Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books.
|
Loading... As Flies to Whatless Boysby Robert Antoni
   None No current Talk conversations about this book.  JudiRobben | May 18, 2015 |    This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.[full review here: http://spacebeer.blogspot.com/2014/07/as-flies-to-whatless-boys-by-robert.html ] (  ) kristykay22 | Jul 22, 2014 | This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers. ) dandelionroots | Dec 14, 2013 | This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.The Publisher Says: In 1845 London, an engineer, philosopher, philanthropist, and bold-faced charlatan, John Adolphus Etzler, has invented machines that he thinks will transform the division of labor and free all men. He forms a collective called the Tropical Emigration Society (TES), and recruits a variety of London citizens to take his machines and his misguided ideas to form a proto-socialist, utopian community in the British colony of Trinidad. Among his recruits is a young boy (and the book's narrator) named Willy, who falls head-over-heels for the enthralling and wise Marguerite Whitechurch. Coming from the gentry, Marguerite is a world away from Willy's laboring class. As the voyage continues, and their love for one another strengthens, Willy and Marguerite prove themselves to be true socialists, their actions and adventures standing in stark contrast to Etzler's disconnected theories. Robert Antoni's tragic historical novel, accented with West Indian cadence and captivating humor, provides an unforgettable glimpse into nineteenth-century Trinidad & Tobago. My Review: We sat in silence, exhausted, filled-up. We didn't move. We couldn't have moved--not a muscle--because we didn't exist yet. Neither me nor him. Only the story existed, during those few final moments of silence after my father's voice had come to a halt. Catnip. This book was catnip for me, pure uncut catnip of the finest grade. Robert Antoni teaches master's degree fiction-writing classes at the New School. Lucky men and women who take the classes, to hear him tell his stories! At its heart, this is a simple tale of greed, passion, and the lifelong effects of believing in a dream. Chicanery is always a worry for the True Believer, because the promise of a dream come true is ever the best bait to lure them into disaster, personal and financial and, not infrequently, mortal. Something dies when a person's True Belief is taken from them, or lost, or simply abandoned (as if this abandonment is ever simple). Many times, I suspect, the pain of it is unendurable and the bereft believer sees no reason to go on...disease or despair carry him off. Others, like our narrator Willy, live on and make life, actual life, work for them without dreams, but with some weird, warped hopes left, hopes that don't see much daylight as the ex-dreamer isn't likely to chat them about. Willy doesn't really want to have hopes. He wants to find his dreams. I think all of us know that quest's end. But the novel, well, a novel is a place to work out the truths of endings and the frailties of beginnings. This novel's truth is in the ending, and it stings the soft places of a tender soul. It also rings perfectly true and wistfully beautiful. A family, once created, is a hard thing to leave, to destroy; even death doesn't do the job. But most families have invisible members. Some have more than others. Willy...Mr. Tucker, as he becomes...carried the invisible members of his family until, exhausted, he lost the eternal battle with gravity. How, and why, and what he made, these are all the subject of the novel, and the meat of life as we all live it. Only most of us don't have beautiful words to wrap our truth in. Fortune smiled on William Tucker. His truth comes enrobed in lovely, lovely language, satisfyingly musical in the inward ear. A pleasure of a read. A lovely artifact of a book. A delight on many levels, and a deeply felt, deeply moving novel. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. (  )7  richardderus | Dec 10, 2013 | This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.Likewise the story that takes place in the Present - there are three interrelated stories in three eras, in the book - in which the erstwhile writer "mr robot" has a verbal tussle with, and then a rollicking Rabelasian affair with, the director of the archives, could be pure fiction or historical fiction, or maybe it's autobiography. Whatever the truth of the story, it is great fun. I liked to read miss ramsol's (the archivist's) passages out loud, so I could get the rhythm of the Trinidadian patois she is given to speak. The book has these brilliant audacious touches, metafiction aspects that enrich the tale. For example,the appendix is not found in the book itself, but online. One of the appendices is supposedly by Henry David Thoreau, which gives the writer Antoni a chance to play with style and content. (But, nicely, the supposed pages of the Thoreau essay are see-through, so one can read the text written on the backside of a page. What a great touch). And I found myself looking up words, to see if they existed anywhere else but in this book. Here's a passage: "He steupsed-- Boy, don't talk foolishness for me now!...He steupsed again, turning from me--" I used a web page that I suspect Antoni used too, called the Wiktionery, that has a glossery of Trinidadian English. "Steups - the act of sucking air pass(sic) one's teeth, creating a sound of disapproval" The metafiction aspects are more in the manner of playful and fun riffs, which are not particularly central to the main tales. I liked that one could read the book slowly or quickly, and spend as much or as little time as one wishes, on the non-central aspects of the book. ( )2 SeaBill1 | Nov 21, 2013 |
Robert Antoni’s new book was a very enjoyable read, with the added interest of using his family history as part of the story. This book has four different story tellers from different periods of time. At first I had a hard time understanding the layout and was a bit confused mid book. So I went back and started again at the beginning to give myself a better understanding of the story line. Then the story grabbed my imagination and I really got into the book. William Tucker and his family immigrated to Trinidad in 1845 and his 15 year old son Willy is the center of the narrative. The body of the story is centered on the trip to the island and his reaction to the experiences there. Multiple layers of his life and emotions are told including: his coming of age and adaptation to island life, his first love for Marguerite and his fascination of the local hummingbirds. Willy’s lifelong interest in hummingbirds actually leads to a reconnection to Marguerite and pulls the story into completion. Thank you to Akashic Books for sending the book and allowing me to review it. I greatly appreciate it.
As Flies to Whatless Boys has been longlisted for the2015 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award! Winner of the 2014 OCM Bocas Prize! Included inWorld Literature Today''s Nota Benes, Summer 2014 One of Edwidge Danticat''s Best Books of 2013, theNew Yorker A Favorite Novel of 2013,Tin House "William''s account of young love attests to Antoni''s fluency in the poetry of nostalgia. In words as vibrant as the personalities he creates, Antoni deftly captures unconquered territories and the risks we''re willing to take exploring them." --Publishers Weekly "The emotional influence of Willy''s narrative--his loving descriptions of the people who surround him--is profoundly effective...Strikes strong emotional chords." --Kirkus Reviews "Antoni...has written a novel epic in scope that...is driven by outbursts of fine writing." --Booklist "A rollicking 19th-century colonial tale blends history with imagination." --Library Journal "Robert Antoni gracefully combines layers of idealism, love, and a plague of the Black Vomit in this historical novel." --World Literature Today "It brings the travails and small delights of Willy Tucker to the centre stage of our imaginings, asking only that we accompany him on this unforgettable voyage." --Caribbean Beat "This tragic historical novel, accented with West Indian cadence and captivating humour, provides an unforgettable glimpse into 19th-century T&T. The book''s narrator, Willy, falls headover-heels for the enthralling and wise Marguerite Whitechurch. Coming from the gentry, Marguerite is a world away from Willy''s labouring class." --The Trinidad Guardian, one of the Best Caribbean Books of the Year "Reminds us that storytelling is fundamental to the human condition...A contending classic of postcolonial literature." --Trinidad Guardian, Review/2014 OCM Bocas Prize Feature "Reminds us that storytelling is fundamental to the human condition...A contending classic of postcolonial literature." --Trinidad Guardian, 2014 OCM Bocas Prize Feature "I have been hooked on Robert Antoni since his first novel,Divina Trace. His new one,As Flies to Whatless Boys, is a marvel of narrative and documents, which collide to create a book that is at times breathtaking and tragic and at other times laugh-out-loud hilarious." --Edwidge Danticat, who selectedAs Flies to Whatless Boys as a Best Book of 2013 for theNew Yorker''s Page-Turner Blog "A bittersweet coming-of-age tale of tragedy, chicanery, high ideals, harsh realities, and the hard choice between love and family duty,As Flies to Whatless Boys is highly recommended." --Midwest Book Review "As Flies to Whatless Boys is a kind of complex word game, a historical narrative in a lilting Caribbean accent, wrapped around with an oddball love story in a wild form of English that seems to create itself as it goes along. In between, snippets of contemporary records provide foils for both these linguistic inventions." --Historical Novel Society In 1845 London, an engineer, philosopher, philanthropist, and bold-faced charlatan, John Adolphus Etzler, has invented machines that he thinks will transform the division of labor and free all men. He forms a collective called the Tropical Emigration Society (TES), and recruits a variety of London citizens to take his machines and his misguided ideas to form a proto-socialist, utopian community in the British colony of Trinidad. Among his recruits is a young boy (and the book''s narrator) named Willy, who falls head-over-heels for the enthralling and wise Marguerite Whitechurch. Coming from the gentry, Marguerite is a world away from Willy''s laboring class. As the voyage continues, and their love for one another strengthens, Willy and Marguerite prove themselves to be true socialists, their actions and adventures standing in stark contrast to Etzler''s disconnected theories. Robert Antoni''s tragic historical novel, accented with West Indian cadence and captivating humor, provides an unforgettable glimpse into nineteenth-century Trinidad & Tobago. No library descriptions found. |
LibraryThing Early Reviewers AlumRobert Antoni's book As Flies to Whatless Boys was available from LibraryThing Early Reviewers.  Current DiscussionsNonePopular covers
 Google Books — Loading...GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.6Literature English (North America) American fiction 21st CenturyLC ClassificationRatingAverage: (3.44)
Is this you?Become a LibraryThing Author. |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Wikipedia in English (1)
3
William Tucker and his family immigrated to Trinidad in 1845 and his 15 year old son Willy is the center of the narrative. The body of the story is centered on the trip to the island and his reaction to the experiences there. Multiple layers of his life and emotions are told including: his coming of age and adaptation to island life, his first love for Marguerite and his fascination of the local hummingbirds. Willy’s lifelong interest in hummingbirds actually leads to a reconnection to Marguerite and pulls the story into completion.
Thank you to Akashic Books for sending the book and allowing me to review it. I greatly appreciate it.
added by JudiRobben | editLibrary Thing for Early Reviewers (Sep 26, 2013) (