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Dec 10, 2011

Nancy rated it:

I’m usually suspicious of over-hyped books, but a friend at the library highly recommended it.

A short way into the story, the narrator’s mom dies, his grandmother dies, he gets severely burned in a car accident, and his aunt and uncle die. I felt beat over the head with all the suffering and seriously thought about giving up reading by page 50. Then Marianne Engel, a woman with a history of mental illness, shows up in the nameless narrator’s hospital room telling a story about he More...

10 comments like (41 people liked it)

Dec 10, 2008

Jason rated it:

(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted here illegally.)

It's easy to take the low road whenever a subpar book with tremendous hype comes out, to comically trash that book not necessarily for its ludicrous elements but rather that a group of corporate executives decided to spend millions on it anyway. But what if that author happens to be on you More...

48 comments like (110 people liked it)

Aug 05, 2008

Amy rated it:

I began to get an idea why the publisher paid $1.5 million for this novel (the highest ever paid in Canada) after the first few pages. Andrew Davidson is able to tease stories out paper with his pen like his character, Marianne, is able to tease gargoyles out of stone with a chisel. Through the mouth of Marianne and with images straight out of Dante's Inferno, he tells 700 years of stories of Marianne's reincarnations which have included whispering nuns, fiery arrows, callous mercenaries, deadly More...

1 comment like (36 people liked it)

Aug 18, 2008

Peter rated it:

I gave this almost 200 pages to win me over since it has been hyped so much and everyone seems to love it, but I had to give up on it and move on. I thought that the writing was very good, with some vivid images, especially the early one equating the narrator's burn to the pain caused by touching a hot stove--for a full minute. I also, surprisingly, enjoyed some of Marianne's tales of love.

The problem was--okay, one of the problems was--that I found them to be more interesting th More...

7 comments like (32 people liked it)

Aug 30, 2008

Jackie rated it:

This is a most unusual tale. It is the love story of a severely burned ex-porn star and a schizophrenic sculptor on it's surface. Which is interesting enough--both are lovably flawed fascinating characters in their on right. But soon the other stories, spanning centuries, begin. Each is a heartbreaking yet uplifting story of love. All are told in language I can only call magical--I found myself often stopping to re-read sections because I wanted to savor their beauty a bit longer. Reading More...

5 comments like (26 people liked it)

Jul 15, 2011

Colleen rated it:

This is not just a book, it's an adventure. You can tell that Davidson did not rush this book. The writing is detailed and vivid but not overdone. The characters jump off the page when you're reading this book, its like you're right there with them. It's amazing, it's a great read, it's an experience.

This book should not be underestimated, there are stories within stories and meanings within meanings and real depth. The writing is excellent. This book will move you emotionally an More...

13 comments like (11 people liked it)

Sep 26, 2008

Michael rated it:

The unnamed narrator of Andrew Davidson's debut novel "The Gargoyle" may be beautiful to the world but internally, his life is a mess. Raised as an orphan by his two meth-addicted cousins and then in foster care, he's now a adult cinema star whose life is built upon looks and appearances rather than any real depth. He's addicted to drugs, drinks too much and all of this leads to him to a horrific car accident in which he is horribly burned over most of his body, even going so far as More...

2 comments like (14 people liked it)

Aug 13, 2008

Lolly LKH rated it:

The Gargoyle moves you to want to be in love and to NEVER want to be in love. Love is suffering, love is bliss. Davidson has penned a beautiful book full of love, meaning, and intelligence. It's not often that a person can learn history,religion and culture in a book about love. Oh and he threw in burn procedures, yes BURN procedures in a book about love, somehow it seems fitting. Wait, I think I forgot to mention there are language translations too. I do realize a lot of people run from anythi More...

4 comments like (25 people liked it)

Sep 23, 2008

Lauren rated it:

Over the period of one day, I was completely immersed in the story... so many stories within one! Starting with a real shock of a near-fatal auto accident, this book definitely starts off with a bang. The main character (who is never "named") is severely burnt, and spends months upon months in a hospital's burn unit. I really enjoyed seeing the transformation of the main character both physically, spiritually, and emotionally throughout the 400+ pages of the novel. With the care/lov More...

2 comments like (12 people liked it)

Aug 25, 2008

Diane rated it:

---Wow...just where do I start? Honestly, I was not sure whether I was going to read this book or not. I took the book home from the library 2 weeks ago, read a few gory pages and then stopped. I then read that this debut author, Andrew Davidson, was given a $2 million dollar advance on this book, and I had to read it to see what all the hype was about. I am so glad I did.

The Gargoyle, is a story about redemption.

This book is not for the faint of heart. The story begins w More...

2 comments like (9 people liked it)

Oct 03, 2008

Bill rated it:

It's hard to believe that this is a first novel, it is a very well accomplished book, I can see me becoming an Andrew Davidson fan over time.

What I loved most about the Gargoyle is that it is so hard to categorise. It is a love story, an adventure story, a supernatural thriller, a horror tale (perhaps?) and there are many heart wrenching and indeed comedic moments in the book.

The characters are all very well developed and the parallels and use of Dante's Inferno have kick More...

3 comments like (11 people liked it)

Oct 08, 2008

Shelby rated it:

What a book! I thought okay so an odd storyline when I heard about it. But my book group was saying it was so good that I thought I would give it a try and I'm soooo glad that I did. This book makes you glad to be a reader. For me it brought stories and that love of a really really good book to life again. I am about halfway through it and I keep making me put it down because I dread it ending.
Andrew Davidson has written a gift for the reading world. His stories sweep you up and place you More...

3 comments like (7 people liked it)

Oct 19, 2008

Mollysusie rated it:

Wow! WOW! Woooow!

Things I loved about this book: the writing! the imagery! the story! the plotline! the fact that everytime someone asked me what I was reading about I could say a porn star!

But mostly it was the writing. Finally, a male author who can show, not tell when it comes to feelings. To love. To devotion. Again, not an American male writer...

Things I didn't like about this book: the first-person point of view. the author addressing the More...

1 comment like (6 people liked it)

Aug 26, 2008

Lisa rated it:

'The Gargoyle' is a bold and ambitious novel for first-time author Andrew Davidson. Opening with the narrator's description of a horrific car crash, you immediately sense that this novel is not going to be a 'light and fluffy' read! "Truth be told, I started with the crash because I wanted to catch your interest and drag you into the story" (p.3) and does he ever - even for the reluctant reader who wants to tear herself away from the gruesome descriptions leaping out of the pages lik More...

0 comments like (6 people liked it)

Aug 16, 2008

Audrey rated it:

‘Gargoyle’ by Andrew Davidson is like no other novel. It revolves around a beautiful but utterly corrupt, nameless, pornographer who is burnt beyond recognition. For him although he lives, he is already dead. Marianne Engel is the elusive, haunting and unstable sculptress of the stone Gargoyles; the title of the novel. Ultimately, she is his saviour in a way that he could never have understood previously. This novel reaches beyond the reader’s usual expectations. It is a story of great dept More...

0 comments like (8 people liked it)

Mar 11, 2008

Sarah rated it:

The Gargoyle is a harsh punch to the gut to those who doubt love transcends time.

The first line got me...Accidents ambush the unsuspecting, often violently, just like love. At that moment, I was pulled off the cliff along with the happless narrator...feeling the explosion and the flames chewing away his skin. As the unnammed narrator awakens, he is recovering in the burn ward and no longer recognizable as a man. This is a far cry from his former glory days of an attractive, womanizi More...

0 comments like (6 people liked it)

Nov 23, 2010

Wendy rated it:

This has got to be one of the best books I have ever read!

9 comments like (6 people liked it)

Oct 02, 2011

oliviasbooks rated it:

After reading 59 pages and waiting five months for summoning up enough motivation to go on reading (all my Goodreads friends seem to love the book with abandon - so what's wrong with me?), I have decided to finally put a lid on the case and throw the book out of its designated and by this time slightly dusty spot on my nightstand. I had this subconscious fear that maybe I have detoriated and am not able to concentrate on "real" grown-up books anymore. All I seem to enjoy these days are More...

15 comments like (5 people liked it)

Oct 04, 2010

Buggy rated it:

I really liked this book and found myself absorbed in the world that Andrew Davidson has created. THE GARGOYLE is a multilayered tragedy within a love story and it will affect you on many different levels; horrific, sad and gruesome it is also complex, funny, thought provoking and redeeming. Unfortunately any summery you read won't really do it justice.

THE GARGOYLE has been written in a first person narrative and although we never learn the narrator's name he is self-consciously and More...

9 comments like (11 people liked it)

Sep 11, 2010

indri rated it:

#2010-22#

Betapa miripnya dengan momen antara tidur dan jatuh ketika segalanya indah tak nyata dan tidak badani. Betapa miripnya dengan mengapung ke arah penyelesaian.

Apa yang dirasakan ketika terjun dari puncak bukit, di tengah kepopuleran dan kemahsyuranmu, keterkenalan yang nista, lalu seolah-olah terhukum dengan terbakar dalam kotak logam yang tadinya dikendarai? Lalu waktu bergerak seakan lambat ketika kau merasa setiap inci tubuhmu memanas, terbakar, sambil kau mengh More...

7 comments like (4 people liked it)

Jan 29, 2009

Thauna rated it:

The Gargoyle is a memorizing albeit unconventional love story. The narrator is a worldly, handsome, successful porn star who's soul is in turmoil even before his horrific accident. The story begins with an accident caused by drugs, alcohol and a hallucination of burning arrows which leaves our narrator severely burned and lucky to have survived. In spite of his miraculous survival, he is hateful, miserable and spends his free time planning his suicide once he is released from the hospital burn w More...

3 comments like (5 people liked it)

Nov 16, 2008

Brenda rated it:

I LOVED this book... The writing was amazing!!! I couldn't put it down... It was SO descriptive... I rarely read books twice, but I think this one is going on the list!

From the book:
"Accidents ambush the unsuspecting, often violently, just like love."

"Your car gathers speed down the embankment, bouncing. Your hypothesis is quickly proven correct: it is, indeed, quite painful. Your brain catalogues the different sensations. There is the flipping en More...

0 comments like (7 people liked it)

Sep 26, 2008

Rob rated it:

I'll give the Gargoyle 3 1/2 stars. I know it received a hefty $1.5 million sale, but the story isn't as strong as the writing. for a first time novelist, Davidson showcases a skilled hand at writing prose, but the subject matter never really took flight for me. The story centers on a man who is badly burned in an accident, then turns his life around when a mentally unstable sculpturess comes into his life and tells him they've been romancing each other over the course of 1,000 years. The re More...

1 comment like (3 people liked it)

Nov 12, 2008

Rosalie rated it:

It took me about 2 1/2 months to get through this book. I am usually a quick reader, but this book challenged that and won. I finished it with no lingering feelings, but glad that I did finally finish.

The writing was great. I enjoyed the writer's ability to construct different worlds, but the main story was not something that held me. I think the reason for this is that I did not buy into the whole mysticism of the story. Maybe mysticism isn't the right choice of word, but the religi More...

6 comments like (7 people liked it)

Sep 02, 2008

Justin rated it:

Grabbed this book up from the library anxious to get on with what was apparently sold for over a million by the author. Shucks. The calculus must be (always has been?) about profit, not story. Is this too harsh? Read the book. ALL first person, which is sort of ok, except this author is in and outside his own story, at times tracking it from an objective viewpoint, and at other times overly-descriptive and precise about what-we-do-not-know. The book sort of clumsily cuts between vignettes o More...

0 comments like (11 people liked it)

Aug 25, 2008

Linda rated it:

This book had moments of brilliance, but in the end, it kind of flopped. I thought the ending was incredibly unclimactic. I've heard this book compared to Life of Pi, which I loved, in the sense that the reader (supposedly) wonders: did it all really happen or didn't it?

Since the marketing campaign asks me to compare these two books, then I shall. I must state that the inherent tension in Life of Pi never lets up. It makes one's head spin. I remember what a big deal it was to have f More...

1 comment like (7 people liked it)

Aug 23, 2008

Kathy (Bermudaonion) rated it:

I'm sure everyone has read at least one review of The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson by now, but I just finished it, so bear with me while I chime in with my opinion. Having just finished the book, I need to catch my breath and gather my thoughts, but I must say that I loved it. Thanks to Doubleday for providing me with a copy!

The narrator, whose name is never revealed, is a porn king who is badly burned in a car accident. The burns leave him grossly disfigured. He spends months in the ho More...

0 comments like (7 people liked it)

Jun 10, 2008

Polly rated it:

I read The Gargoyle in one sitting - from start to finish in 12 hours. It was so incredible that I just. couldn't. stop. I was a captive passenger in a car, driving through the Southwestern United States - the desert - a good place to be burned alive!

Several times over the course of the first few chapters I had to put the book down - the literary car crash and resulting horrors were so visceral that I was terrified that the vehicle I was in would mimic the visual images my brain More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Nov 05, 2008

David rated it:

Wow, what a read. An author's debut book that goes straight into my top ten reads is pretty special. The early descriptions of a car crash and fire will have you driving extra safely for weeks, the descriptions of treatment and suffering in a hospital burns unit will leave you wary of ignition sources for a similar time. There is a friendship, unexplained at first, but when explained is inexplicable. What is going on? The narrator is as puzzled as yourself, fantastical explanations are revealed More...

0 comments like (5 people liked it)

Sep 29, 2008

Mandy rated it:

Where to start...

I'll tell you what this book is. It is gritty and realistic. It is fantastical and mesmerizing. It is told so matter-of-fact you WANT to believe. You want to believe everything as much as your reason commands you to resist.

In this way, you are not unlike the protagonist...and this is a huge success for any writer.

Something I found most engaging is not only the main story, but the many hypnotic tales interwoven expertly between the present More...

2 comments like (5 people liked it)

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