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Stars and Bars: A Novel
Sharply observed and brilliantly plotted, Stars and Bars is an uproarious portrait of culture clash deep in the heart of the American South, by one of contemporary literature’s most imaginative novelists.
A recent transfer to Manhattan has inspired art assessor Henderson Dores to shed his British reserve and aspire to the impulsive and breezy nature of Americans. But when Loomis Gage, an eccentric millionaire, invites him to appraise his small collection of Impressionist paintings, Dores's plans quite literally go south. Stranded at a remote mansion in the Georgia countryside, Dores is received by the bizarre Gage family with Anglophobic slurs, nausea-inducing food, ludicrous death threats, and a menacing face off with competing art dealers. By the time he manages to sneak back to New York City–sporting only a cardboard box–Henderson Dores realizes he is fast on the way to becoming a naturalized citizen.
From the Trade Paperback edition.
A recent transfer to Manhattan has inspired art assessor Henderson Dores to shed his British reserve and aspire to the impulsive and breezy nature of Americans. But when Loomis Gage, an eccentric millionaire, invites him to appraise his small collection of Impressionist paintings, Dores's plans quite literally go south. Stranded at a remote mansion in the Georgia countryside, Dores is received by the bizarre Gage family with Anglophobic slurs, nausea-inducing food, ludicrous death threats, and a menacing face off with competing art dealers. By the time he manages to sneak back to New York City–sporting only a cardboard box–Henderson Dores realizes he is fast on the way to becoming a naturalized citizen.
From the Trade Paperback edition.
356 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1984
154 people are currently reading
682 people want to read
About the author
William Boyd
69 books2,543 followersNote: William^^Boyd
Of Scottish descent, Boyd was born in Accra, Ghana on 7th March, 1952 and spent much of his early life there and in Nigeria where his mother was a teacher and his father, a doctor. Boyd was in Nigeria during the Biafran War, the brutal secessionist conflict which ran from 1967 to 1970 and it had a profound effect on him.
At the age of nine years he attended Gordonstoun school, in Moray, Scotland and then Nice University (Diploma of French Studies) and Glasgow University (MA Hons in English and Philosophy), where he edited the Glasgow University Guardian. He then moved to Jesus College, Oxford in 1975 and completed a PhD thesis on Shelley. For a brief period he worked at the New Statesman magazine as a TV critic, then he returned to Oxford as an English lecturer teaching the contemporary novel at St Hilda's College (1980-83). It was while he was here that his first novel, A Good Man in Africa (1981), was published.
Boyd spent eight years in academia, during which time his first film, Good and Bad at Games, was made. When he was offered a college lecturership, which would mean spending more time teaching, he was forced to choose between teaching and writing.
Boyd was selected in 1983 as one of the 20 'Best of Young British Novelists' in a promotion run by Granta magazine and the Book Marketing Council. He also became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in the same year, and is also an Officier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. He has been presented with honorary doctorates in literature from the universities of St. Andrews, Stirling and Glasgow. He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2005.
Boyd has been with his wife Susan since they met as students at Glasgow University and all his books are dedicated to her. His wife is editor-at-large of Harper's Bazaar magazine, and they currently spend about thirty to forty days a year in the US. He and his wife have a house in Chelsea, West London but spend most of the year at their chateau in Bergerac in south west France, where Boyd produces award-winning wines.
Of Scottish descent, Boyd was born in Accra, Ghana on 7th March, 1952 and spent much of his early life there and in Nigeria where his mother was a teacher and his father, a doctor. Boyd was in Nigeria during the Biafran War, the brutal secessionist conflict which ran from 1967 to 1970 and it had a profound effect on him.
At the age of nine years he attended Gordonstoun school, in Moray, Scotland and then Nice University (Diploma of French Studies) and Glasgow University (MA Hons in English and Philosophy), where he edited the Glasgow University Guardian. He then moved to Jesus College, Oxford in 1975 and completed a PhD thesis on Shelley. For a brief period he worked at the New Statesman magazine as a TV critic, then he returned to Oxford as an English lecturer teaching the contemporary novel at St Hilda's College (1980-83). It was while he was here that his first novel, A Good Man in Africa (1981), was published.
Boyd spent eight years in academia, during which time his first film, Good and Bad at Games, was made. When he was offered a college lecturership, which would mean spending more time teaching, he was forced to choose between teaching and writing.
Boyd was selected in 1983 as one of the 20 'Best of Young British Novelists' in a promotion run by Granta magazine and the Book Marketing Council. He also became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in the same year, and is also an Officier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. He has been presented with honorary doctorates in literature from the universities of St. Andrews, Stirling and Glasgow. He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2005.
Boyd has been with his wife Susan since they met as students at Glasgow University and all his books are dedicated to her. His wife is editor-at-large of Harper's Bazaar magazine, and they currently spend about thirty to forty days a year in the US. He and his wife have a house in Chelsea, West London but spend most of the year at their chateau in Bergerac in south west France, where Boyd produces award-winning wines.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 148 reviews
September 11, 2009
The best thing I can say about this book is that I got in on sale at a used bookstore for less than $4. The story follows Henderson Dores, an English expatriate working in New York at an auction house (think Christie's), as he travels to Georgia to acquire artwork from an eccentric millionaire. Of course I was expecting some good-natured joshing on the South--something akin to My Cousin Vinnie or that Reese Witherspoon movie. Boyd's portrayal of Georgia, however, is more along the lines of Deliverance, expect possibly more insulting, and is factually inaccurate. Boyd describes in detail every street corner on the upper Westside in Manhattan, and then doesn't even bother to check whether an intersection even exists in Atlanta before making it the location of an important scene in the story. To be fair, I will say that the most annoying and terrible character in the book is the main character and one is led to believe that many of his flaws stem from his English upbringing—Boyd is Scottish so this may be on purpose. If so, then kudos to him because he did a perfect job of creating the worst protagonist ever. Also, the plot itself becomes quite ridiculous, especially when the author throws in a ring of art counterfeiters for no particular reason. This book is an insult to the South, England, art dealers, and really anybody who reads.
September 8, 2018
I didn't enjoy this as much of some of William Boyd's other books. A seemed a bit far-fetched in places. It was about an English art dealer in America and his adventures in The Deep South, where he was totally out of his comfort zone. It was witty rather than laugh-out-loud funny.
June 1, 2009
I love the books of William Boyd. His Any Human Heart is one of my top favorite novels, up there with Kavalier and Clay, Atonement and Cloud Atlas. His Ice Cream War, set in the little known African theater of World War One, is among the finest of the war/imperial novels, right up there with anything by JG Farrell. A Good Man in Africa is right up there with Graham Greene's great ones. Armadillo is a well constructed examination of identity and the idea of Englishness.
Stars and Bars, which I just read, is not as good as those books. It has Boyd's trademark wit, but it lacks the deeper understanding of people that enrich his other books. The book is the closest thing to pure slapstick that I have yet encountered among his works. Henderson Dores is an Englishmen who longs to be American. The novel opens with him at work at an art house in NYC. He is sent into wildest Georgia to evaluate the collection of an elderly man.
Upon his arrival, he finds that most of the family is none too happy to see him. One son threatens to beat his ass with his head and one daughter is given to candid Anglophobia. He makes matters worse by trying to juggle two women, one of whose daughters travels with him to Georgia.
There are many funny moments, but the book just feels insubtantial when compared to the others. If this were one of his others, he might try to explore more of how Americans and the English interact. Here, it is mostly, if not entirely played for laughs. It isn't a bad book by any means, but don't expect something like his others.
Stars and Bars, which I just read, is not as good as those books. It has Boyd's trademark wit, but it lacks the deeper understanding of people that enrich his other books. The book is the closest thing to pure slapstick that I have yet encountered among his works. Henderson Dores is an Englishmen who longs to be American. The novel opens with him at work at an art house in NYC. He is sent into wildest Georgia to evaluate the collection of an elderly man.
Upon his arrival, he finds that most of the family is none too happy to see him. One son threatens to beat his ass with his head and one daughter is given to candid Anglophobia. He makes matters worse by trying to juggle two women, one of whose daughters travels with him to Georgia.
There are many funny moments, but the book just feels insubtantial when compared to the others. If this were one of his others, he might try to explore more of how Americans and the English interact. Here, it is mostly, if not entirely played for laughs. It isn't a bad book by any means, but don't expect something like his others.
March 13, 2015
Tedious, forced, painfully irritating.
Wow. I managed to get to chapter 14 and then just gave up. I decided that staring at the horizon until it got dark was a better option. That actually was what I did in the end.
I work offshore and the book just ground me down over a day with its weak plot which reads like some form of 1990's sitcom and its improbable (and impressively annoying) character names. I read often and have never submitted a review before. Yet Boyd has changed all that I have taken the leap, used my precious satellite internet connection & signed up (took 30 minutes to load this page!) and written my first review, if it will save just one persons day off from tedium then I have done my bit.
my particular copy is somewhere around 4 45.78 N, 5 34.69 W. Only after I launched it over the side did it occur to me that I hadn't weighted it sufficiently to send it to the bottom. Like its content the book proved to light and hollow, enough to remain afloat. I apologize in advance to anyone lost at sea on a raft who finds it, it might just tip them over the edge. Legally I feel responsible.
I'm off to stare angrily at myself in the mirror for being drawn in by the reviews...
Wow. I managed to get to chapter 14 and then just gave up. I decided that staring at the horizon until it got dark was a better option. That actually was what I did in the end.
I work offshore and the book just ground me down over a day with its weak plot which reads like some form of 1990's sitcom and its improbable (and impressively annoying) character names. I read often and have never submitted a review before. Yet Boyd has changed all that I have taken the leap, used my precious satellite internet connection & signed up (took 30 minutes to load this page!) and written my first review, if it will save just one persons day off from tedium then I have done my bit.
my particular copy is somewhere around 4 45.78 N, 5 34.69 W. Only after I launched it over the side did it occur to me that I hadn't weighted it sufficiently to send it to the bottom. Like its content the book proved to light and hollow, enough to remain afloat. I apologize in advance to anyone lost at sea on a raft who finds it, it might just tip them over the edge. Legally I feel responsible.
I'm off to stare angrily at myself in the mirror for being drawn in by the reviews...
June 30, 2013
I would have liked to have given this tragicomedy or comic tragedy 4.5 stars. But not 5 stars, as it does not quite reach that level of excellence. I enjoyed it, and was unable to put it down.
Henderson Dores, a British art-historian works for an art gallery in Manhattan. He wants to remarry his ex-wife, but is also reluctant to give up his relationship with his lover, Irene. His ex-wife will take him back but only when her two adolescent children from another marriage are prepared to accept him. For most people, this set of relationships would be sufficiently troublesome to trouble.
Henderson's life enters even more troubled waters when he is sent by his gallery to view a remarkably fine collections owned by a man in one of the southern states of the USA. Unwillingly, he has to be accompanied by his future step-daughter, a 14 year old obnoxious adolescent. They arrive at the house where the paintings are kept, and his problems begin to increase exponentially. The family that live in the house are, to put it mildly, dysfunctional. And, most of them are not at all pleased when he arrives.
This out-of-the-frying-pan-and-into-the-fireplace-story is British humour at its best, but in an American setting.
Henderson Dores, a British art-historian works for an art gallery in Manhattan. He wants to remarry his ex-wife, but is also reluctant to give up his relationship with his lover, Irene. His ex-wife will take him back but only when her two adolescent children from another marriage are prepared to accept him. For most people, this set of relationships would be sufficiently troublesome to trouble.
Henderson's life enters even more troubled waters when he is sent by his gallery to view a remarkably fine collections owned by a man in one of the southern states of the USA. Unwillingly, he has to be accompanied by his future step-daughter, a 14 year old obnoxious adolescent. They arrive at the house where the paintings are kept, and his problems begin to increase exponentially. The family that live in the house are, to put it mildly, dysfunctional. And, most of them are not at all pleased when he arrives.
This out-of-the-frying-pan-and-into-the-fireplace-story is British humour at its best, but in an American setting.
January 11, 2018
This is dire. I love Boyd's work, his use of history, the mix of good and bad that happen to people, his apparently detailed research. This is an attempt at a farce, but it just falls flat. People end up in situations and places just because Boyd wants them there; he doesn't even bother with a rationale. This is close to being an insult to people who admire his books. Still read Boyd but don't waste your time with this one.
December 28, 2020
2.5 stars. I would have given this book 3 full stars if not for the fact that the protagonist has a couple of lustful moments towards a teenage girl. That aside, the book was fairly absurd, though well-written. It was an easy read, but not one I would recommend to anyone.
April 25, 2020
Henderson Dores es un inglés sin carisma que vive en Nueva York y hace un viaje de trabajo al sur de Estados Unidos, compuesto por situaciones absurdas forzadas durante 380 páginas. Escatología y trastazos son la base de un cocktail que se supone es gracioso. Quién me lo prestó lo hizo de buena fé, pero vaya tostón. Admito que el último tercio lo leí más bien en diagonal. Es tedioso.
February 7, 2022
Meh, the Boyd book I've enjoyed least. Sometimes when you read a book the wider, current context really colours it. So this 1980s farce - and it is a farce rather than a comedy, even though it feels like it takes the first hundred pages to make its mind up on that - is, well, ok. It's about an English art critic - not too posh, but inherited wealth and privilege and all that, who ends up taking his 14 year old soon-to-be-stepdaughter on a trip to the deep south while he values some paintings for work. Stereotypes and hi jinks ensue. Some may be genuinely amusing, I liked the hotel and the American general having an affair jokes. Some bits are dated, and some - never cool (yeah, he leers after the 14 year old a couple of times). But against the binfire that is British politics at the moment, another plucky posh boy hoping to make things good but damn the consequences anyway was just a bit more depressing than amusing.
September 25, 2021
I recently reported that I thought "The Blue Afternoon" was the weakest by far of the many books by Boyd that I'd read. Never mind; "Stars and Bars" is. I believe that Mr. Boyd was trying to duplicate the kind of enjoyably comic antics on display in his first novel, "A Good Man in Africa," but his apparent unfamiliarity with the Deep South in the United States results in much of his humor falling flat. Really flat. I didn't care for the characters; they weren't credible; and their predicaments weren't funny. Possibly this was the rough draft for a screenplay by Boyd - which indeed followed, written for the film of the same name starring Daniel Day-Lewis. I won't be watching that.
Again, because there are so many wonderful novels by William Boyd, there is no need for readers to waste any further time over this one.
Again, because there are so many wonderful novels by William Boyd, there is no need for readers to waste any further time over this one.
February 15, 2016
After having read Boyd's Any Human Heart I ventured further into his literary catalogue, picking Stars and Bars. I was aware that with this one I could expect less of the serious writing and more of the chaotic, humerous and rather silly. I enjoyed about twenty pages, then I just wished it was over.
This might have come down to my personal very strong dislike of stories where the main character entangles themselves further and further into ridiculous situations instead of pulling the plug and leaving.
This might have come down to my personal very strong dislike of stories where the main character entangles themselves further and further into ridiculous situations instead of pulling the plug and leaving.
July 30, 2019
The divide between two cultures, England and the American south couldn’t be illustrated more poignantly. This story is what ‘page turners’ are all about. A broad range between barbarism and sophistication, between intention and naïveté, between ignorance and bliss. An absolute gem!
May 26, 2020
A perfect satire, loved the contrast between Britain and the US. Sharp and witty, and uproariously funny. Different from other Boyd books, but definitely worth it.
May 13, 2019
William Boyd's fiction is just a pleasure to read, silky sentences with laugh out loud humor. In this tale, a British art assessor is employed by an auction house in New York. He is hopeful that the move to the USA will help him become more focused and assertive. While juggling a plan to remarry his ex-wife and maintaining a relationship with his lover, Henderson is assigned to inspect an art collection in rural Georgia. He is unexpectedly accompanied by his ex-wife's surly and rebellious 14-year old daughter. You might call the Georgia family of the art collector a bit eccentric and you might conclude that Henderson's transplant to America does not achieve his goals. The whole collision of cultures and ensuing good humor makes for a very entertaining read.
January 30, 2026
I do enjoy Boyd’s writing; I always learn some new words ( hierophant & farinaceous in this case.) Here we have one of his common themes of a character with a normal life suddenly coming into and trying to navigate difficult circumstances. Its difference is that this is a farce, verging on the ridiculous at points, and satirising the differences between Brits and Americans. A light page-turner of a read.
December 25, 2023
Oh yes. Again, so stunningly different in theme, setting and plot to the others. Boyd’s fast becoming my favourite novelist for this reason.
Very funny, desperately sad at times, ironic, a great read.
Very funny, desperately sad at times, ironic, a great read.
June 23, 2020
great story, loved the style 👍📚☕️
April 21, 2023
Not as good as some of his others, but amusing and entertaining nonetheless.
Far fetched in places, but I still enjoyed it.
Far fetched in places, but I still enjoyed it.
August 20, 2011
I have just counted up the number of books written by William Boyd - 17 in the 30 years! That is prolific by anyone's standards. This novel is his 4th, published in 1984 and the 7th of his books I have read. Apart from Harry Potter books and Enid Blyton decades ago, I don't think I have read so many books by the same author. He really is very good. His stories full of interesting characters, trying to go about their normal lives but then finding themselves in difficult circumstances that somehow they manage to get themselves out of. And this story follows much the same theme, which you think you might actually start to get a bit sick of, but it really is like meeting an old friend - the stories are all different but also very familiar, and his plots and characters are so good you don't really mind!
So in this story, we meet Henderson Dores, a very English Englishman, art assessor, nearly 40, who has recently moved to New York to lend his considerable expertise to an art auction house. His personal life is in chaos - trying to rebuild his relationship with his ex wife, and a mistress on the side. He finds New York chaotic and is literally a fish out of water living there. Nothing seems to be going right. His chance to escape comes in the form of an unexpected assignment to the Deep South, Atlanta to be specific, to assess a rare art collection. And finds himself the middle man in a quite peculiar and dysfunctional family situation which threatens both his mental health and physical safety.
Through the ever more bizarre things that happen to him, including a crazy few hours in a theme hotel in Atlanta, and finding himself running for his life in the middle of the night in New York wearing nothing but some cardboard, he somehow retains his English-ness - his dignity, his manners, his impeccable dress sense. This just makes those all around him more buffoon like and madder than they already are.
I see the book was made into a movie in 1988, the screen play written by the author and starring Daniel Day-Lewis as Henderson Dores. I think it would be well worth seeing!
So in this story, we meet Henderson Dores, a very English Englishman, art assessor, nearly 40, who has recently moved to New York to lend his considerable expertise to an art auction house. His personal life is in chaos - trying to rebuild his relationship with his ex wife, and a mistress on the side. He finds New York chaotic and is literally a fish out of water living there. Nothing seems to be going right. His chance to escape comes in the form of an unexpected assignment to the Deep South, Atlanta to be specific, to assess a rare art collection. And finds himself the middle man in a quite peculiar and dysfunctional family situation which threatens both his mental health and physical safety.
Through the ever more bizarre things that happen to him, including a crazy few hours in a theme hotel in Atlanta, and finding himself running for his life in the middle of the night in New York wearing nothing but some cardboard, he somehow retains his English-ness - his dignity, his manners, his impeccable dress sense. This just makes those all around him more buffoon like and madder than they already are.
I see the book was made into a movie in 1988, the screen play written by the author and starring Daniel Day-Lewis as Henderson Dores. I think it would be well worth seeing!
August 20, 2016
“The best often seem the worst”
― William Boyd
Henderson Dores, an English art historian fast approaching 40 has moved to New York in the belief that America will change not only his life but also his character. There he works for an auction house as a valuer.Henderson is a stereo-typically inept British gentleman constantly getting the wrong end of the stick, and getting into awkward situations entirely due to his own fault. In New York, he has become re-engaged with his ex-wife but is also involved while in a clandestine affair with another woman. When he is sent to the deep South to value an elderly recluse's collection of paintings he becomes involved with the recluses wacky family and entwined in their antics. These people, the prickly father, the angry son and his Southern gal wife, the enigmatic daughter, the Viet Nam veteran, the truculent housekeeper and her son can also be seen as pretty stereo-typical.
Now whilst I quite enjoyed this book and it did make me smile if not actually laugh I felt that there were some shortcomings. Personally I felt that Henderson was just far too innocent, too polite and well bred ever to express anything but bewilderment. I felt that the author was trying to so rigidly stick to the stereo-type that he had imagined that he stopped the character from really forming. In fact I just wanted to shout at him "to grow a pair and man up'. Also I found the angry eldest son very predictable and was not at all surprised as to reason why he disliked Henderson. However, as I said it did at least make me smile so that can be no bad thing.
― William Boyd
Henderson Dores, an English art historian fast approaching 40 has moved to New York in the belief that America will change not only his life but also his character. There he works for an auction house as a valuer.Henderson is a stereo-typically inept British gentleman constantly getting the wrong end of the stick, and getting into awkward situations entirely due to his own fault. In New York, he has become re-engaged with his ex-wife but is also involved while in a clandestine affair with another woman. When he is sent to the deep South to value an elderly recluse's collection of paintings he becomes involved with the recluses wacky family and entwined in their antics. These people, the prickly father, the angry son and his Southern gal wife, the enigmatic daughter, the Viet Nam veteran, the truculent housekeeper and her son can also be seen as pretty stereo-typical.
Now whilst I quite enjoyed this book and it did make me smile if not actually laugh I felt that there were some shortcomings. Personally I felt that Henderson was just far too innocent, too polite and well bred ever to express anything but bewilderment. I felt that the author was trying to so rigidly stick to the stereo-type that he had imagined that he stopped the character from really forming. In fact I just wanted to shout at him "to grow a pair and man up'. Also I found the angry eldest son very predictable and was not at all surprised as to reason why he disliked Henderson. However, as I said it did at least make me smile so that can be no bad thing.
June 2, 2016
Very funny, very literate fish-out-of-water story concerning a Brit-born art dealer, "an Impressionist man," now in NYC, forced to take a trip to the Deep South to corral the purchase of several million dollars' worth of paintings.
He's recently begun a relationship with his ex-wife, who -- in the 15 years' interim -- married and divorced and has two kids, one a sulking 14-year-old girl. The protagonist is also in a relationship with another woman; neither woman is aware of the other's existence.
The voice is very British -- dry and funny -- and the writing reminds me of a cross between David Lodge and Kingsley Amis. There are some sequences, particularly one set at a "motor court," that seem to make reference to Nabokov's "Lolita," in terms of the American/Americana road-trip aspects and the friendship between an older man and a teenage girl (although in this case, there's really no prurience).
The man and the girl arrive at the home of the very eccentric military veteran Gage, head of a household of similarly eccentric kids and hangers-on. Two NY tough guys also play into the story.
I read this book very quickly -- lots of very effective comic suspense and unexpected turns of plot, although there was at least one (involving a blind daughter) that I could spot a mile away.
Looking far to picking up another Boyd novel.
He's recently begun a relationship with his ex-wife, who -- in the 15 years' interim -- married and divorced and has two kids, one a sulking 14-year-old girl. The protagonist is also in a relationship with another woman; neither woman is aware of the other's existence.
The voice is very British -- dry and funny -- and the writing reminds me of a cross between David Lodge and Kingsley Amis. There are some sequences, particularly one set at a "motor court," that seem to make reference to Nabokov's "Lolita," in terms of the American/Americana road-trip aspects and the friendship between an older man and a teenage girl (although in this case, there's really no prurience).
The man and the girl arrive at the home of the very eccentric military veteran Gage, head of a household of similarly eccentric kids and hangers-on. Two NY tough guys also play into the story.
I read this book very quickly -- lots of very effective comic suspense and unexpected turns of plot, although there was at least one (involving a blind daughter) that I could spot a mile away.
Looking far to picking up another Boyd novel.
February 26, 2022
As ever with William Boyd, beautifully written, with well-formed characters and a novel, unexpected plot. So in terms of pure prose, Boyd is never going to disappoint.
But what a waste. Fantastical situations that degenerate into farce, not in a fun-frolic sort of French-farce way, but just in a farcical nonsense way. The stumbling across the hotel atrium’s bizarre reception lake setting comes to mind. Likewise the night-time jaunt through New York wrapped in cardboard.
Characters that in Boyd’s other work resonate with irony, their hopes and failures captivating the reader, in this setting merely subside as meaningless ciphers.
A “comic masterpiece”? I don’t think so: William Boyd writes beautiful, wry, touching and affecting masterpieces but comedy isn’t his oeuvre. As comedy this is like one of those try-hard stand-ups that force feed you material that just constantly misses the mark.
For content and simple enjoyability this would have been one-star if not redeemed by Boyd’s usual writing excellence.
p.s. no wonder it’s so hard to find any way to stream the 80’s movie for which William Boyd also wrote the screenplay, and starred Daniel Day-Lewis. Even his presence couldn’t rescue the plot from the painful missed comedic opportunities - a true turkey.
But what a waste. Fantastical situations that degenerate into farce, not in a fun-frolic sort of French-farce way, but just in a farcical nonsense way. The stumbling across the hotel atrium’s bizarre reception lake setting comes to mind. Likewise the night-time jaunt through New York wrapped in cardboard.
Characters that in Boyd’s other work resonate with irony, their hopes and failures captivating the reader, in this setting merely subside as meaningless ciphers.
A “comic masterpiece”? I don’t think so: William Boyd writes beautiful, wry, touching and affecting masterpieces but comedy isn’t his oeuvre. As comedy this is like one of those try-hard stand-ups that force feed you material that just constantly misses the mark.
For content and simple enjoyability this would have been one-star if not redeemed by Boyd’s usual writing excellence.
p.s. no wonder it’s so hard to find any way to stream the 80’s movie for which William Boyd also wrote the screenplay, and starred Daniel Day-Lewis. Even his presence couldn’t rescue the plot from the painful missed comedic opportunities - a true turkey.
March 4, 2016
Perhaps this fairly amusing novel could be seen as a kind of 20th-century corrective to Henry James, whose theme of innocent Americans floundering in ultra-sophisticated Europe is here turned on its head: sophisticated Brit art historian gets flummoxed by the outwardly Beverly Hillbillies-like rubes in Luxora Beach, GA who turn out to be grasping and corrupt, and rake him over pretty thoroughly. leaving him estranged from ex-wife and girlfriend, out of a job, and creeping uptown along Park Ave. naked except for cardboard coveralls improvised in the alley after he escaped from murderous art forgers.
A different sort of story than I had anticipated, but I really don't know what I anticipated, after looking to read this for many years. A quick read, an early Boyd, whose themes and tyle have become more serious, I think, over the years.
I will remember Henderson's malleable personality, his unwillingness to confront or stand out, until circumstances force him to be stupidly brave, and that is where we leave him, still fleeing for his life, this time from the disappointed swain Duane, who blames him for spiriting away his love, Bryant.
A different sort of story than I had anticipated, but I really don't know what I anticipated, after looking to read this for many years. A quick read, an early Boyd, whose themes and tyle have become more serious, I think, over the years.
I will remember Henderson's malleable personality, his unwillingness to confront or stand out, until circumstances force him to be stupidly brave, and that is where we leave him, still fleeing for his life, this time from the disappointed swain Duane, who blames him for spiriting away his love, Bryant.
March 8, 2014
Following on the heels of A Good Man in Africa, Boyd transports another awkward Brit to a former colony: the USA. It doesn't quite work. You'll see on Wikipedia that it's the one Boyd novel that isn't loved enough to have its own page. Other, worse, stories do. But then that's the separation between fans of early and late Boyd.
May 16, 2007
this is a terrible book, I can't believe I read it.
it has the most ridiculous plot line,
and the most misleading title I have ever seen - Boyd chose to call the book 'Stars and Bars', before going on to describe one guy going into the large home of a very eccentric family and having some over the top adventures. absolutely nothing to do with stars or bars.
henry
it has the most ridiculous plot line,
and the most misleading title I have ever seen - Boyd chose to call the book 'Stars and Bars', before going on to describe one guy going into the large home of a very eccentric family and having some over the top adventures. absolutely nothing to do with stars or bars.
henry
June 10, 2022
Enjoyable read about an idiot Englishman in New York and the farcical events that unfold around him - and usually because of him. It is nowhere near the best William Boyd but not the worst either. Like Ordinary Thunderstorms (which IS the worst of his I have read) this book starts with a present tense plea to the reader to 'look' at the protagonist as he goes about his business.
November 27, 2009
An attempt at comedy that I found didn't really work. Bizarre story, strange unbelievable characters and ridiculous interactions. A disappointment after reading and enjoying some of his other books, but maybe I just missed the point somewhere.
June 30, 2014
I've enjoyed quite a few of William Boyd's books, but I found this early effort downright odd. It's allegedly a comedy but I suppose I just didn't get the humour, which led to me finding it pretty dull
November 20, 2017
A disappointing farce.
Boyd’s weakest novel. It felt as if he were trying out a new gig, way waaay off Broadway, and sticking it up the Amurricans while he was at it. Some people would love that, I suppose.
Boyd’s weakest novel. It felt as if he were trying out a new gig, way waaay off Broadway, and sticking it up the Amurricans while he was at it. Some people would love that, I suppose.
January 2, 2018
Early work, feeble attempt at parody of brash americans and wimpy Englishmen. Tom Sharpe would be embarrassed.
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