What Can We Know (2025)
by Ian McEwan
There is no author more synonymous with the 1,001 Novels to Read Before You Die project than Ian McEwan. The author continues his movement into the realms of speculative fiction- following Kazuo Ishiguro, arguably. In 2021 he published Machines Like Me, his android book. What Can We Know is his future-dystopia take, about a literary scholar in the farish future trying to reconstruct/discovery a famous lost poem written during our present. In addition to the expected third act twist, What Can We Know has the distinct pleasures both of McEwan's take on the decline and fall of civilization from the perspective of someone who is living on the other side and his recounting of our present. Clever choices, well executed, I agree with the New York Times whose headline read "The Best Novel He's Written in Ages."
Published 12/5/16
The Cement Garden (1978)
by Ian McEwan
The Cement Garden is another example of a classic that was only retrospectively awarded that status after the author obtained a critical and commercial audience with the success of a later work. In this case, that later work is Amsterdam, which won the Booker in 1998. He had another hit with Atonement, the movie version of which won an Oscar. He continues to publish new titles, and his hits are airport book store mainstays. His q rating among people who have actually purchased a book in the last twelve months is probably close to 100%.
Which is all to say that The Cement Garden, a dry, sparse, horrific tale about three siblings who suffer the natural deaths of both parents within the space of a few months. They are alone, without family, friends or even neighbors, since they occupy the single standing home in a development of abandoned, decaying, lots. There is also an explicit incest theme which ends up playing a critical role in the denouement. It's no wonder that The Cement Garden was not the hit that McEwan needed, but it was his first novel, and so here we are.
Published 1/16/17
The Comfort of Strangers (1981)
by Ian McEwan
Ian McEwan lost an astonishing five titles (of eight) that were deemed worthy of inclusion in the 1st edition of the 1001 Books list in the 2008 revision. This decision tells you all you need to know about the flaws of the first list: An over-representation of late 20th century authors who achieved a measure of popular and critical success as judged by editors in the very early 21st century. Ian McEwan and J.M Coetzee allegedly represent 2% of the books one needs to read before one dies, according to the first edition of this list. That is insanity. You can't tell me that during 2000 plus years of literature, EIGHT Ian McEwan novels make the list and The Odyssey, Dante's Inferno and The Canterbury Tales are all found wanting.
Perhaps the justification is that a large majority of readers are likely to have read books like The Odyssey, and therefore they don't need to be included, but how many people who bought the 1001 Books to Read Before You Die book had read either Atonement or Amsterdam, McEwan's huge critically acclaimed, prize winning, spectacular novels? I would bet that is over 50% of the potential audience for the 1001 Books list.
Which is not to say that The Comfort of Strangers, McEwan's second novel, isn't worth a read. This novel, along with his first, earned him the nickname "Ian Macabre" and based on this novel and the Cement Garden it's not hard to see an alternate universe where McEwan turned into something like an English version of Stephen King. The Comfort of Strangers follows a middle-aged English couple on holiday in a nameless city. They come into contact with a strange local couple and what happens next... will shock you. Suffice it to say that Christopher Walken plays the husband of the shadowy pair the English couple encounter in the movie version.
Published 4/26/17
The Child in Time (1987)
by Ian McEwan
McEwan placed an ASTONISHING number of titles on the first edition of the 1001 Books list: 8! Five of them were dropped in 2008. Another title was dropped in 2010, leaving him with only two core titles: Atonement (his biggest hit) and The Cement Garden (his first novel.) McEwan is an author I've always had an attitude about- I've never read Atonement, never read Amsterdam, never seen any of the movies, would laugh at someone who expressed appreciation for his talents- typical hipster bullshit attitude stuff. But I was impressed by The Cement Garden- which is spoooky as hell, and this book- The Child in Time- which is his breakthrough in terms of his- I think- characteristic ability to warp the workings of time and space. I think that's where he's headed in his big monster hits, though I can't quite be sure.
It's true that your authors from the 1980's who combine critical and popular success tend to couple solid, if uninspired technique with power packed twists, much in the same way a movie works to develop suspense. Here, McEwan starts with a horrifying event: the abduction of a 3-year-old child from a grocery store checkout counter in London and traces its impact on the life of the father, the protagonist, and his wife and family. The Child in Time obviously lacks the immense swagger of his later blockbusters, but all the elements are there.
But losing six out of eight original titles- would clearer evidence could one have of the extremely arbitrary and biased process of canon making exercise. "Yes, let's include eight books from a guy who literally everyone who buys this book will have already heard of, because he's popular right as we are publishing this book- that's a good idea."
Published 1/20/18
Enduring Love (1997)
by Ian McEwan
The problem with writing about the books of Ian McEwan is that he specializes in the third act twist, and any casual discussion risks ruining the pleasure the reader might derive from McEwan's expertise in plotting. Enduring Love, about two strangers, both men, whose lives become intertwined after they jointly witness a horrific ballooning accident, falls squarely into this description. Joe Rose, 47, a failed physicist and successful writer of "pop science" non fiction, is having a quiet picnic in the countryside with his Keats-scholar girlfriend when they see a hot-air balloon with a small child in the basket, threatening to escape the grasp of the operator.
Rose, along with several other men in the area, try to stop the balloon from flying away. One of the would-be good Samaritans continues to hold onto the rope while all the others, including Rose, let go. The man who remains holding onto the rope plummets to his death from a great height shortly thereafter. In the aftermath, one of the other witnesses, a sad loner named Jed Parry becomes obsessed with Rose and this obsession drives the rest of the book.
The third act twist, when it comes, is as satisfying as any. Reading McEwan is always a pleasure. His achievement is to write books steeped in dread and bad feeling that are easy and fun to read. His successful combination of literary function and the pleasures of genre fiction mark all of his books.
Published 1/6/18
Amsterdam (1998)
by Ian McEwan
There is no doubting that Ian McEwan is a top flight writer of literary fiction, with genuine cross-over potential- see best seller's on both side of the Atlantic and an Oscar winning movie version of his biggest, most ambitious work, Atonement. And he is still very much active and writing, with six titles in the last decade-ish. McEwans' rise is well chronicled in the 1001 Books list. Atonement, published in 2001, six years before 1001 Books first edition came out, was his huge break out, but he actually won the Booker Prize in 1998, for Amsterdam, which bears strong elements from his "Ian Macabre" phase, but also the exquisite plotting and character development that (I guess) made Atonement such a smash.
Like many of his books, there is something to lose by a thorough description of the story. There is no question that McEwan's rise has been at least partially to his darkness and dramatic third act denouements. If you make your way through his stuff in a leisurely way, each book comes as a mild surprise. If there is any surprise to reading Amsterdam it's that it won the Booker Prize. It's a short book, not three hundred pages long with decent sized print and generous margins. There is no diversity element- all the character are well off Londoners. The plot does concern itself with contemporary social issues in a certain way- that gives Amsterdam an element that his earlier stuff lacks.
But I think the Booker Prize was just a "damn this is a great book by a great writer, and he sells, too, let's do this!" That is how I imagine the Judges discussion that year. Or maybe it was just a weak year- I don't recognize any of the other books on the shortlist from 1998.
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Published 3/9/18
Atonement (2001)
by Ian McEwan
Another in a remarkable succession of books that were critically acclaimed, commercially succesful and the basis of succesful film versions, Atonement is the kind of novel that really deserves to be called "meta fiction," with a narrator who is a novelist who is writing a novel about a "real" event about her life, and a novel about her life. That person is Briony Tallis, who starts out as a young woman who wrongfully identifies her sister's new lover as a rapist, leading to his false imprisonment. The title refers to her atonement for that false accusation. Revealing that much is no spoiler, since Briony presents the initial accusation with a preface that she regrets what happened.
And although there is a very personal and intimate betrayal at the heart of Atonement, which is classic Ian McEwan, there is little else to link this book to his earlier works, except the generally high level of execution and a history of twist-like third act resolutions. He's not know for historical fiction, and Atonement is mostly a work of historical fiction. No one is murdered, no animals are tortured. You could almost say he was selling out, were Atonement not based on a blatantly false mis-identification and subsequent imprisonment.
Published 4/18/18
Saturday (2005)
by Ian McEwan
Ian McEwan is an author who immediately challenges the "Early/Middle/Late" principle of 3 works for any author in the literary canon. Saturday is the last of seven books he place in the first edition of 1001 Books to Read Before You Die. Since 1001 Books was published in 2006, he's published six more novels, one of which (On Chesil Beach, 2007) was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. He has yet another novel coming out this year, which would seem to indicate that there is no clear point at which to demarcate the periods of McEwan's writing except for the beginning.
As far as the beginning goes, The Cement Garden, 1978, which is his first published novel, makes a great choice. None of his other early books clearly surpasses it, and it was published first, so pick that one. The next question is, what is the cut-off point for mid-period Ian McEwan, and of course, here the difficulties begin. At least setting the boundary between early and middle should be possible.
I think the proper dividing line is Black Dogs (1992) and Enduring Love (1997). Enduring Love is the first book that really explores his mid-period combination of the exquisite workings of fate with specialized medical and scientific knowledge wielded for good and/or evil by a troubled protagonist. Picking a middle period representative is pretty easy, probably Atonement (2001), which is his best seller, his most famous and maybe his best book as well. It's the cut off for the middle period where his continued productivity causes problems.
It could be anywhere, really, On Chesil Beach, his last book to be nominated for a major literary prize, makes a certain amount of sense, or the next book, Solar (2010). The late period representative is impossible to determine. Cutting out the other five books brings his 1001 Books total down to two, which seems about right for a truly representative canon.
Saturday, then, is a cut. It is squarely inside his middle period, about a single day in the life of a neurosurgeon who has a chance encounter with a Huntington's disease suffering cockney gangster in a fender bender caused by Iraqi war protestors. The liberal use of brain surgeon language makes Saturday an ideal Kindle read- being able to touch a particular term and bring up the Wikipedia page before progressing was invaluable in this case, and you can count on McEwan for a reasonable length for all of his books.
Published 5/10/19
Machines Like Me (2019)
by Ian McEwan Ian MacEwan is a giant of literary fiction in the United Kingdom, in the United States he isn't as popular, but MacEwan is still one of those non-American writers of literary fiction who sells enough to merit a United States specific press campaign and book tour. I therefore had high hopes for
Machines Like Me, MacEwan's latest book, sparking a wave of MacEwan related press and excitement, but alas, it seems like the public reception for
Machines Like Me has been muted.
It was hard to read
Machines Like Me without thinking about Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. Both books take place in a parallel science-fiction past/present where technology has advanced beyond that of our own world while at the same time maintaining a retro air in the area of aesthetics and creature comforts. In
Never Let Me Go the sci fi element where clones grown for organ transplants, in
Machines Like Me, the hook is artificially intelligent androids, produced in a limited edition of 26, 13 Adam's and 13 Eve's.
Charlie Friend, the narrator of
Machines Like Me, purchases one of the Adam's, the Eve's already sold out. Friend is not the kind of independently wealthy gentleman you would imagine buying such a cutting edge technological innovation: he has recently inherited some money after the death of his mother, and he scrapes by day trading and engaging in a desultory affair with his upstairs neighbor, who may or may not have framed a man for rape.
MacEwan doesn't stint on his alternate history/past, a world where Alan Turing refused chemical castration, avoided suicide and emerged as an apostle of open world science (and artificial intelligence). MacEwan is known for his interest in technical research in many of his books, sometimes it is intimately intertwined with the plot, other times it just kind of sits there.
Machines Like Me is more of the later than the former, at times the exposition is closer to what you would find in genre fiction.
Like every Ian MacEwan book, events take a dark turn. He didn't earn the nickname, "Ian Macabre" for nothing!
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