The Water Star - Softcover

Casey, Philip

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0330371916 ISBN 13: 9780330371919

Publisher: Picador, 2000

Synopsis

`Set in a post-war London still recovering from the Blitz, the novel follows the overlapping lives of five characters who inhabit the ruins of North London . . . Casey escorts his reader through the labyrinths of his character's minds, unpicking the jumbled mosaic of mourning, desire and fear. The Water Star is a bitter-sweet testimony to the never-ending struggle between exile and assimilation' John Tague, Times Literary Supplement `There is something at once tough and endearing in Casey's predominant concerns with making his creations seem like real people, with delineating intimate human relationships - with being, essentially, emotive and compassionate' John Kenny, Irish Times `Casey is a poet and a playwright; he has a poet's delicate ear and a playwright's eye for direction . . . The Water Star is a graceful, gentle novel that does not shy from the truth. It is a metaphor of lives rebuilt from rubble - whether the detritus of the past or the structures shattered by the Blitz' Erica Wagner, The Times

About this title

Product Description:

Set in post-war London still recovering from the Blitz, this novel follows the overlapping lives of five characters who inhabit the ruins of North London. It revolves around the fractured worlds of Irish and English communities in London at the time.

Review:

Casey is a poet and a playwright; he has a poet's delicate ear and a playwright's eye for direction . The tale that unfolds in this thick, satisfying volume is not particularly complex - any more than the circumstances of any of our lives are complex, which is to say, infinitely and infinitesimally so. Through the interweaving and the overlapping of these relationships, Casey examines how human nature is shaped by sorrow; how people will find a way - sometimes, it seems, despite themselves - to take comfort from others, to make homes where they can, even among the ruins. - Erica Wagner, The Times. Philip Casey's second novel, The Water Star, confronts the central Irish experience of the twentieth century: exile. It is distinguished by the finely wrought lyricism that has characterised much of his poetry. His first novel, The Fabulists (1994) won acclaim; his new one confirms that he is a writer with a gift for uncovering the tortuous impulses of his characters with a lucid and affecting eye. Set in a post-war London still recovering from the Blitz, the novel follows the overlapping lives of five characters who inhabit the ruins of North London The Water Star is a bitter-sweet testimony to the never-ending struggle between exile and assimilation. - John Tague, Times Literary Supplement. No one should read this book in search of lapidary sentences or shock tactics. Instead, the peculiarly quiet power of its tale should be enjoyed at the leisurely pace demanded by its length. It is perhaps a good thing to be sometimes driven to a blurbish cliché: The Water Star is, somehow, haunting. - John Kenny, The Irish Times. Philip Casey has recreated a whole era of Irish life in this amazing novel. ... If you want to find out what it was like for the Irish in London in the early '50s, read this book. It is a treat. - Pat Byrne, The Irish World, 26 May 2000 This elegiac novel casts a gentle - but discerning - eye on the lives and loves of Irish and other exiles in a London shattered by the Blitz. Philip Casey brings the lyricism of a poet and the dramatic sense of a playwright to his tale of lost souls doing their best to glue their fragmented lives back together; his characters are vivid, subtly shaded, often tragic, but there's no wallowing in misery here - on the contrary, a life-affirming tenacity and humour, reinforced by an elegant cyclical structure and more than a hint of mysticism, makes The Water Star a pleasure to read. The final sequence, set in Ireland, chimes a little uncomfortably with the rest, but then comfort was never going to be a top priority in a book about alienation. An intelligent, memorable, moving novel. - Arminta Wallace, The Irish Times, Saturday April 1st, 2000 The lives of these characters become totally absorbing as different versions of important events are related from their respective viewpoints. Casey has brought alive the dilemmas of a lost generation and made them vivid and memorable. -The Good Book Guide The Water Star is a compelling series of life stories at a crucial point in modern history; it is equally compelling as an imaginative analysis of national versus private identity, of how people may transcend the bogus boundaries of their lives through small acts of honesty and kindness. - Sharon Barnes, IMAGE The Water Star is a powerful work of fiction, at once passionate and compassionate. - Waterstones Philip Casey is one of our most intuitive and interesting writers. ...This is a lyrical and captivating read in which the dead are as present as those survivors rebuilding their lives and the mental scars of inexpressible wounds find expression in moments of exquisite tenderness ... - Dermot Bolger, The Sunday Independent

About this edition

• Publisher: Picador
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0330371916
• ISBN 13: 9780330371919
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 448