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Book Review, Fiction

Book Review: “The Bone Clocks” by David Mitchell

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The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell

As in earlier works (The Cloud Atlas (2004), Black Swan Green (2006), etc.), Mitchell once again plays with time. The story proceeds through many settings in time and space, with lovingly detailed and nostalgic recreations of the past. Past, present, and future, highly realistic and totally fantastic, all magically stitched together.

This book is beautifully written, well worth reading.

The characters are memorable. I notice the “good guys” are realistic and sympathetic and deeply developed. On the other hand, the “bad guys” are shallow caricatures. Some are in between. This must be deliberate-we know he can write characters.

The plot is part fantasy, part real life. Perhaps the hidden, supernatural story is intended to give added meaning to the otherwise inexplicable events in life. If there is a deeper message here, I’m not getting it, because neither the fantasy nor the “real” life seem to have a lot of sense to them.

The description of locations is nicely done. But the best part of the book is the dialog, which, in places, is wonderfully funny and interesting.

The worst part of the book is the overall dark, sad, depressing nature of the story. A novelist is allowed to make us feel the hopelessness of loss and aging and social disintegration; and boy, oh boy, Mitchell takes the opportunity. I could barely stand to finish the book, it is so crushingly depressing—a sign of great writing, but very demanding.

  1. David Mitchell, The Bone Clocks, New York, Random House, 2014.