Product Description

For Arthur Rowe the charity fete was a trip back to childhood, to innocence, a welcome chance to escape the terror of the Blitz, to forget twenty years of his past and a murder. Then he guesses the weight of the cake, and from that moment on he's a hunted man, the target of shadowy killers, on the run and struggling to remember and to find the truth.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #57814 in Books
• Published on: 2006-11-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 224 pages

From the Publisher
A master of storytelling
‘One of the finest writers of any language’ Washington Post

For Arthur Rowe the charity fête was a trip back to childhood, to innocence, a welcome chance to escape the terror of the Blitz, to forget twenty years of his past and a murder… Then he guesses the weight of the cake, and from that moment on he’s a hunted man, the target of shadowy killers, on the run and struggling to remember and to find the truth.

‘No serious writer of this century has more thoroughly invaded and shaped the public imagination than did Graham Greene’ Time

‘Opening a new book by Graham Greene is like settling into a gran turismo car. Nothing will go wrong’ Sunday Times

About the Author
Graham Greene was born in 1904. He worked as a journalist and critic, and in 1940 became literary editor of the Spectator. He was later employed by the Foreign Office. As well as his many novels, Graham Greene wrote several collections of short stories, four travel books, six plays, three books of autobiography, two of biography and four books for children. He also wrote hundreds of essays, and film and book reviews. Graham Greene was a member of the Order of Merit and a Companion of Honour. He died in April 1991.

Customer Reviews

Slow Starting War/Detective/Conspiracy Story
This book took me a lot longer to read than I would normally expect for such a short novel (only 220-odd pages).

It opens in Blitz-punished London with a guilt-ridden, socially disconnected man (Arthur Rowe) stumbling into the midst of a shadowy conspiracy of some kind. The novel then tells the story of the uncovering of the conspiracy and Rowe's attempt at reconnection with the world.

Greene's descriptions of the constant terror all of London's inhabitants had to deal with during the Blitz is reason enough for the price of admission. He gives a great human insight into life in a city under aerial attack, and opens ones eyes as to how terrible it must have been to live in one of the many cities in the UK, Europe or Japan that were punished during WW2. The statistics and historical accounts have suddenly taken on so much more meaning.

The difficulty with this novel is that the main character's disconnection with his world and his self absorption is so severe that it is quite tough to get into the meat of the story.

Once you get over this hurdle, however, you will enjoy a very well written story.

Blitzed out Greene
What's great about this story is the setting. As a Londoner I feel I know the city, so I was intrigued to discover another London which Greene brilliantly conjors from the smoke and ashes of the blitz. The hero is an enigma, to the reader and himself. Being a civvie and convicted killer, he's about as remote from a war hero as you can get, so Greene twists the typical war-time tale. It is also a detective story, but one where the detective is also implicated in the crime. Well worth buying.

Haunting...
"There was something about a fete which drew Arthur Rowe irresistibly....."

It's now over ten years since I first read this book, but something about it haunts my memory, making me read and re-read it over and over again. Perhaps it is the dream like quality of Greene's prose, or the way he brings blitz torn London to life, or perhaps simply his portrayal of his protagonist, Arthur Rowe, an innocent lost and alone in a guilty world.

One of Greene's more obscure novels, well worth reading and, together with 'Brighton Rock', an ideal introduction to this writer's world.