Looking after children can be a subtle way of giving up... They become the whole ones, the well ones, the postponement of happiness, the ones who won't drink too much, give up, get divorced, become mentally ill. The part of oneself that's fighting against decay and depression is transferred to guarding them from decay and depression. In the meantime one decays and gets depressed.” — 1 person liked it

More quotes…

title link	preview: The Patrick Melrose Novels: Never Mind, Bad News, Some Hope, and Mother's Milk
avg rating	preview: The Patrick Melrose Novels: Never Mind, Bad News, Some Hope, and Mother's Milk Goodreads rating: 4.07 (945 ratings)
small image	preview: click here [close]
med image	preview: click here [close]
BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13166478-the-patrick-melrose-novels?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1340820982l/13166478.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13166478-the-patrick-melrose-novels?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]The Patrick Melrose Novels: Never Mind, Bad News, Some Hope, and Mother's Milk by Edward St. Aubyn[/url]

The Patrick Melrose Novels: Never Mind, Bad News, Some Hope, and Mother's Milk (The Patrick Melrose Novels #1-4)

Friend Reviews

Community Reviews

Share This Book

Share This Book on Your Website