The real story here is why the cleverly observant author of works such as The Mezzanine and Room Temperature has chosen to publish something at once so daft and so half-hearted.
The sensitive and observant author of two travel books on the former Soviet Union explores a strong candidate for worst place on earth, both for its natural gifts and for human improvements.
The sensitive and observant author of two travel books on the former Soviet Union explores Siberia, a strong candidate for worst place on earth, both for its natural gifts and for human improvements.
If I have come to love it, it is because now I am half a century older, and not trapped in a house and kitchen, I can equably sympathise with the central person in the book, who is its author - endlessly inventive, observant, and full of life.
A book about a week in the life of a sensitive, observant kid — affectionately viewed by the author, as one might a teen-age son or a younger brother, but hardly idolized — became a bible to a whole generation.
The author "is a sensitive and observant traveler who clearly respects the Siberians for the hardships they have endured," Ken Kalfus wrote in the Book Review in 2000.
"Authors are a little more observant and sensitive than the average clod – they know what hurts them, which is probably part of why they're able to write about the human condition.
"Watchful" is the word for both the author and his people, who are always keenly observant and yet on guard, as if about to be exposed at any moment.
It is also a travelogue — equal parts touching, wry and hilarious — told by a gifted storyteller and a notable author of other golf books with an especially observant eye and ear.
"Ash Wednesday" is not a perfect novel or a major one, but it is absorbing and thoughtful, observant and witty, with enough delicately crafted flashes to justify its existence well beyond its author's Hollywood fame.
Also small in scale but large-hearted in scope, "Summer Days and Nights," by Wong Herbert Yee (author of the delightful "Mouse and Mole" series and "Fireman Small"), follows a cheery, observant and adventurous little girl as she explores her outdoor world.
