So let me turn my attention to this novel. Perhaps Amsterdam won the Booker Prize because it was McEwan’s first great novel, though I am only speculating because I haven’t read any of his works that predate Amsterdam. Both are more recent and have been read more on goodreads. I cannot honestly say what makes this book better than McEwan’s two other novels that I have read, Atonement, and The Children Act. Amsterdam, for the most part, meets these criteria. No space can be wasted dwelling on the past or the future the reader needs to be immediately drawn in to the story and their attention needs to be held until the end. For me, any good short story must be elegant and must capture a moment. This is the third McEwan novel that I have read, and each of those have read like long short stories. This review will be wordier, but I take solace in believing that that quote was lifted from something longer as well. Not another word is needed to tell the reader what to expect, and McEwan’s novel is certainly worthy of this admirable blurb. I could write an entire essay in praise of the Sunday Telegraph quote on the front cover, “A psychologically brilliant study of heartlessness.” Never has a novel been more succinctly paraphrased than this description of Amsterdam. A list of the reviews I have completed so far can be found on my archives page. This post is part of a series of reviews of all the Man Booker Prize winners since I was born.
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