Although Sheers travels widely here, taking in Los Angeles, Fiji, Paris and Zimbabwe, his scenery, characterised habitually by gaps, shadows and boundaries, possesses a reassuring internal coherence, while the sites he homes in on are linked by their liminality: the ploughed-over graves of first world war soldiers; a quarry "filled in years ago"; "the invisible meridian..
Each is read and filed, although the sheer volume precludes individual responses.
Vegetative patients, by contrast, do show periods of REM activity, although the sheer amount of REM activity is reduced.
"Although by sheer good luck the victim received no lasting physical injuries, the incident left her very badly traumatised.
That sounds like a reasonable explanation although the sheer number of boreholes dug over such a wide area beggars belief.
What he expects from the deal is hard to fathom, although its sheer novelty, perhaps, offers respite from his dogged indifference to life.
Although the sheer volume of concrete construction in the city might have something to do with those figures, Ms. Lancaster said the issue was broader.
And the humor can be corny, although the sheer charm of Mr. Neshyba-Hodges wins us over, so we are ready to forgive him that third pratfall, and the fourth too.
Other chapters, as on the history of recorded sound, analog and digital, and the business of music, seem too indebted to his secondary sources, although his sheer knowledge is impressive and his reading and research have been extensive.
The characters are funny at times, plausible at times, although the sheer niceness of the rent boy makes it hard to worry about him in any crisis, however lurid.
