The Heart's Invisible Furies
2018 • 592 pages
Ratings52
Average rating4.5
15
Ratings52
Average rating4.5
Named Book of the Month Club's Book of the Year, 2017 Selected one of New York Times Readers’ Favorite Books of 2017 Winner of the 2018 Goldsboro Books Glass Bell Award From the beloved New York Times bestselling author of The Boy In the Striped Pajamas, a sweeping, heartfelt saga about the course of one man's life, beginning and ending in post-war Ireland Cyril Avery is not a real Avery -- or at least, that's what his adoptive parents tell him. And he never will be. But if he isn't a real Avery, then who is he? Born out of wedlock to a teenage girl cast out from her rural Irish community and adopted by a well-to-do if eccentric Dublin couple via the intervention of a hunchbacked Redemptorist nun, Cyril is adrift in the world, anchored only tenuously by his heartfelt friendship with the infinitely more glamourous and dangerous Julian Woodbead. At the mercy of fortune and coincidence, he will spend a lifetime coming to know himself and where he came from - and over his many years, will struggle to discover an identity, a home, a country, and much more. In this, Boyne's most transcendent work to date, we are shown the story of Ireland from the 1940s to today through the eyes of one ordinary man. The Heart's Invisible Furies is a novel to make you laugh and cry while reminding us all of the redemptive power of the human spirit.
Reviews with the most likes.
I loved this book, Capital L. It felt a lot like a Dickens book - a lot of vignettes about the same character. I laughed out loud a lot, and also got teary-eyed at parts. The dialogue is so sharp and witty, and it deals with serious topics in a real way without being preachy. Just an all around well written book that I didn't want to put down.
every book should end in the fashion this one does.
the second half is monumentally better than the first. the remainder is both blessed and (more so) cursed by the youthful idiocy of our protagonist, which works to an extent but just ended up as an annoyance. while the converging plot threads and extreme levels of drama made it feel like something out of a soap opera, the second half is honestly beautiful. gave me “a gentleman in moscow” vibes and that's like the highest praise I can give a work of writing. it still has its flaws but damn good book :D
Le récit magnifique de la vie d'un irlandais homosexuel, de son enfance jusqu'à la fin de sa vie. Splendide, du début à la fin.
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