Skip to main content

Mock Kirkus Review: 'The Great Fortune' by Olivia Manning


Newly orphaned Harriet met and married Guy Pringle over the span of one summer, then moved back to Romania with him. It was 1938 and she didn’t speak the language…

This first volume of ‘The Balkan Trilogy’ follows the couple’s minor relationship problems, major moral issues, and constant drama between friends and native residents of the country they've chosen to live in. Olivia Manning is ruthless with her racism and misandry; anything Romanian is at once morally corrupt and physically grotesque, and men! Oh, faithless! Uncomprehending! 

Harriet pretends to be an intellectual liberal but really is only pleased to be passé about extramarital affairs, to mention menstruation in casual conversation at a fancy restaurant, and loudly refusing to be quiet when a drunk colleague of her husband’s tells her to “shut up”. The book was published in 1960, but was it a shocking epic of love and deceit and the banner of intellectual freedom even then?

The pace of the novel is stately, though the events surrounding the narrative are set in the time right before the Second World War; the tone is a persistent high pitch of tension and anxiety. The sense of place is gorgeous—but to see it you must overlook the author’s conviction that everything lower class or Romanian (or worse—both!) is inherently flawed. As the first part in a trilogy, it leaves everything to be desired. 

But how on earth will these people and their prejudices respond to the looming war? With all its troubles, the story ends on an irresistible cliffhanger and despite all my disappointment I am nevertheless curious to see these unsympathetic protagonists meet the next chapter in their lives. 

Comments

  1. RivkahFebruary 10, 2019 at 5:19 PM

    I FEEL REALLY BAD ABOUT BEING SARCASTIC IN THIS REVIEW. I'M NEVER DOING THAT AGAIN.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Erin CataldiFebruary 11, 2019 at 1:37 PM

    Don't feel bad!!! I loved it and worked so well as a Kirkus review!!!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Week 11 Prompt

The change from printed book to ebook or audiobook does imply some shift in appeal factors; an ebook is no longer subject to possible restrictions on length because of the heaviness of the book (or portability, whether or not it will fit into a purse), and an audiobook may be limited in its appeal to readers because of the style of the narrator.   This change affects our knowledge of the genre because we can no longer make snap judgments based on the publishing company’s dustjackets, blurbs, or the physical attributes of the book (font, paper type, cover material, etc.) and does not allow for browsing a shelf as easily as has been done in the past. We must learn to browse electronically and make connections through online networks (GoodReads, YouTube, various bloggers, NoveList—just for a few examples!).   The fact that readers are able to change font, line spacing, color, etc. of an ebook could have an effect on the reader’s appeal but I think individual rea...
12 comments
Read more

Week 6 Prompt

I think promoting classic horror at my local library would be fun; integrated advisory would be a snap! It would be possible to do this close to Halloween and make it a seasonal event as well.   We could host a movie night with films already in the public domain; there are several starring Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff, and Orson Welles on The Internet Archive alone, let alone the more obscure films which might be just as enjoyable. Popcorn and retro candy from the period (Smarties, Necco wafers, Dots etc.) could be serves as refreshments along with rootbeer floats; it could be done fairly cheaply but we could expand it depending on our budget (if we really want to spend money, we could show some of the Universal Classic Monsters films, or do a costume contest with prizes!). If there’s an audience for it, we could talk about the local history of cinema in our town (my town has a *new* drive-in movie theater just this year, but lots of folks remember the old historic movie the...
6 comments
Read more

Week 14 Prompt

Respectfully, I would not shelve them outside of the general collection unless they were being displayed for a specific, temporary function such as a topical or seasonal display. Of course, it would depend on the reasons why the patrons requested the separation: if it was to make the books more easily found by those who would read them, I could suggest an alternate method (making up an annotated bibliography, doing a few blog posts of “So you’re interested in…”, a passive display, etc.). If it was for the purpose of censorship, I could provide the concerned party with a copy of library policy and explain that libraries (and other services subsidized by the federal government) must serve a diverse community.   If the collection is not separated by genre, starting a new system for one subset of books is not appropriate to the organization of the library. We probably—to be perfectly honest—do not have the space to set up a completely different set of shelves for a small su...
5 comments
Read more