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From the Bookshelf of Constant Reader…

Warlight

Michael Ondaatje

Start date: May 15, 2019

Finish date: June 1, 2019

Discussion: Reading List

Discussion leader: Sherry

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Reading List

* The Schedule for July through Dec. 2025
By Lynn · 1 post · 41 views

last updated Jun 20, 2025 08:37AM

Circe - discussion with spoilers
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last updated Sep 06, 2025 04:48PM

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What Members Thought

Jul 27, 2018 Jenny (Reading Envy) rated it really liked it

Shelves: location-uk, read2018, audiobook, around-the-world, booker-winners-and-listed

On the heels of Michael Ondaatje winning the Golden Man Booker Prize for his book The English Patient, his newest novel Warlight is now on the longlist for this year's Man Booker Prize. The English Patient, which won the Man Booker in 1992, is set in 1945 and follows a cast of characters after the end of World War II. Warlight, which is up for the Man Booker now, is set in 1945 and follows a brother and sister after the end of World War II. Oh wait, that's weird....

The book doesn't stay set in 1 ...more

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May 15, 2019 Ruth rated it it was amazing

I got this book on Saturday and dropped into it like a stone into a well. Resurfaced on Tuesday. Wow. I’ve learned something about myself in many years of reading. I’ll love almost any book if it’s well written. Conversely, no matter how interesting the subject and/or plot, I almost invariably get mired down amidst writing that plods competently, but uninspiredly along. I think that’s why LaRose did me in. And this book is very well-written. Ondaatje also writes poetry, so it’s not surprising hi ...more

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May 11, 2019 Jane rated it it was amazing

Shelves: recentfiction, historical-fiction, political

A very dream-like evocation of childhood, war, school. The disappearances are so disconcerting...Rachel and Nathaniel's father, then Rachel. I loved the sentences, and the atmosphere Ondaatje creates. But I have to say there were many places where I felt "WHAT IS GOING ON?" Here's an interview with Ondaatje about the book. I found it fascinating. https://www.youtube.com/

I love the way Ondaatje talks about the fact that we don't remember our childhoods. We reconstruct them from images and convers A very dream-like evocation of childhood, war, school. The disappearances are so disconcerting...Rachel and Nathaniel's father, then Rachel. I loved the sentences, and the atmosphere Ondaatje creates. But I have to say there were many places where I felt "WHAT IS GOING ON?" Here's an interview with Ondaatje about the book. I found it fascinating. https://www.youtube.com/

I love the way Ondaatje talks about the fact that we don't remember our childhoods. We reconstruct them from images and conversations, both overheard and ones we engage in. It's a fascinating premise, and makes sense. Once we've had more of a conversation, I'd love to share some passages from book reviews I read when the book first came. The NYT review was utterly dismissive. I loved The English Patient and The Cat's Table, so I ignored the snarky review...but I returned to it after reading. I got what the reviewer meant, but he missed everything I loved. And other reviews are glowing.

notes during a Constant Reader discussion: Barbara and Larry, I love what you're noticing. Does anyone have anyone have any idea why the character was named "Felon"? I thought to myself, Could that really be a name? It seems like a slam over the head. I'm reading too many books. I am going to just focus on the forty or so sections I marked in Warlight...and if anyone is interested, the snarky review from the NYT. I realized, when I read it that it struck a chord for me. I actually love this...so many ways a book can turn a reader off, or utterly engage them. I think I'll share a link to the NYT Book Review about Warlight. Here it is: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/07/bo...
The review, by Dwight Garner, is very, very snarky, but fun to read. I disagree with it on the whole, but I can see glimmers of truth if I think about the book from a different vantage point.
Ruth, you loved this book and really didn't like La Rosa as much. I like them in completely different ways. When I write that, I'm immediately wrapped in atmosphere. Warlight is hazy, misty, difficult to discern with clarity. La Rosa is stark, sunlit, harsh and hard to engage because it is so bright and right in my face. anyone else who read both books feel this?

see comment history The response to this book has been overwhelmingly positive. My response certainly is. I think I'll share a link to the NYT Book Review about Warlight. Here it is: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/07/bo...
This review, by Dwight Garner, is very, very snarky, but fun to read. I disagree with it on the whole, but I can see glimmers of truth if I think about the book from a different vantage point.

Beautiful passages:
"The city felt wounded, uncertain of itself. It allowed one to be rule-less. Everything had already happened, hadn’t it?"

page 9 their mother tells Rachel and Nathaniel about the family on the roof. Marsh, the boy who falls off, will be important to their mother, Rose, later. In this time with their mother the house seems freer, more spacious. 33, a desc. of all the buildings lost during the war. 37 The Moth's friends stood a little to the left of the Labour Party--about three miles or so. ...more

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