The Vivid Worlds of Jim Crace (Quarantine - Jim Crace)

Member Name: beedubblyer

Product:	Quarantine - Jim Crace
Date:	09/09/00 (114 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Hugely imaginative fiction...

Disadvantages: ... at times a solemn read.

In 'Quarantine', Jim Crace does nothing less than suggest a source for the myth (legend?) of Jesus! He takes us through the quarantine, or forty-day fast, of a small group of travellers in the Judean desert. They share their barren home with a vicious merchant and his wife. Musa, the merchant, preys on them as they begin their quarantine, and he becomes obsessed with the last of their group, a pious Galilean carpenter - Jesus.

Crace's descriptive flights, taking in the harsh landscape, the physical trials, and the mental torments of the fast, are stunning. He approaches their impossible task with all the reason of the modern mind, yet he retains all the religious and superstitious trappings of the age.

The book is leavened with very little humour, and can at times be a less-than-easy read, but it is rewarding for all that. It looks as though Crace might not have a peer in terms of the sheer force of invention he brings to his novels. However, if this book has a failing, it's that the narrative takes a back seat to the swathes of description, and the last third of the book shows no pay-off from the rather more involving opening.

BUT! hey, it's not a long book, you're still doing yourself a favour by picking it up..!

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