Don Jaime is a fencing master of the classical style, and the inventor of a secret thrust. Grown older, and with the pistol increasing in popularity and rebellion fomenting in society all around, he is still living by the particular ethos of his life and training, setting him apart from his contemporaries. Into his humble life comes a beautiful woman who requests that he teach her his secret fencing thrust. What follows are murder, intrigue, and consequences.

The story is written from Don Jaime's perspective, and the most interesting aspect of the story flows from how his history, and the events that led him to become a fencing master, impart on him this particular air and grace, and admirable aloofness from the confusion of life all around him. Because of who he is, and how he decides to deal with life, the mystery is made ever the more complicated and deep. The gorgeousness of the language comes through the constant interpretation of fencing, a most physical activity, and into the story through action in the story itself and as metaphor. There is not a moment in the book that fencing does not touch in some way.

As a mystery, perhaps, it is not especially difficult to guess what had happened, though of course the details themselves are slowly revealed. The reward for the reader comes at the very end, when these details are known, and given the gravity of each component, the reader is spell-bound as the final confrontation takes place, and brings the reader around again to the beginning of the story. ( )

I wasn't sure I would enjoy a book in a historical setting (19th-century Spain) about which I knew absolutely nothing, but the main character is similarly distanced from any interest in politics, and the focus is quite on the margin of the historical events. The atmosphere of the faded fencing hall is palpable, and I warmed to the crusty old fencing master and his old-world poise. MB 12-vi-2009 ( )

The Fencing Master is set in Madrid in 1868, when political plots are being hatched by every faction in the government. Don Jaime is removed from all this; he is an aging fencing master with one goal: to find the unstoppable thrust and write down his life-work. He is a very reserved, traditional, and almost ascetic man, and no one is more surprised than himself when he agrees to teach a woman his famous killing thrust. But Adela de Otero is not an ordinary woman, and her mysterious past soon involves Don Jaime in a murderous political plot, with opponents who will do far worse than simply kill him.

This book reminded me of Carlos Ruiz Zafón's The Shadow of the Wind, but it is not quite as good. It has the same gritty feel, though Pérez-Reverte never quite indulges in the graphic descriptions of sexual desire that Zafón explores. There are a few interesting character studies and the book has an undeniable atmosphere to it. Pérez-Reverte obviously did his homework about the different methods of fencing.

But in the end, I can't say this book and I were really good friends. I was hard-put to it to really like any of the characters, and the big revelation at the end wasn't even all that clear. I'm sure I missed something that was set up in earlier chapters, but when we finally got to read the incriminating letter, it wasn't even shocking; to be honest, I couldn't make much of it.

I'm glad to have read this, so that I have a better understanding of the author's style. But it isn't a book I really cared for, and I'm putting it up on PaperBackSwap because I don't think I will ever reread it. ( )

A very fine novel. It went by very quickly, combining both philosophical musings on honor, and a good mystery in an unusual setting of 1850's Madrid. Jamie Astraloa is an old fencing master, who is experiencing the waning of interest in his art among the aristocrats of the day. He is engaged, against his initial will, to teach fencing to a woman, who is both beautiful and mysterious. He introduces her to a notorious nobleman whom he teaches fencing, who later entrusts Jamie with incriminating documents that the nobleman had been using for blackmail. The nobleman is found dead, by a fencing wound, and it becomes clear the woman is involved. In the end, she is the evil one, and is killed by the fencing master in a duel. Very cerebral characters, and a fine depiction of the innocence of honor in the fencing master. ( )

very pleasantly surprised to come across this author. have enjoyed mysteries and action and suspense, but was growing weary of the standard English authors that could tell a good story but without much flourish. Perez-Reverte is a master with the written word and what's more astonishing is that his books have to be translated to English. ( )