Book a Month Mission; The Verdict

A Week in December;

Well I've finally finished it. Notice the word 'finally' there because it feels like i've been reading it for a solid eternity. I am genuinely so disappointed in this book, not a great start to the year then.

I get what Faulks is trying to do, he's trying to encapsulate modern day London life, through a series of interlinking characters of various classes and lifestyles. But it just doesn't work for me. I think he's cast his net a little too big, he's chosen to focus on too many characters and so most of them seem a little flat.

Faulks has clearly put a lot of research into his novel in order to make it seem more realistic, but I think perhaps it's a little too realistic, to the point it's actually dull. There are long descriptive passages about complicated financial transactions, which frankly, speaking as someone who's idea of finance is not spending my whole wage in Topshop, is really rather tedious. Faulks seems to spend most of his time describing John Veals the hedge fund manager, than anybody else... but maybe that's because I find it so boring that I tend to notice it more. Whilst we're talking about time spent on characters you don't even meet one of the seven main characters until 170 pages into the book. That's like halfway through.

Also everyone seems to be so unhappy and so alone, I mean I know life isn't a bed of roses but there is a single character who seems satisfied with their lot in life. There's the emotionally isolated wife of John Veals, the desperately competitive book critic, the socially inept tube driver and the sexual bully Radley Scott. I just don't believe that everyone in life is that unhappy all the time.

No I'm sorry I tried to love it but I just couldn't. He's trying to achieve so much and rather than giving me a Dickensian feel of Christmas in London, it left me feeling bleak (and not in the Christmassy mid-winter way), depressed and a little bit scared of humanity.

Overall then I have to say that despite my love of his other work, this is just not worth the hassle.

Sorry Faulks: 3/10