From the Bookshelf of Constant Reader…

Warlight

Michael Ondaatje

Start date: May 15, 2019

Finish date: June 1, 2019

Discussion: Reading List

Discussion leader: Sherry

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Reading List

* The Schedule for July through Dec. 2025
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last updated Jun 20, 2025 08:37AM

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What Members Thought

May 11, 2019 Jane rated it it was amazing

Shelves: political, recentfiction, historical-fiction

A very dream-like evocation of childhood, war, school. The disappearances are so disconcerting...Rachel and Nathaniel's father, then Rachel. I loved the sentences, and the atmosphere Ondaatje creates. But I have to say there were many places where I felt "WHAT IS GOING ON?" Here's an interview with Ondaatje about the book. I found it fascinating. https://www.youtube.com/

I love the way Ondaatje talks about the fact that we don't remember our childhoods. We reconstruct them from images and convers A very dream-like evocation of childhood, war, school. The disappearances are so disconcerting...Rachel and Nathaniel's father, then Rachel. I loved the sentences, and the atmosphere Ondaatje creates. But I have to say there were many places where I felt "WHAT IS GOING ON?" Here's an interview with Ondaatje about the book. I found it fascinating. https://www.youtube.com/

I love the way Ondaatje talks about the fact that we don't remember our childhoods. We reconstruct them from images and conversations, both overheard and ones we engage in. It's a fascinating premise, and makes sense. Once we've had more of a conversation, I'd love to share some passages from book reviews I read when the book first came. The NYT review was utterly dismissive. I loved The English Patient and The Cat's Table, so I ignored the snarky review...but I returned to it after reading. I got what the reviewer meant, but he missed everything I loved. And other reviews are glowing.

notes during a Constant Reader discussion: Barbara and Larry, I love what you're noticing. Does anyone have anyone have any idea why the character was named "Felon"? I thought to myself, Could that really be a name? It seems like a slam over the head. I'm reading too many books. I am going to just focus on the forty or so sections I marked in Warlight...and if anyone is interested, the snarky review from the NYT. I realized, when I read it that it struck a chord for me. I actually love this...so many ways a book can turn a reader off, or utterly engage them. I think I'll share a link to the NYT Book Review about Warlight. Here it is: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/07/bo...
The review, by Dwight Garner, is very, very snarky, but fun to read. I disagree with it on the whole, but I can see glimmers of truth if I think about the book from a different vantage point.
Ruth, you loved this book and really didn't like La Rosa as much. I like them in completely different ways. When I write that, I'm immediately wrapped in atmosphere. Warlight is hazy, misty, difficult to discern with clarity. La Rosa is stark, sunlit, harsh and hard to engage because it is so bright and right in my face. anyone else who read both books feel this?

see comment history The response to this book has been overwhelmingly positive. My response certainly is. I think I'll share a link to the NYT Book Review about Warlight. Here it is: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/07/bo...
This review, by Dwight Garner, is very, very snarky, but fun to read. I disagree with it on the whole, but I can see glimmers of truth if I think about the book from a different vantage point.

Beautiful passages:
"The city felt wounded, uncertain of itself. It allowed one to be rule-less. Everything had already happened, hadn’t it?"

page 9 their mother tells Rachel and Nathaniel about the family on the roof. Marsh, the boy who falls off, will be important to their mother, Rose, later. In this time with their mother the house seems freer, more spacious. 33, a desc. of all the buildings lost during the war. 37 The Moth's friends stood a little to the left of the Labour Party--about three miles or so. ...more

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Aug 07, 2018 Linda added it

Shelves: historical-fiction

This picaresque story is a perfect start to our upcoming visit to London. There are many beautifully written passages. The stoic British people gave up much to win the war. And many of the individual stories may remain to be told. What if abandoning your child is the best and perhaps only way to save them?

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