Well-written, yes, but I just couldn't care about these characters. I don't empathize with people who are so self-absorbed and who feel sorry for themselves despite having so many advantages. ( )

Great first half, so-so second half -- but it was a very important book for me in my 20s, and my favorite for many years. ( )

It's turning out to be a bit of a pot-boiler with cliched language. There's one awful blunder where the protagonist is supposed to know French and Italian but in a couple of places counts in French and Spanish, but to top it off says nieve instead of nueve for nine - nieve means snow. Still I'll keep reading to see if it actually talks much about translating. ( )