Still waiting for Crace to live up to [bc:Being Dead|92559|Being Dead|Jim Crace|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1311979610s/92559.jpg|1239782] ( )

A fantastic novel about a saxophone player set in the near future. Leonard is stuck in a rut and needs to do something to revive his relationship with his wife. The novel starts slowly but gets going and is a joyful tale about how Leonard starts something and then is pushed further. The narrative is linear through time. Jim Crace tells the experience of playing the sax and jazz beautifully. He imagines a world where resources are valued and security is tight; this is a world not too difficult to imagine. The novel is funny and beautifully constructed and written. A tight and enjoyable read. ( )

An interesting book juxtaposing jazz with fringe politics and family life, and plenty of insight into modern society. The future setting seems there largely to give the right distance between the two halves of the story - Crace's future Britain doesn't require any great imaginative leaps. Like everything I've read by Jim Crace, it is beautifully written too. ( )

Set in an Autumnal future, All that follows, enmeshes us in the life of Leonard Lessing. He a jazz saxophonist grappling with turning 50, a buggered right shoulder and the realisation that he will never be like his hero who fought in the International Brigade.

Leonard is drawn into the events surrounding a hostage taking, where a figure from his past is one of the hostage takers.

Interesting things about this realistic novel are the inclusion of small futuristic accents and the black humour. The focus of this novel is Leonard's impressions; I feel my library is a bit hopeful when it stuck a THR on this book's spine. This is not really a plot driven novel in the way thriller fans would expect. ( )

I own a couple of other Jim Crace books, "Being Dead" and "Quarantine," but this was my first experience reading his work. I normally enjoy reading stories that are placed in the future, but in this book, that seemed to secondary to the protagonist's identity as a jazz musician, to the point that I wondered why Crace decided to place the story in the future. I like music, but I got tired of all of the musical references. It reminded me of "Netherland" in which Joseph O'Neill seemed to go overboard re: all the references to cricket. It didn't help that I didn't find Crace's protagonist very likable or interesting. Although it's clear that Crace knows how to write, this storyline was not very engaging. If this had not been a LibraryThing Early Reviewers book, I doubt I would have finished it. ( )