I returned to a novel that both Vicky and I truly loved when we both read it when it first came out. It’s the story of Thomas Maggs, a 12-year-old son of a drunken pub keeper in a small village on England’s Suffolk coast, as World War One begins. The regular slow pace of life there and then is beautifully reflected in Esther Freud’s writing. I originally wrote of the book that, “I would love to be able to carry the world that this novel created around in my mind, each and every day.” Another reader, the writer Ann Patchett said the following of the book was, “A compelling tale beautifully told, Mr. Mac and Me is as close to a perfect novel as anything I’ve read in a long time. I loved every page of it.”

Life changes for Thomas with the arrival of a mysterious couple, Charles Rennie McIntosh and wife Margaret. The Scottish architect, designer, and artist becomes a person of interest, as tensions with Germany continue to rise. The villagers are suspicious of the artistic couple, especially his habit of taking walks along the coast while always carrying his binoculars. Thomas has some suspicions about them, but he gets to know them as a kind and generous twosome. They both encourage Thomas to do more with his doodling and sketching. It a very curious friendship that develops.

The slow pace of village life changes drastically once the war with Germany breaks out and the troops being shipped out are passing through their streets on a regular basis. But just as the book’s short chapters pass by quickly, once a group of soldiers leave, the village almost returns to it peaceful and traditional pace of life—until the next group arrives.

Perfectly reflecting the feel of the story, Freud has Thomas along the shoreline in the following passage.
“I stand on the beach and tilt back my head and I count the few stars that have pierced the cloud. There are less than a dozen, although the longer I look the more I find, and I'm searching so hard that at first I don't notice the shadow of the Zeppelin, it's belly only slightly blacker than the cloud. I stand quite still. It's got me by the eye.”
I love the fascination with the airships, and the images seem almost benign, until Thomas realizes that they’re headed to attack London, and later they strafe and bomb the village with most likely leftover armaments from a London run.

I simply love the way this book tells its story. I learned more about McIntosh and this book also worked on so many levels telling its story of war, family, friendship, and trust. In the reverse of most reviews of her work, I will only tell you now that Esther Freud is indeed the great-granddaughter of Sigmund, and that her father was the famous painter, Lucian Freud, AND that she has written a wonderful book. ( )

I love Esther Freud's writing - she has such a sense of place and atmosphere that is so quintessentially English (or quintessentially English home counties, at least).

Mr Mac and Me is set in an English seaside village just as WWI develops. Our narrator, a curious young boy, befriends Charles Rennie Mackintosh and his artist wife Margaret Macdonald, who are staying in the area to put some distance between themselves and issues Mackintosh has been having around recognition of his work. It feels natural to add some kind of 'and' to that, i.e. 'and the point is', but.... I'm not sure that part was well executed. Freud rushed into the last 10 or 15 pages some attempt at a twist and reason for Mackintosh and Macdonald being in the book, but it felt an unconvincing plot turn, and one contrived to try to justify putting these names into the story to begin with.

As it's Esther Freud I enjoyed it anyway - she develops great characters, and it's nice just to go along on a jaunt with her regardless of where she takes us, but the sinister developments that the jacket blurb pushes are really a misnomer and inconsequential to the big picture.

If you're a reader who's happy enough to meander along with fantastic prose without any big plot then this is a beautifully written book, but somehow I felt a little unsettled that it tried to be more plot driven without following through fully on the intention.

3.5 stars - I'm still very much in the Esther Freud fan club, but somehow this book felt a little confused in terms of what it was trying to be. ( )

Charles Rennie Macintosh is the Mr Mac in Freud's beautiful, sensitive story. By looking at Mr Mac through the eyes of an 11-year old boy Freud shows the architect's vulnerability following his rejection after completing the design of the Glasgow School of Art. He and his wife, Margaret MacDonald, also a gifted artist, retreated to Suffolk in 1914. The story yields an amazing amount of information about Macintosh, Margaret, and the the culture of the times. Freud's story also points to the moment in our history when craftsmanship was being replaced by mass production.

I've always been an admirer of Mackintosh designs but now I feel like I have known him for a short while. Wonderful, highly recommended.

The author notes at the end reminds the reader that the Glasgow School of Art, one of Mackintosh's great achievements, burned just as Freud's book was going to print. ( )

I loved this gentle story about a young man on the Suffolk coast during WWI who meets the great Scottish architect Charles Rennie MacIntosh and his wife Margaret Macdonald. The perfect combination of England, art, nature, family, and spies. ( )

Een indrukwekkend boek over architect en kunstenaar Charles Rennie MacIntosh en zijn vrouw Margaret, verteld door een jongen van 11, 12 jaar. Zo'n mooie vorm om een soort van biografie te schrijven. Er doorheen speelt het verhaal van de jongen, Thomas, door zijn vader op jonge leeftijd verminkt. Er gebeuren gruwelijke dingen maar eigenlijk is het hele verhaal zachtaardig van toon. De natuur speelt een belangrijke rol, kijken, observeren. Een boek om over een paar jaar te herlezen. ( )