What do you think?
Rate this book
Little Monsters
"When I was thirteen my father killed my mother."
How do you recover from something like that? Carol never quite does. Sent to live with her aunt, who barely tolerates her presence, Carol is grief-stricken, and all too aware she's not wanted. Desperate for love, but unable to ask for it, she nonetheless - and almost despite herself - finds it where she least expected. Her Uncle Joey is the only one to notice her when she's a teenager; years later, he's also the man with whom she builds a home and a life. But when Carol helps to rescue a young refugee from the sea, that life suddenly threatens to unravel, just as surely as it did when she was thirteen.
Written in tight, spare prose, "Little Monsters" is a novel of creation, redemption and obsession; it's also the story of what it's like to experience the unthinkable - and what happens next.
'Charles Lambert is a seriously good writer' Beryl Bainbridge
'Sharp like sherbet, poignant and gripping' Griff Rhys Jones
'With exquisitely tender writing and quiet authority, "Little Monsters" is a powerful debut' Jill Dawson
How do you recover from something like that? Carol never quite does. Sent to live with her aunt, who barely tolerates her presence, Carol is grief-stricken, and all too aware she's not wanted. Desperate for love, but unable to ask for it, she nonetheless - and almost despite herself - finds it where she least expected. Her Uncle Joey is the only one to notice her when she's a teenager; years later, he's also the man with whom she builds a home and a life. But when Carol helps to rescue a young refugee from the sea, that life suddenly threatens to unravel, just as surely as it did when she was thirteen.
Written in tight, spare prose, "Little Monsters" is a novel of creation, redemption and obsession; it's also the story of what it's like to experience the unthinkable - and what happens next.
'Charles Lambert is a seriously good writer' Beryl Bainbridge
'Sharp like sherbet, poignant and gripping' Griff Rhys Jones
'With exquisitely tender writing and quiet authority, "Little Monsters" is a powerful debut' Jill Dawson
- GenresFictionContemporary
Hardcover
First published February 6, 2008
1 person is currently reading
279 people want to read
About the author
Charles Lambert
82 books203 followersCharles Lambert was born in the United Kingdom but has lived in Italy for most of his adult life. His most recent novel is Birthright, set in Rome in the 1980s and examining what happens when two young women discover that they are identical twins, separated at birth. In 2022, he published The Bone Flower, a Gothic love story with a sinister edge, set in Victorian London. His previous novel, Prodigal, shortlisted for the Polari Prize in 2019, was described by the Gay & Lesbian Review as "Powerful… an artful hybrid of parable (as the title signifies), a Freudian family romance, a Gothic tale, and a Künstlerroman in the tradition of James Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.” For the Kirkus Review, The Children's Home, published in 2016, was 'a one-of-a-kind literary horror story', while Two Dark Tales, published in October 2017, continues to disturb. Earlier books include three novels, a collection of prize-winning short stories and a memoir, With a Zero at its Heart, selected by the Guardian as one of its top ten books from 2014.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
June 16, 2008
I have a particular yen for reading books about one place when I’m in another, very different one. I read ‘The God of Small Things’ in Rekjavik, and ‘The Bear Comes Home’ in Kerala (I refused to read Roy’s book while I was in her home state and it was a wise choice, revisiting Kerala through her words was magical, interpreting it via her narrative would have warped my view of an already puzzling and beautiful environment and culture), Middlemarch beguiled me in Melbourne and I kept ‘Dirt Music’ to read in Swindon (and can you blame me?).
All this is a meandering way of saying that the books I’ve read in Rome were Hannibal (yeah, the Thomas Harris one, not some scholarly tome on the Alp-crossing elephant-owner, so sue me for my vulgarity!) set in Florence and Vargas’s The Storyteller, set in South America. So where did I read Little Monsters, the subject of today’s review/interview? In the Scottish Highlands. And where is it set? Rome (and Buxton in the Peak District). It wasn’t planned that way: in fact, due to a ‘technical error’ my first copy was taken away from me and replaced, but that’s how it worked out and the synchronicity of it all pleases me greatly.
As did the novel. I like doing some of the work myself. I applaud an author who trusts me to give my attention and rewards me by allowing me to fill in some shadowy corners for myself. I enjoy novels with complicated and less than perfect characters, and I am fond of stories where the environment shapes the action, as it does in Little Monsters, both in the early story (where air and flight predominate) and the later one (where the coast both creates and constrains the narrative).
This isn’t a light book, either in scope or technique, there are moments of profound bleakness which will resonate with anybody who has had a troubled adolescence, but there are also flashes of honest feeling which never fall into the trap of the simple label (love, affection, trust, dependency) but which contain delicately nuanced emotions that show how long-established relationships create such blended feelings, and how it is never wise to judge others by surface impressions.
There is great assurance in the way the narrative moves through strong and painful situations. I think assurance is one of the gifts a good novelist gives the reader: like a concert violinist taking to the stage with confidence, assurance allows the audience to relax, knowing that the leader in this journey is sure about where we are heading. Where we end up is a different matter, and I suspect Little Monsters may will surprise readers, although there is not a single twist in the plot, it has a psychological suspense to it, reminiscent (to this reader) of Henry James. Dear reader, I recommend it to you.
All this is a meandering way of saying that the books I’ve read in Rome were Hannibal (yeah, the Thomas Harris one, not some scholarly tome on the Alp-crossing elephant-owner, so sue me for my vulgarity!) set in Florence and Vargas’s The Storyteller, set in South America. So where did I read Little Monsters, the subject of today’s review/interview? In the Scottish Highlands. And where is it set? Rome (and Buxton in the Peak District). It wasn’t planned that way: in fact, due to a ‘technical error’ my first copy was taken away from me and replaced, but that’s how it worked out and the synchronicity of it all pleases me greatly.
As did the novel. I like doing some of the work myself. I applaud an author who trusts me to give my attention and rewards me by allowing me to fill in some shadowy corners for myself. I enjoy novels with complicated and less than perfect characters, and I am fond of stories where the environment shapes the action, as it does in Little Monsters, both in the early story (where air and flight predominate) and the later one (where the coast both creates and constrains the narrative).
This isn’t a light book, either in scope or technique, there are moments of profound bleakness which will resonate with anybody who has had a troubled adolescence, but there are also flashes of honest feeling which never fall into the trap of the simple label (love, affection, trust, dependency) but which contain delicately nuanced emotions that show how long-established relationships create such blended feelings, and how it is never wise to judge others by surface impressions.
There is great assurance in the way the narrative moves through strong and painful situations. I think assurance is one of the gifts a good novelist gives the reader: like a concert violinist taking to the stage with confidence, assurance allows the audience to relax, knowing that the leader in this journey is sure about where we are heading. Where we end up is a different matter, and I suspect Little Monsters may will surprise readers, although there is not a single twist in the plot, it has a psychological suspense to it, reminiscent (to this reader) of Henry James. Dear reader, I recommend it to you.
April 28, 2009
There are things about this book that made me want to give it three stars - despite the very fine writing - e.g. the situation was maybe too familiar: the 'orphaned' girl who goes to live with a 'bad' relative with a favoured but stupid son; there were odd jumps in the plot, we never learn for example, how Uncle Joey became Jozef the lover/companion in later life or much about the narrator's murderous father; massive events (eg Jozef's WW2 past) done in a paragraph. However the story is complicated and improved by a current day (well 90s?) perspective interweaving another story about a rejected girl, a refugee in Italy, and the gaps become intriguing. 50s/60s Britain is also beautifully evoked - the schoolrooms and the pub. The steady power of the writing, observant and thoughtful, and the fact that several days later I'm still thinking about it and am left with several strong images - the glider incident, the rash on her legs, Aunt Margot, the art installation, the refugee's entry by sea - makes me go for four.
March 15, 2008
Mellifluous prose, patient dementia, remorse and recrimination—all the stuff that keeps you up late. Reading, ruminating.
March 25, 2009
A very gentle and beguiling read. It had a distinctly feminine touch, despite being written by a man with a moustache!
The way we were introduced to the characters felt very natural, very life-like, more akin to the way you get to know a person in the flesh than through the pages of a book. You didn't know everything straight away and didn't learn it in a linear way, they gave you bits of themselves when they were ready.
I liked the two halves of the story, the past the present, the England, the Italy, but I found shifting between them a little awkward, like I was displaced, I didn't really know how I had come from one to the other, I felt unsettled, but perhaps that was intentional.
Lambert writes well about women, and especially younger ones. And he introduces striking images that won't leave me in a hurry. I'm keen to check out his short story collection.
The way we were introduced to the characters felt very natural, very life-like, more akin to the way you get to know a person in the flesh than through the pages of a book. You didn't know everything straight away and didn't learn it in a linear way, they gave you bits of themselves when they were ready.
I liked the two halves of the story, the past the present, the England, the Italy, but I found shifting between them a little awkward, like I was displaced, I didn't really know how I had come from one to the other, I felt unsettled, but perhaps that was intentional.
Lambert writes well about women, and especially younger ones. And he introduces striking images that won't leave me in a hurry. I'm keen to check out his short story collection.
August 26, 2014
This very strange and elaborate version of the wicked stepmother tale is totally engrossing. He's created a whole lot of characters that are really unpleasant and chillingly calculating in a very ordinary way, with a plot that moves unpredictably and swiftly. It's very readable.
November 28, 2008
I loved this novel: compassionate, moving and not the kind of novel you forget in a hurry. See my blog review:
http://elizabethbaines.blogspot.com/2...
http://elizabethbaines.blogspot.com/2...
October 26, 2020
At times I really enjoyed this book. I found it difficult sometimes to connect the younger Carole to the adult Carole, and at times found it a little boring. The story was interesting though.
May 13, 2019
As a former foster child, I'm speechless for this author had me pegged from the start. How could he know those things that I went through as a man first of all, and as someone, I don't know? How I could not ask for basic necessities for being ashamed, afraid, alone. For feeling different and not belonging where I was and not being wanted. For feeling grateful for every scrap of affection or attention good or bad that I mistakenly received.
And how could the author know that as we grow older us former Foster's that we want so bad to rescue and save children that may have just a glimmer, or reflection, or representation in them that might have been in us as lost children. As if we could save our own selves as children if we could only save them. We are determined as Carol and Joseph to save that glimmer we see we desperately cling to the saving. Even if they don't want to be saved. It reminds me of a quote I related to at a young age by Carl Jung.
As a child, I felt myself to be alone, and I am still because I know of things and must hint of things which others know nothing of and for the most part do not want to know. You never really recover but you do become a survivor.
And how could the author know that as we grow older us former Foster's that we want so bad to rescue and save children that may have just a glimmer, or reflection, or representation in them that might have been in us as lost children. As if we could save our own selves as children if we could only save them. We are determined as Carol and Joseph to save that glimmer we see we desperately cling to the saving. Even if they don't want to be saved. It reminds me of a quote I related to at a young age by Carl Jung.
As a child, I felt myself to be alone, and I am still because I know of things and must hint of things which others know nothing of and for the most part do not want to know. You never really recover but you do become a survivor.
May 1, 2009
Sorry Charles (if you happen to read this, i noticed you rated it yourself and are a goodreads user) but i can only give the book 2 stars. At first i thought i had picked up a book aimed at young adults but read on anyway.
I think the story had some potential but was very disjointed. I liked the way the past and present were presented but felt there were parts of the story that seemed superfluous (Carol's relationship with Richie to name one).
There was never really an explanation as to why Joey and Carol moved to Italy. It left me asking questions as to why some things were even included in the book at all. It seemed to me that things just happened in the book without ever really being explained - why she ended up with her uncle for example.
I didnt hate the book i just thought there was too many characters and too little explanation in what was a brief story. I felt like some of the story was a bit weak.
Anyway i am no literary scholar but i know what i like to read and this isnt it.
I think the story had some potential but was very disjointed. I liked the way the past and present were presented but felt there were parts of the story that seemed superfluous (Carol's relationship with Richie to name one).
There was never really an explanation as to why Joey and Carol moved to Italy. It left me asking questions as to why some things were even included in the book at all. It seemed to me that things just happened in the book without ever really being explained - why she ended up with her uncle for example.
I didnt hate the book i just thought there was too many characters and too little explanation in what was a brief story. I felt like some of the story was a bit weak.
Anyway i am no literary scholar but i know what i like to read and this isnt it.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 14, 2013
I didn't really know what to think of this novel. It sort of left me with this empty feeling. Plus it was rather disturbing in parts. I never really understood the main character. Didn't know what she wanted, why she did things. Also, the changing between past and present happened out of nowhere and quite far into the book, which just deepened my confusion. It was well written but it just didn't give me any sort of emotions. I didn't laugh or cry. I did wonder a little about where the story would lead and end. But then I found that I was unsatisfied with the way it turned out, sort of incomplete. Not the most enjoyable reading experience and I probably wouldn't recommend it to anyone. I think it just wasn't my cup of tea.
September 11, 2016
I enjoyed the story unfolding but feel it was left unfinished. It was like the author had to rush the end or keep to a certain word count so just crammed everything in. Most frustrating, but good story
Read
April 21, 2020Interesting.
May 29, 2020
I’m giving this one three because it was provocative, but there quite a few things unanswered for me. It certainly kept me reading, and Lambert has a way with language, but it could have gotten a higher star count if it had been a bit more complete, and less all over the place. (It’s not that I even mind the unstructured structure.)
One bit I really appreciated is “‘That’s just how art should be,’ he says. ‘You should feel watched by art. It’s not there only to answer questions, you see, but to ask them, too.’” (P. 128).
One bit I really appreciated is “‘That’s just how art should be,’ he says. ‘You should feel watched by art. It’s not there only to answer questions, you see, but to ask them, too.’” (P. 128).
September 1, 2010
With the attention-grabbing first line; "When I was thirteen, my father killed my mother" this story soon had me racing through the pages, wondering just how 13 year old Carol ends up marrying Uncle Joey.
Thirteen year old Carol is sent to live with her Aunt Margot when her father is jailed for murdering her mother. Aunt Margot runs a pub with Uncle Joey, also living there is Carol's cousin Nicholas, a few years old than her - fat, lazy and not very bright. Carol is confused, nobody talks to her about her family, in fact Aunt Margot is downright cruel to her and often tells her that her mother was a whore. By the end of the story we understand why Margot behaves in such a way. Only Uncle Joey shows her any compassion - not her real Uncle, just a guy who Margot used so that she could get a pub tenancy. Joey is Polish, very secretive about his past, a thinker and an artist but cares.
The story is narrated alternatively by 13 year old Carol and then 30 years later by adult Carol - so we know from the start that she ends up married to Uncle Joey, that they work in Italy in a refugee camp and that Carol seems to form inappropriate attachments to some of the teenage refugee girls. One such girl is Kakuna - a mysterious, troubled girl who has a streak of violence simmering below the surface - it seems that Carol recognises something of herself in Kakuna.
The dual time narrative did become a little confusing in parts, yet also intriguing - knowing Carol's circumstances later in life made me want to dash back to the early years to see how she got there.
As more and more events are recounted, Carol's adult personality is formed and the reader understands some of her actions, although to be honest I felt that her relationship with Kakuna was a bit contrived and didnt add alot to the story line.
There is a lot of the story missing - how did Carol and Joey meet up again - we know he sacrificed a lot for her, but I wanted to know more. The story is told only from Carol's perspective and I think that at times she can be a pretty unreliable narrator - I would have loved to have know more about the other character's views on events. On the whole, despite and probably because of what she has been through, Carol is not the nicest of characters - she is very complex and I was left feeling as though I knew nothing about her really. On the other hand, Uncle Joey is a warm, steadying and very central character.
I'll be interested to read more of Charles Lambert's novels.
Thirteen year old Carol is sent to live with her Aunt Margot when her father is jailed for murdering her mother. Aunt Margot runs a pub with Uncle Joey, also living there is Carol's cousin Nicholas, a few years old than her - fat, lazy and not very bright. Carol is confused, nobody talks to her about her family, in fact Aunt Margot is downright cruel to her and often tells her that her mother was a whore. By the end of the story we understand why Margot behaves in such a way. Only Uncle Joey shows her any compassion - not her real Uncle, just a guy who Margot used so that she could get a pub tenancy. Joey is Polish, very secretive about his past, a thinker and an artist but cares.
The story is narrated alternatively by 13 year old Carol and then 30 years later by adult Carol - so we know from the start that she ends up married to Uncle Joey, that they work in Italy in a refugee camp and that Carol seems to form inappropriate attachments to some of the teenage refugee girls. One such girl is Kakuna - a mysterious, troubled girl who has a streak of violence simmering below the surface - it seems that Carol recognises something of herself in Kakuna.
The dual time narrative did become a little confusing in parts, yet also intriguing - knowing Carol's circumstances later in life made me want to dash back to the early years to see how she got there.
As more and more events are recounted, Carol's adult personality is formed and the reader understands some of her actions, although to be honest I felt that her relationship with Kakuna was a bit contrived and didnt add alot to the story line.
There is a lot of the story missing - how did Carol and Joey meet up again - we know he sacrificed a lot for her, but I wanted to know more. The story is told only from Carol's perspective and I think that at times she can be a pretty unreliable narrator - I would have loved to have know more about the other character's views on events. On the whole, despite and probably because of what she has been through, Carol is not the nicest of characters - she is very complex and I was left feeling as though I knew nothing about her really. On the other hand, Uncle Joey is a warm, steadying and very central character.
I'll be interested to read more of Charles Lambert's novels.
August 23, 2013
With the eye-catching first lines "When I was thirteen, my father killed me mother", Little Monsters is a heartbreaking story about how thirteen year old Carol had to deal with seeing her father kill her mother. Carol is then sent to her mother's sister - who is soon revealed to be jealous of her mother and the former lover of her father. Her life there would have been miserable if it were not for her Uncle Joey - Jozef, the man she will build a future with years later. Carol had a tragic past, her cousin Nicholas died while trying to run away from the cruel army, her boyfriend Richie loving her because he lusted after her, and her friend Patricia was never truly her friend.
There were lots of things missing from the book, like how she and Jozef met together again after he got out of prison. Also, how and why they moved to Italy. It was also never explained if they were married or not and why they only made love once in the book.
I also didn't get the ending. I wanted to know what the ending lines meant, but the book did no further explanation and simply ended with:
"This work will never be finished, I think. And no barn will ever hold it."
There were lots of things missing from the book, like how she and Jozef met together again after he got out of prison. Also, how and why they moved to Italy. It was also never explained if they were married or not and why they only made love once in the book.
I also didn't get the ending. I wanted to know what the ending lines meant, but the book did no further explanation and simply ended with:
"This work will never be finished, I think. And no barn will ever hold it."
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 12, 2012
Part way through: I got this as a free gift with something completely different. It is written describing several stages in the character's life. So far I find I am really interested in her past - as a child - but not her current situation - which is rather odd. It is written by a man (at least the author has a male name) but the character is female; I might not have known this from the text but it seems to grate on me a bit.
At the end: Oddly, two of my all time favourite books (The Ginger Tree and Memoirs of a Geisha) are written by a man using a female voice. This one is not at their level - I never felt fully reconciled to the character, especially as an adult. However, it was an absorbing read, and showed me some sides of life I would not have considered. I found the end rather unresolved, but maybe I missed the point.
I might read it again, but I might not. It wouldn't be the first book I'd recommend...
At the end: Oddly, two of my all time favourite books (The Ginger Tree and Memoirs of a Geisha) are written by a man using a female voice. This one is not at their level - I never felt fully reconciled to the character, especially as an adult. However, it was an absorbing read, and showed me some sides of life I would not have considered. I found the end rather unresolved, but maybe I missed the point.
I might read it again, but I might not. It wouldn't be the first book I'd recommend...
March 10, 2008
I wrote it. I love it. I'd love to know what you think.
April 16, 2023
It was a good book
June 5, 2014
review tomorrow
August 27, 2009
An accomplished novel that nevertheless left me feeling a little cold by the end.
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews