Doug's Reviews > Booth

3.5, rounded up to 4.

#10 in this year's Booker Longlist Marathon, and one of the most polarizing amongst my GR friends/cognoscente. I was somewhat predisposed to like this based on the subject matter, since my doctorate is in theatre, and the theatrical history of the Booths has always fascinated me. And although I knew the rudimentary facts of the story, Fowler provides many fascinating details of which I was unaware.

I found the beginning a bit slow - it took me 4 days to read the first 40%; but then it picked up and I breezed through the final 60% in 2 days. And, man, could this have definitely used an editor with a more determined red pencil. Fowler's prose stylings are nothing terribly exciting, and I am not quite convinced telling the story largely through the eyes of the two daughters (surely the two least interesting family members) was a wise choice. But the story being told is so intriguing and resonates on so many levels - although the author's claim to parallels to recent American demagoguery isn't quite clear to me either.

Finally, though, I really enjoyed reading about this eccentric family, and as I read primarily for plot and character, rather than any other attributes, I ranked this higher than some other Booker nominees that proved perhaps more inventive, but less comprehensible. Although I am also wondering why anyone wouldn't just read the biographies Fowler used as source material, rather than wading through this fictionalization.