Here we have the familiar fragmented narrative style that has become Ondaatje's calling card. Written a few years before his magnum opus, this novel shows a writer that has not quite blossomed into his full potential. This novel works pretty well and has some pretty imagery (the Swedes skating the river with burning cattails comes to mind) but it doesn't reach the heights of it's more famous sibling.

The other slight issue here is that the story of Patrick's evolution into an anarchist just isn't as interesting as the story of 'The English Patient'. If I could do it over again, I would have read 'In the Skin of a Lion' before reading 'The English Patient'. While you don't need to have read the former to enjoy the latter, 'Skin of a Lion' introduces us to characters such as Caravaggio and Hana and also helps fill in a few blanks in some of the passages in 'English Patient'. A worthy read; strong three stars.

1) watched English Patient, loved it
2) decided to read different Ondaatje book
3) got whole book club to read this book
4) big mistake, this book is a hot mess

a book to reread

In the Skin of a Lion is a striking and spellbinding piece of literature. It poses questions that deal with our humanity and makes us question our perspective.

The book takes place in the 1920’s and 30’s, and follows Patrick Lewis, an immigrant to the city of Toronto. Through his character we are given insight into the lives of immigrants, workers and marginal individuals that helped build the city. These men and women molded and shaped Toronto into what it is today. Ondaatje sheds light on the fact that these people are not represented in history yet play an essential part. Therefore, in the book, storytelling is a central aspect. To make up for the historical oblivion, Ondaatje emphasizes the importance of local and personal narratives.

Although the book is fiction, it is based on real events and places, such as the construction of the Prince Edward Viaduct on Bloor Street. Ondaatje paints the picture of this vibrant and teeming immigrant community in Toronto. He immerses you in the hardships of workers and the unjust contrast between the rich and the poor. This novel definitely depicts some main aspects of humanity, such as the importance of language and community, the power of dreams and the value of human life.

However the novel may not be for everyone. The story is not told in typical linear or chronological order. It is woven intricately together with a blend of places, characters, events and voices. Ondaatje himself paints an accurate description, illustrating Patrick’s life as, “no longer a single story but part of a mural” and “a wondrous night web- all of these fragments of a human order” (145).

Ondaatje is a writer like no other; his work is eloquent and poetic. Immediately, the novel pulls you into a surreal state, where reality and dreams are blended together. It can get confusing at times as the book jumps around, but in the end it all comes together. As Ondaatje explains, "only the best art can order the chaotic tumble of events. Only the best can realign chaos to suggest both the chaos and order it will become" (146). That is exactly what the novel is, chaotic and disorderly yet beautiful. The novel is full of hidden meanings, symbols and connections that require careful attention and reading between the lines.

The best part is that the characters have complex personalities that make them seem life like. Ondaatje strives to make them live off the page, even explaining that concept in the novel.
“Patrick never believed that characters lived only on the page. They altered when the author's eye was somewhere else. Outside the plot there was a great darkness, but there would of course be daylight elsewhere on earth. Each character had his own time zone, his own lamp, otherwise they were just men from nowhere” (143).
Not only that but the characters are completely memorable and unique. Such as a vanished millionaire and his mistress, a nun with a new identity, a thief with a charmed life and a daredevil bridge builder. Each person has his or her own valuable story to tell that is entwined in the plot.

This novel is insightful, brilliantly written and definitely a worthwhile read.

Wow!~ I just finished this book and it blew me away. I read it after hearing an author discuss it as her favorite book that she read over and over and needed multiple copies so that she could pick it up to read passages wherever she was on NPR. I understand what she means and might do the same myself. This author (I forget her name, sorry!) beautifully described how it feels to read a book that is like a precious jewel that you're not sure you want to share with just anyone - people have to be good enough for it. Well, I recommend it to all book lovers!!!

When I returned to this book to write a critical essay about it, I came back to Goodreads to retroactively give it a 5-star rating from my previous 4-star. I've been uncovering, for lack of a better words, "easter eggs" throughout that more than reward a very, very careful reader. This is not a casual read. It's not a throwaway paperback to peruse on the train. This is a book that will live with you. Ondaatje has woven a web of the most intricate, delicate, subtle complexity. And if you try to untangle the web, giving it the thought and time it deserves, it will reward you tenfold. Read this book.

July 7th 2017 EDIT:

That previous review was hyperbolic. The book did not "live with me" as I expected. It is an excellent read, but not as life-changing as I thought. The star-rating is back to a 4.

As a parent with two sons who loved the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (i.e. Michelangelo, Rafael, Donatello and Leonardo) when they were children in the 1990s, I was delighted to discover that the fifth turtle Caravaggio was a character of “In the Skin of a Lion”. In most cases, however, the surprises in this novel dismayed me.
One of the major themes of “In the Skin of Lion” is to portray Toronto’s ethnic minorities during the first four decades of the twentieth century when in the view of Ondaatje, they were culturally alienated and economically alienated. Although Ondaatje is a at least partially correct, his lack of contact with the ethnic groups that he assigns his characters to thoroughly undermines his endeavour. Ondaatje is an arch wasp which is not necessarily a bad thing. It is a label that could be applied to half of my family. However, if one is to write about non-Wasps one needs some familiarity with them. Mere commiseration which is all that Ondaatje has is not enough.
Ultimately Caravaggio, especially in his second avatar in “The English Patient” is a Wasp. I also fond the nominally Macedonian Temelcoff to be very much an Anglo.
“In the Skin of Lion” nonetheless has its charms. Ondaatje fares much better with his Wasp characters. As in other novels, Ondaatje presents an intriguing set of characters who fight the good fight of life and arouse our sympathy when they are inevitably crushed by harshness of this cruel world. Patrick Lewis, the protagonist and professional dynamiter loves passionately but all his loves are unrequited.
Finally, I must note that "In the Skin of a Lion" introduces Hana who will be the leading character of "The English Patient" and for this reason alone is worth reading.

I've heard many good things about Michael Ondaatje, often from other writers praising his exquisite prose or poetic eye.

So what am I missing?

The plot of In the Skin of a Lion was engrossing enough. I didn't find it baroque or off-puttingly ambiguous, although some further character development wouldn't have hurt. But my god, the writing... I don't mind purple prose—I mean, Huysmans, Malcolm Lowry and DFW are three of my all time faves—but rarely did Ondaatje let a paragraph pass without burdening it with some overwrought metaphor or periphrastic phrase.

Two highlights:

In daylight he moved slowly as if conserving remnants of energy – a bat in post-coital flight.

...

They were sitting on the floor leaning into the corner of the room, her mouth on his nipple, her hand moving his cock slowly. An intricate science, his whole body imprisoned there, a ship in a bottle.

(Emphasis added.)

One only has to compare Ondaatje's imagery with that of another writer, also a poet, but renowned for his literary economy:

(a) The train stopped at a silent loading platform. Lönnrot got off. It was one of those deserted evenings that have the look of dawn.

(b) The ballroom was lit indirectly; it seems they were all in a moment of time that resembled the half-hour before the sun comes up over an oasis.

Guess which one is which... Although if you don't sense a difference (and perhaps there isn't one?), then there's a chance that you'd like Ondaatje just fine.

An exalted language rendered simply. Ondaatje lays down on a wood grained table, an axe, fallen trees, a log jamb, explosives, the building of a bridge and a waterworks. The concrete tools of realism. As he speaks in his mesmerizing words his agile hands tent and curl, through the fingers arise images of a hallucinogenic prose. In short declarative sentences he calls forth the onset of a first LSD trip; the shock of boundaries melting away, the particles of the world slowed and oozing with meaning.

Ondaatje is clearly someone who can create a burning solvent in a lab that steams words beyond their summit of representation and into the scalding approach of what is real.

I got through the first fifty or so pages solely because of the poetic language of this book. Otherwise I would have meandered my way, got lost somewhere, looked around for help, and finding none, tossed the book away.

I am not a big fan of so many characters, so many voices, and so much happening in a book. But with this one I remained patient. And lord I'm I not grateful. It seems that I have been richly rewarded.

This is book is set in Toronto in the '30s. And except for Patrick, the main protagonist, the other dominant characters are mostly immigrants, whose lives and toils are described with painstaking detail, but still subtly sensual.

In fact, Patrick ends up feeling like the outsider in a cast of men and women that are ready to make it by whatever means; in a masculine new world that is neither merciful nor apologetic.

Which brings us to the dominant theme. History. And the place of the seemingly insignificant. Ondaatje makes us care for what part that these small people, those who build the cities with their ill remunerated labor, and lost their lives in the course, played in making this history.

It is a book with many pleasures, romantic and poetic in part, and greatly rewarding for anyone who wishes to read some thought provoking stuff. Dig in, with patient and assurance that you'll be rewarded in the end.

This was a very haunting story, about all kinds of people from different places in the world, their life paths crossing in mysterious ways. The language was sometimes very poetic, other times quite crude. Patrick was introduced first only as 'the boy' and he was the only Canadian in the story, all the other characters were immigrants. Patrick himself felt like an immigrant when he moved to Toronto, he was lost, with no real goal.

The end was very open, with no real resolution for any of them.

Radnja ovog romana je smeštena u Torontu početkom XX veka gde se preduzimaju kapitalni radovi poput izgradnje visećeg mosta, kopanja tunela ispod jezera Ontario za potrebe novog vodovoda, prenos drvene građe rečnim tokovima... Junaci su mahom radnici koji učestvuju u ovim mukotrpnim poslovima, za male naknade rizikujući sopstveno zdravlje i život. Većina njih su imigranti, dosta njih i sa ovih naših balkanskih prostora.
Neke scene su nezaboravne - vetar koji nosi časne sestre preko nezavršenog mosta, veoma domišljato bežanje iz zatvora, sabotaža vodovoda i ronjenje kroz mračni tunel...
Nasuprot ovakvoj surovoj radnji, intezivnim, napetim, nekada i mučnim scenama je jedan veoma lep, nežan, poetski stil pisanja što ovom romanu daje po meni najveću draž i jedinstvenost.
Veoma prijatno iznenađenje.
P. S. Čitanje sinopsisa ove knjige može vas samo dovesti u zabludu o kakvom je romanu reč.