"A sense of falling, falling, falling, which we have every day of our lives, and then the awareness that the fall was being made gentler, was being arrested, by an unseen current whose existence no-one suspected. A short eternal moment that was absurd, improbable, unbelievable, true. Eggs cracked from the slight concussion of landing, but nothing more. The richness of all subsequent life after that moment."
Julian Barnes' England, England is a fractured novel, with a heart-tugging opening, a long funny middle and a short wistful ending. Together (and maybe seperately) these parts provide plenty, but Barnes is best in "what's it all about?" land.
The book made the shortlist for the 1998 Man Booker Prize (for the best novel of the year by a citizen of the Commonwealth or the Republic of Ireland). With 36 winners, 180 or so shortlisters and three or four times that many longlisters since 1969, the Booker Prize lists are a reader's Everest. Or at least Ben Nevis. I'm on track to summit a few days after never.
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