Product Description

An evocative tale of belonging and exile by one of Britain's best young novelists.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #222044 in Books
• Published on: 2006-06-05
• Binding: Hardcover
• 304 pages

Tatler
'Compelling, atmospheric and elegantly written.'

Daily Telegraph
'Well written and often entertaining .... a perfectly pleasant
read.'

Marie Claire
'If you're looking for an intelligent holiday read, this has it
all.'

Customer Reviews

Fragmented
Overall, a rather disappointing book, though the writing is quite good and there are particularly good passages/sections throughout. The trouble is that 'Alentejo Blue' is a fragmented novel with no real central narrative drive or plot to pull together the disparate strands. It reads like a collection of linked short stories set in the same Portuguese area.

Each chapter focusses on a different character living or staying in Alentejo. Inevitably with any book of this kind, some characters are more interesting and easy to identify with than others. I found the first two sections particularly hard going and almost stopped reading, although some of the subsequent sections were better.

I've never been to the area so can't comment on accuracy, but I wouldn't say that it was particularly strongly invoked. With a book of this kind, where location is the unifying theme, you would hope to finish reading and feel like you've visited yourself. But I can't say that I really know much more about Alentejo than before, except that it is hot and rural, which I could probably have guessed.

Every time I felt like I was getting to know a character and becoming interested in their story, their section finished and another character was introduced. I felt I had little 'investment' in the book and this meant I wasn't excited about getting home to read it. The one very tenuous linking storyline was the anticipated return of a wealthy local man, but this wasn't much exploited and the ultimate conclusion was flat, dull and disappointing. I found the returnee character extremely unbelivable as well.

I would say that Ali is a good writer in terms of style, and I would try another of her books. But this novel (if you can call it that) lacks the coherency to make it anything more than an OK read.

How does she do it?
This book is awesome. I'm a Brit living in Canada but have been intimately connected with the south of Portugal since the 60s.
I can't begin to fathom how Monica Ali did it. She got into the minds, language, innuendo and naked emotion of the Alentejo to give us a refreshing, behind the scenes, look at this loveable parallel world. If you don't love this book it's because you just don't get it. Do yourself a favor and read it. It's everything that "facing reality" isn't.

Not sure if this is actually a novel...
Alentejo Blue is certainly a work of fiction which runs for just shy of 300 pages - but that isn't enough to make a novel. It's really more like a collection of short stories all set in the same rural Portuguese village. There is occasionally some wonderful use of language in the description, but this fails to make up for the fact that it just doesn't hang together. I can't help feeling that it would have been a more absorbing and satisfying read if more time and attention had been given to fewer characters, rather than skimming the surface and risking stereoptype and characature in the process. Or perhaps the range of characters and perspectives would work if there were a strong plot driving there interactions, but ultimately this is a book about a place where nothing happens. I hope Ali can pull something rather meatier out of the bag for her next offering.