84K

I loved Claire North's Gamehouse novellas. I really enjoyed her novel Touch. I found The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August compelling and thought provoking. I was not a big fan of The End of the Day, but it was not a terrible book.I am such an admirer of Claire North's writing that I reflexively buy her books when they come out. After trying to read 84K, I regret this reflex.I found 84K unreadable. I got 37 percent through the book and gave up. The book has none of the attractions of Claire North's previous books. The dystopian world that the novel is set in is trite and quickly becomes uninteresting. The plot is plodding, even more tedious than The End of the Day. The central character is grey and uninteresting.There are sections of the book that exhibit Claire North's elegant writing. But there are other sections that appear to be some kind of stylistic experiment. An experiment that fails for me.I considered persevering and slogging through the book. But it showed no promise of getting better. There are just too many other good (or at least readable) books waiting to be read to bother with this one.Many writers have a disastrous book and later produced better work. I hope that this will be the case for Claire North. But I might wait to read some reviews before buying her next book.

This is a very tough review for me. I am a great admirer of Catherine Webb, who writes under the pen names of Claire North and Kate Griffin. I wanted to make this understood from the beginning.84K was a very hard book to get through. Although Ms. North got her point across in this book, getting there was an exercise in sheer determination and perseverance. When I read a book from an author who is on my "favorites" list, I do so with great anticipation. With this book, however, I had to force myself to read it. I did not allow myself to stop until the end of the book.When characters are not fleshed out, especially the protagonist, then it makes the readers job so much harder in understanding the plot and story-line of the book. I would say that all of the characters in this book never reached the 3-dimensional phase that is so important to the entertainment value and emotional commitment of the reader.I won't go into the details of the book. They've been listed enough here. This is the first book of Ms. Webb's, under either of her pen names, that I have not enjoyed. I've reread all of her books multiple times. This book, however, will not be read again. It was so difficult getting through it the first time; I cannot imagine going through that again.I am a devoted fan of Ms. Webb's and will continue to buy her books. If her book continue in this vein, I will have to say goodbye.It will be a painful parting for me.

I discovered Claire North's books a few years ago when traveling through London. The first I read was The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August. I've read each of her new releases as they've come out so I was excited to see a new one: 84K. Wow, so disappointed. This book spends an enormous amount of time going absolutely nowhere. I've tried to finish it many times, but each time I find myself wondering why I'm spending time slogging through something I really don't like. Too bad...hope the next one is back to her old standards.

A dystopian future set in the UK. Government and “the Company” have become essentially one and the same, and all government functions are now run with the stoic efficiency required to meet the profit margin. Everything is contracted, and everything has a dollar value – including human life / dignity. In a world where the power and immunity of wealth is hyper-exaggerated, our protagonist finds himself – by accident – at the genesis of and later – by design (and luck) – at the moment of comeuppance to our antagonists. Like 1984, the system remains broken; unlike 1984 there is at least hope for our protagonist to live the life he desires.The story was compelling. I thought the world building was well done, and the characters both enjoyable and believable. The author frequently uses unfinished thoughts to highlight the uncertainty or nebulousness, etc. of a moment. It is done well – but just like when my wife starts a sentence and then just stops talking in the middle… it’s a bit annoying. The author also uses physical line breaks (like in poetry) to convey some sense of the moment to the reader. This did NOT have the impact on me that I know they were hoping for – it just made that paragraph slower and more annoying to read. Liked everything else

I would know this book was written by [author:Claire North|7210024] if I was to read only one page of it. Her style is so unique and distinctive. Sentences are left unfinished, sometimes words and phrases just pile up on themselves and yet it always makes perfect sense. Did I mention that she is one of my favourite authors? In my eyes she can do no wrong but I can understand why some people find her hard to read.[book:84K|35511975] is set in a dystopian near future in England. The country is in a sorry state since the Company joined forces with the Government and took over everything. Life now depends on having money, lots of it, or dare we say it is not worth living. Our main character, Theo, while not being a particularly brave man, stands up against the status quo and attempts to 'break the world'.This is a very dark book, much more so than any of the author's previous works. There is death and degradation by the bucket load but there are also occasional hints of human warmth and kindness. The story is not linear and jumps around times, places and people until my head swam. I am glad I was reading it - audio would be very hard to follow.The ending is hard to take, but real although there were highlights. I closed the book with a smile and thought to myself I am so very glad I am a reader.