Joe Rose, a science writer, has a traumatic experience, and then is stalked. I could never tell where this book was going, and I was surprised and thrilled by McEwan’s allegiance to truth that is nuanced, complex, and founded in the way we really feel and act, rather than manipulated via neat literary tricks that are so popular in commercial fiction and, to me, feel packaged.

Enduring Love is my ninth Ian McEwan book and I now have a sense that I can group his work by certain characteristics. This book belongs in the “stories of intrigue” group that includes Amsterdam and Sweet Tooth. In some ways, I suppose these books are more commercial than the ones that ride on even more nuanced undercurrents of denied, sublimated, and repressed human feeling (although, to be honest, all of his books contain these), but I actually prefer the subtler books (Saturday, The Children Act, On Chesil Beach). Atonement straddles both categories, and Nutshell (hilarious) and The Cement Garden (first novel) occupy their own categories. But honestly, why quibble and categorize? I will read anything this man writes. Why?

I think of the famous obvious answer, “It’s the economy, stupid.” With McEwan, “It’s the writing.”

I can pick any page and find wonderful writing. I always draft my reviews as I’m reading, and I happen to be on page 95 for this thought. Here’s a sentence:

There was another thing too, like a skin, a soft shell around the meat of my anger, limiting it and so making it appear all the more theatrical.

And later, page 213, there’s this:

What I had thought was an expression was actually his face at rest. I had been misled by the curl of his upper lip, which some genetic hiatus had boiled into a snarl.

This is writing I feel in my teeth—as if they are sinking into the meat he references—and my mouth waters.

Aralara sıkıştırılmış bilimsel açıklamalar kitabın akıcılığına sekte vursa da "Sonsuz Aşk" ilginç konusu ve gerilimli kurgusuyla çok severek okuduğum McEwan kitaplarından biri oldu. Bir balon kazasıyla başlayan roman daldan dala atlayarak ilgiyi hep üzerinde tuttu. Ian McEwan'ın okunmadık kitabı kalmasın o zaman :)

Impecable.

This book has the best opening scene of any book I ever read!

Objectively, I can see the appeal to this. It is generally well-written and there are some interesting aspects to it. Unfortunately, it totally lost me. I found myself mostly bored and not caring enough about the outcome to bother picking it up unless I had nothing else to do. I can certainly see this working for other people, but it definitely wasn't for me.

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Mittlerweile habe ich ja ein recht zwiespältiges Verhältnis zu den Romanen von Ian McEwan und bin mir im Vorfeld nie sicher, was mich erwartet. Manche habe ich kaum beenden können, so furchtbar fand ich sie, andere konnte ich vor lauter Faszination fast nicht aus der Hand legen.

"Liebeswahn" gehört definitiv eher zur zweiten Kategorie als zur ersten, ich glaube aber, dass mir das Buch insgesamt noch besser gefallen hätte, wenn ich es im englischen Original gelesen hätte, denn die Übersetzung war an vielen Stellen sehr holprig und die Wortwahl recht ungewöhnlich.
Sowohl das Thema als auch die Umsetzung in der Handlung fand ich ausgezeichnet, ein wirklich empfehlenswerter McEwan!

“How do you feel?'
Scared,' she said. 'Really scared.'
But you don't look it.'
I feel I'm shivering inside.”

Enduring Love was at times a well-written and conscientious account of mixed genres of drama and suspense and at other times, purple prose build-up leading up to an anticlimactic fizzle. The story follows three main players, mostly: Joe Rose, his live-in partner, Clarissa Mellon and an unwelcome third party, Jed Parry. The situation that opens the novel and remains the centerpiece of its conflict is a "runaway" hot air balloon, pursued by Joe, Jed and several others, and the ensuing gruesome slaughter of one of those men. Jed is stricken with de Clérambault's syndrome, which is a delusional condition that makes him believe that Joe and him are meant to be lovers. The condition is explained further in the book, with reference to a case of King George V, in which a woman he's never met had become convinced that even a little gesture as shifting his curtains was a message of everlasting love for her. Joe believes Jed's obsession will become dangerous, and this becomes the crux of the story.

Ian McEwan's story is very well-written at points but unfortunately, in my opinion, over-written at others. Situations and emotions are over-described, so much that it becomes tiresome for a story of such small scope. The themes of love, obsession and heartache are given full exploration in this novel, especially via the descriptions of Clarissa's inability to bear children, the deceased man's wife's belief that he was having an affair at the time of his death, and Joe and Clarissa's first row as she expresses doubt that he is being stalked at all.

Enduring Love is a poignant story with three richly defined characters that unfortunately flounders at its third act with a dragging account of obtaining a gun from a household of ex-hippies. It should also be noted that Enduring Love switches narrative styles a few times, a brave move by Ian McEwan. However, as brave as it is, the first switch from first-person to third-person left me initially confused. But upon reflection, it worked.

On a final note, it was my girlfriend, Portia, who recommended this book to me. She noted the imagery of the men running to the hot-air balloon in the opening scene. Joe and Jed running towards each other, like lovers do. I thought that was a very interesting observation and way to picture that scene from Jed's point of view.

Trying to describe the deeply intimate & personal with psychopathology … this is precisely what made ‘Saturday’ the worst book ever contrived. (Emphasis on CONTRIVED.) Now, this dish is not devoid of that ingredient--it is again about a member of the upper class (DON’T EVER FORGET IT dear reader!) crashing head-on with a creep-o misfit, a defective misanthrope who has this eerie pathological condition stalking the incredibly intelligent and quick-witted protagonist for pages… a neo noir, a-la Saramago (but not turtle-paced like his are usually, thank God).

The premise is incredible, too many coincidences create a rift in an otherwise stagnant life: two events, including the aforementioned illness (of the ‘antagonist') and the event which propels the reader to continue reading the novel in 1 sitting (!), the hot air balloon accident, are one too many things to occur to a science journalist who functions intellectually in a plane above you & me (… he's British after all). That all these occurrences happen at once is almost a literary impossibility.

But. Damn it if this isn’t O-so-readable! You must know what happens next, and at all costs, and ignoring your outside life will become a necessity. It is bizarre, ugly in the clinical definition of the word. Sterile, bleak, sad. I love the fact that the central problem in the book is the surplus of love. Are all emotions really just teensy chemical reactions within a susceptible organism? That this has been McEwan’s recurring thesis for books previous to this and also after does not shock: he is adulated for that exact type of coldness. Saturday, On Chesil Beach… I'm not a huge fan of this brand of bleakness. Atonement barely has that conceited, I-know-everything-even-the-biological-processes-which-govern-the-universe-entire narrative voice… which is why it's his Sole Masterpiece.
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And if you didn’t think the writer sufficiently pretentious, look at the dual appendixes at the end of the book, look at the over usage of words like love and innocence to describe the psychological landscape. At least he refrained from using footnotes! (Alas, American Paul Auster already has.)

After the first section of this book - surely the most gripping, heart wrenching I've ever read - I'd have given this 5 stars without blinking. Half way through I was down to 4 stars - what book could possibly maintain the standard of that beginning? By the end I'd lost interest and can only award it an aggregate 3 stars (only 2 stars and fading at the end). Brilliantly clever and superbly written as it is, I found it difficult to overcome a feeling indifference concerning the eventual outcome for the lead players.

I read a lot of books by this author. I like his writing. Some of them are very good and some IMO are not so good. This one I really enjoyed. Not exactly for the subject of the story but for the way it was told. I could not stop reading this book. I finished it very quickly. The story was told by the main character and I could not stop reading it. I really felt that "Atonement" was this author most outstanding book but I will continue to read him because when I find another book this good it's always a pleasant surprise.

de Clerambault's syndrome (also known as erotomania) is when the affected believes that another person, usually a stranger, high-status or famous person, is in love with them. Enduring Love tells the story of a man (Joe) who becomes the victim of a de Clerambault's sufferer (Jed), we witness Jed's building obsession, the breakdown of Joe's and Clarissa's (his partner) relationship and most importantly, how mental illness can be just as devastating to the people surrounding the victim as the victim himself.

McEwan has outdone himself this time, and in my opinion this is his best book. The frustration felt by Joe when it becomes apparent that no one is taking him seriously is tangible - even his girlfriend is sceptical and it is this insight into human behaviour, ignoring problems in order to avoid acceptance, that makes his work so compelling. Love is not often seen as something sinister, "all you need is love" etc, so this is a refreshing change for the more cynical of us. As with all interesting novels, the outcome of this situation has to be a ravaging yet unavoidable one. Violence and desperation prevail, meaning that the end is ultimately tragic. Everyone survives but not everyone recovers.

on fighting...

Joe has another kind of problem. His emotions are slow to shift to anger in the first place, and even when they have, he has the wrong kind of intelligence, he forgets his lines and cannot score the points. Nor can he break the habit of responding to an accusation with a detailed, reasoned answer, instead of coming back with an accusation of his own. He is easily outmanoeuvred by a sudden irrelevance. Irritation blocks his understanding of his own case, and it is only later, when he is calm, than an articulate advocacy unrolls in his thoughts.

Some of his description on emotions, like the one above, feels like he is describing me (much better than I ever could). I read Atonement in 2003 and was very disapointed - it was too slow, and I did not understand how such a small incident could have such a big effect. I now think that I was just too young to "get" it. Luckily I recently received Enduring Love as a present, and I loved it. The writing and descriptions of thought processes and feelings are amazing, they are insightful and read like poetry. I also enjoyed the out of the ordinary narrative, especially interesting was de Clerambault's syndrome, a disorder that causes the sufferer to believe that someone else is in love with him or her. This is probably not for everyone, but if you enjoy descriptive books that unfold slowly, with a constant sense of foreboding, then give this a try. I am adding more of his books to my TBR list.

The Story: One windy spring day in the Chilterns, Joe Rose's calm, organized life is shattered by a ballooning accident. The afternoon, Rose reflects, could have ended in mere tragedy, but for his brief meeting with Jed Parry. Unknown to Rose, something passes between them - something that gives birth in Parry to an obsession so powerful that it will test to the limits Rose's beloved scientific rationalism, threaten the love of his wife Clarissa and drive him to the brink of murder and madness.