This was the next book on my shelf and it was only when I reached the end that I realised there was a second part to the story. I won't be rushing out to buy "[The Closed Circle]"; the second part, but I would be happy to pick it up if I saw it in a library. The story starts well and enigmatically with a man and a woman meeting in Berlin in 2003. They realise that they know people from each others families and are eager to work out the connection. Sophie offers to take Patrick on a ride down memory lane starting in the early 1970's when people that they had known were in secondary school. The story is fragmented and some gaps need to be filled by articles in the press, but a cohesive story is none the less told. The school is a private school in Birmingham which also admits children by scholarship. This area of the city is dominated by British Leyland the car manufacturers and the interlinked families are represented by a man in middle management and a shop steward at the works. It is at a time when tentative steps were being taken for some rapprochement between managers and union representatives, but Thatcher was just around the corner, which would put a stop to all that. The story follows the children of the two men as they make their way through school into early adulthood.

Many people are shaped by their environment and when there are clashes in cultures, people have to ride these out in accordance with their characters, perhaps none more so than at work and at school. Coe does a good job in relating his characters to the context of the times that they lived through. This was especially fascinating for me as I grew up in London only a few years older than the people in the book and so I could easily relate to the politics and culture of the time. Coe is particularly strong on music (pop culture) which grabbed many people of that era, but his two major themes are racism and the battle between capital and labour, both of which have left England in the sorry state that it finds itself today (in my opinion). Coe never loses sight of the culture, but I think he does lose sight of his characters. The further I read through the novel the less I cared about what happened to the Trotters and the Chases. Other aspects of his writing did not particularly appeal, for example the record reviews or snapshots from the school magazines, and although they at times made me laugh out loud; I thought they got in the way of the story, slowed the narrative flow for no particular reason: my attention wandered.

I was entertained for the most part and I appreciated the placing of the story in Birmingham; a city that seems to have been overlooked by many authors: 3.5 stars from me. ( )

Most definitely not what I was expecting, but fabulously told story with amazingly detailed characters, and a history lesson of life in the UK in the 70’s. I can’t wait to read the second book.
I already ordered it. ( )

Beautifully written, but perhaps too true to life for me - a rambling story lacking the feel good endings and closure that leaves a warm memory. ( )

2022 book #40. Excellent story about growing up in England in the mid-1970s. First of a trilogy following the group at roughly 20-year intervals (which I read in reverse order). Well written, employing a few different styles (3rd person, 1st person, diary entries, etc). ( )

Highly evocative of time and place and wryly amusing ( )