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3.5 

Ordinary Thunderstorms

By William Boyd
Ordinary Thunderstorms by William Boyd digital book - Fable

Publisher Description

“William Boyd seems singularly blessed with both an innate love of storytelling and the talent to render those stories in swift, confident prose.” —The New York Times

From William Boyd, award-winning author of Brazzaville Beach and Restless, comes a stunning literary mystery about crime and punishment: Ordinary Thunderstorms. One of the most accomplished writers of our time, Boyd has written a profound and gripping novel about the fragility of social identity, the corruption at the heart of big business, and the secrets that lie hidden in the filthy underbelly of every city.

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46 Reviews

3.5
“I get the feeling that Boyd has had his fill of Richard Curtis movies and thought: 'that’s not the London I know' so he threw together a bunch of slags and geezers so that they could get slotted against the grimy backdrop of London. The story is centred around the brain-dead Adam Kindred who manages to McGuffin his way into a murder and incriminate himself by being very, very dumb indeed. So, instead of doing what any vaguely sentient person would do and phone the police he goes on the run (which is the best bit of the book to be fair) and then gradually descends down the levels of society until he is eating a seagull cooked over a Bic lighter. Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Boyd writes well. Really well. But there are no likeable characters and the constant descriptions of rain sodden streets and fast foot wrappers collecting around the trembling ankles of John’s in dimly lit alleyways gets a bit wearisome. This doesn’t really work as a thriller because the middle section is just SO LONG and SO BORING…and it doesn’t work as social realism because not everyone in London is this horrid…it's not funny...so I am not sure what this is? So: Eastenders with swearing? 2.5 out of 5 rounded down to 2 because of the stupidity of the main character.”

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