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Glow
South London, May 2010: foxes are behaving strangely, Burmese immigrants are going missing, and everyone is trying to get hold of a new party drug called Glow. A young man suffering from a rare sleep disorder will uncover the connections between all these anomalies in this taut, riveting new novel by a young writer hailed by The Guardian as “playful, arresting, unnerving, opulent, rude and—above all—deliciously, startlingly, exuberantly fresh.”
Twenty-two-year-old Raf spends his days walking Rose, a bull terrier who guards the transmitters for a pirate radio station, and his nights at raves in warehouses and launderettes. When his friend Theo vanishes without a trace, Raf’s efforts to find him will lead straight into the heart of a global corporate conspiracy. Meanwhile, he’s falling in love with a beautiful young woman he met at one of those raves, but he’ll soon discover that there is far more to Cherish than meets the eye.
Combining the pace, drama, and explosive plot twists of a thriller with his trademark intellectual, linguistic, and comedic pyrotechnics, Glow is Ned Beauman’s most compelling, virtuosic, and compulsively readable novel yet.
From the Hardcover edition.
257 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2014
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February 26, 2024
As some musicians have the gift of perfect pitch for musical notes, so Martin Amis observed that Elmore Leonard had the gift of perfect pitch for prose, a wonderfully smooth prose that continues page after page after page without the slightest hint of a rough edge, a smoothness and fluidity not even found in great writers such as Raymond Chandler or Henry James.
By my modest judgement, Ned Beauman also possesses a perfect pitch for prose, surely a prime reason why, in his Guardian Review of Glow, Edward Docx wrote its "worth taking a moment to celebrate Beauman's great originality and skill – as a maker of phrase, as a master of simile, as a scrupulous selector of words. Indeed, on a line-by-line basis, Beauman's intelligent aesthetic often provides pure revitalizing reading pleasure; he is playful, arresting, unnerving, opulent, rude and – above all – deliciously, startlingly, exuberantly fresh."
Master of simile, you say? Indubitably! Samples (two of many) of our young British author spicing the first chapter:
"The skyscrapers across the river and cramped together into one narrow band of the horizon's curve, a string of paper dolls, as marginal and unconvincing as one of those tourist board graphics where they cut and paste a dozen famous silhouettes into a greatest hits compilation."
"Someone's windscreen must have got knocked through outside Isaac's block of flats, because in the gutter there are diamonds of safety glass with which this morning's rain has mingled an alluvium of damp white blossom and a few fronds of synthetic wig hair caught on a chicken bone, like the shattered remains of a tribal fetish."
Glow is an intricately plodded International thriller that's, well, thrilling. Ned Beauman begins his turbocharged yarn thusly: we're at a small rave concert in London in the spring of 2010 when main character Raf, an appealing mix of hero, computer programmer, quick-witted slacker and Romeo wannabe, spots a gorgeous half-white, half-Asian gal with long black hair framing her distinctive facial features.
It's as if this boy meets girl scene serves as the firing of a starter's gun for a sprint - only here the dash covers fifteen days (exact times are noted within each day) in two hundred and some pages.
Twenty-two-year-old Raf has a medical condition known as non-24-hour sleep/wake syndrome - rather than the normal 24 hour cycle, Raf's cycle is about 25 hours. “It's like his brain is wearing a novelty watch.” Raf so wishes he could find something, anything, that will allow his to go to sleep and wake up like everyone else. Hey, could a new synthetic MDMA-like drug that's recently hit London, a drug called glow, be the answer?
And that half-white, half-Asian young lady mentioned above is a Burmese-American by the name of Cherish and her role in the unfolding drama can change at the drop of a pill or a pointing of a pistol. Keep an eye on this gal who came to London by way of Burma and Los Angeles.
A number of other players take their turn in the spotlight, including a couple of animals: 1) a bull terrier, Rose, who guards the transmitters for a pirate radio station when Raf isn't keeping her in his apartment or taking her for a walk; 2) red foxes of London that have a distinctive connection to the process of producing glow.
We have the opportunity to know more women and men in London during the two week cycle but here's the important point to underscore with this novel: many of the intriguing sections take place in other countries, Asia in particular, via characters sharing their detailed backstory with Raf. In this way, Ned Beauman proves himself a consummate storyteller.
Oh, yes, I noted Glow is an international thriller. One prime reason: the multinational corporation Lacebark recognizes more money can be made with glow than things like mining. How all this fits together makes for one spine-tingling, delightful read.
British author Ned Beauman, born in London in 1985
February 20, 2018
Ned Beauman is a brilliantly creative author. There are scenes in this book that are outrageously funny, and his depiction of the London drug subculture is richly detailed. Yet at times the book reads like an pharmaceutical text book.
The story line becomes convoluted at times almost like a keystone cops movie, some of the situations our POV characters encounter feel contrived and over done.
What I liked most in the book were the back stories of the minor characters and the adventures of Rose the dog.
As far a marketing is concerned, the dust jacket for the UK edition is vastly superior to the American one.
Over all the book left me unfulfilled. Read instead Beauman's previous book, if you haven't already titled "The Teleportation Accident: A Novel"
The story line becomes convoluted at times almost like a keystone cops movie, some of the situations our POV characters encounter feel contrived and over done.
What I liked most in the book were the back stories of the minor characters and the adventures of Rose the dog.
As far a marketing is concerned, the dust jacket for the UK edition is vastly superior to the American one.
Over all the book left me unfulfilled. Read instead Beauman's previous book, if you haven't already titled "The Teleportation Accident: A Novel"
February 22, 2022
(Review originally published on my blog, February 2014) The biggest challenge involved in reviewing a Ned Beauman book is knowing where to start. His stories are such eclectic mixtures of different characters and situations, with so many wild tangents and twists, that I feel it would probably be easier to just write 'expect the unexpected' and leave it at that. However, apparently the point of writing a positive review is to persuade other people to want to read the book... So here goes.
Glow starts with the protagonist, Raf - a Londoner with a sleeping disorder and a broken heart - attending a party in a launderette, where he's persuaded to try a new drug known as glow. At the same party, he spots a beautiful girl and instantly becomes obsessed with seeing her again. Okay, so this doesn't sound very interesting so far, but the first few pages are where the normality ends. From there, the book morphs into an unconventional conspiracy/drug thriller featuring a pirate radio station, soundless white vans and a very unethical PR man called Fourpetal. And a lot of foxes. Raf and his best friend Isaac become involved when their mutual friend Theo is kidnapped, unwittingly plunging themselves deeper and deeper into the sinister machinations of a global corporation.
Ned Beauman is the author of two previous novels, the fantastic Boxer, Beetle and the less good, but Booker-longlisted, The Teleportation Accident. Both were at least partially set circa WWII, so Glow marks Beauman's first real venture into contemporary fiction. And although I loved Boxer, Beetle in particular, reading Glow made me wonder why he hasn't always written stuff like this. I would probably have liked the story anyway, but like the author's previous books, Glow is elevated to another level altogether by its brilliantly inventive narrative style. Playing with language, repeatedly delving into short but detailed flashbacks to flesh out minor characters, throwing complex scientific explanations into the mix... The writing never stops being surprising and delightful, and the sparkiness of it is perfectly suited to the setting of modern-day London, equal parts hedonistic playground and brutalist nightmare. Having felt rather lukewarm about the main character in The Teleportation Accident, it was a relief to find that Raf was likeable and that most of the characters, while flawed in a very realistic way, were easy to relate to (with a few deliberately grotesque exceptions).
Previously, Beauman's narratives with their frequent coincidences and humour have reminded me a lot of Jonathan Coe, but this time I was put in mind of David Mitchell too. If you enjoyed the stories in Ghostwritten and Cloud Atlas, chances are you will love this - it's like one of those taken and fleshed out into a full-length book: similarly original and intelligent and unpredictable.
I know some people have been put off Beauman's books by The Teleportation Accident, and others by comments he's made about readers, but honestly, I can't recommend Glow enough. When I reached the end, my immediate thought was that I wished I could scrub it from my mind so I could have the experience of reading it for the first time all over again: that's the hallmark of a really great book, as far as I'm concerned. This is my favourite of 2014 so far, and despite the fact that we're only a week into February, I feel that if I read anything better this year, it will be an incredible year for books. I already can't wait for his fourth novel.
Glow starts with the protagonist, Raf - a Londoner with a sleeping disorder and a broken heart - attending a party in a launderette, where he's persuaded to try a new drug known as glow. At the same party, he spots a beautiful girl and instantly becomes obsessed with seeing her again. Okay, so this doesn't sound very interesting so far, but the first few pages are where the normality ends. From there, the book morphs into an unconventional conspiracy/drug thriller featuring a pirate radio station, soundless white vans and a very unethical PR man called Fourpetal. And a lot of foxes. Raf and his best friend Isaac become involved when their mutual friend Theo is kidnapped, unwittingly plunging themselves deeper and deeper into the sinister machinations of a global corporation.
Ned Beauman is the author of two previous novels, the fantastic Boxer, Beetle and the less good, but Booker-longlisted, The Teleportation Accident. Both were at least partially set circa WWII, so Glow marks Beauman's first real venture into contemporary fiction. And although I loved Boxer, Beetle in particular, reading Glow made me wonder why he hasn't always written stuff like this. I would probably have liked the story anyway, but like the author's previous books, Glow is elevated to another level altogether by its brilliantly inventive narrative style. Playing with language, repeatedly delving into short but detailed flashbacks to flesh out minor characters, throwing complex scientific explanations into the mix... The writing never stops being surprising and delightful, and the sparkiness of it is perfectly suited to the setting of modern-day London, equal parts hedonistic playground and brutalist nightmare. Having felt rather lukewarm about the main character in The Teleportation Accident, it was a relief to find that Raf was likeable and that most of the characters, while flawed in a very realistic way, were easy to relate to (with a few deliberately grotesque exceptions).
Previously, Beauman's narratives with their frequent coincidences and humour have reminded me a lot of Jonathan Coe, but this time I was put in mind of David Mitchell too. If you enjoyed the stories in Ghostwritten and Cloud Atlas, chances are you will love this - it's like one of those taken and fleshed out into a full-length book: similarly original and intelligent and unpredictable.
I know some people have been put off Beauman's books by The Teleportation Accident, and others by comments he's made about readers, but honestly, I can't recommend Glow enough. When I reached the end, my immediate thought was that I wished I could scrub it from my mind so I could have the experience of reading it for the first time all over again: that's the hallmark of a really great book, as far as I'm concerned. This is my favourite of 2014 so far, and despite the fact that we're only a week into February, I feel that if I read anything better this year, it will be an incredible year for books. I already can't wait for his fourth novel.
November 17, 2014
Once again the British cover of a books beats the American cover. C'mon publishers, Foxes sell books!
October 21, 2014
From MDMA to LSD to an unusual drug called, Glow, the book speaks about those hidden secrets of organic chemistry behind the making of these powerful drugs, that its bound to amaze and surprise you in a million ways!
Glow! - Surprise, guess what it's a Burmese drug, made from the petals of a Burmese flower. Glow by Ned Beauman is an intriguing and a quite unusual tale of a young insomniac guy whose life turns upside down when a scandal and speculation begins around a certain drug called, Glow and he gets dragged into the underworld’s secretive businesses. This tale is filled with so many enriching facts about drugs and their chemicals go into making them. An enthralling plot that is bound to capture you with its flow and mysteries from the very beginning.
I'd like to thank the author, Ned Beauman, for giving me this opportunity to read and review this book.
Raf, actually named Ralph, is a young boy, just out of his uni, living in South London, doing some computer programming freelancing. He's an insomniac, and a frequent drug-taker. He and his childhood friend from Myth FM, Issac, used to hit all the popular rave parties around London and never stopped themselves from experimenting with many unusual drugs. And in one such party, Raf meets Cherish, an extraordinary half- Burmese girl, who was quite well aware of this most speculated drug of that time called-Glow. But when Raf's friend, Theo, a Burmese guy, gets kidnapped in a white van making no sounds, things starts to fall into their places and the unraveling mystery around this mysterious drug, Glow, becomes more appealing to Raf.
And quoting by Bob Marley's words;
“When you smoke the herb, it reveals you to yourself.”
Similarly, in the book Glow, when people, like Raf, Cherish, Fourpetal, a Lacebark accountant and Win, a Burmese drug-maker get themselves more involved into the mystery of Glow and the secret behind the hyper-intelligent foxes, they eventually give away the terrible secrets of their past!
I liked this story a lot, and in fact, I got so hooked to its mystery that for moments I lost myself in the mining lands of Burma to the dark warehouses in South London. But the climax was quite shocking and more that justifiable and a bit sad on Raf's part. The characters are no doubt quite well-developed and a very convincing type. Raf and Cherish's relationship is more like a drug to the readers, we can't get enough of them, and when we get it, we get addicted to them. And then Lacebark's takeover of power in drug making industry from Burmese Concession to the jails of Pakistan, everything has been portrayed so vividly. It seems that the author is quite a story-teller and the way he has presented his logic and technical explanations behind all those drugs' characteristics, is quite enticing. I loved the author's grip on this suspense and all the twists and turns were kept well-hidden under wraps till the very end and were peeled away layer by layer.
So if you want to wrap yourself up in a hallucination that you hate to give it up, and then do read this book for sure. This book might keep you on your edges till the very end!
P.S. Do not Google anything about this drug called, Glow! Because you won't find anything on it. And if you wanna know all about it, this book is going to be your pal!
Glow! - Surprise, guess what it's a Burmese drug, made from the petals of a Burmese flower. Glow by Ned Beauman is an intriguing and a quite unusual tale of a young insomniac guy whose life turns upside down when a scandal and speculation begins around a certain drug called, Glow and he gets dragged into the underworld’s secretive businesses. This tale is filled with so many enriching facts about drugs and their chemicals go into making them. An enthralling plot that is bound to capture you with its flow and mysteries from the very beginning.
I'd like to thank the author, Ned Beauman, for giving me this opportunity to read and review this book.
Raf, actually named Ralph, is a young boy, just out of his uni, living in South London, doing some computer programming freelancing. He's an insomniac, and a frequent drug-taker. He and his childhood friend from Myth FM, Issac, used to hit all the popular rave parties around London and never stopped themselves from experimenting with many unusual drugs. And in one such party, Raf meets Cherish, an extraordinary half- Burmese girl, who was quite well aware of this most speculated drug of that time called-Glow. But when Raf's friend, Theo, a Burmese guy, gets kidnapped in a white van making no sounds, things starts to fall into their places and the unraveling mystery around this mysterious drug, Glow, becomes more appealing to Raf.
And quoting by Bob Marley's words;
“When you smoke the herb, it reveals you to yourself.”
Similarly, in the book Glow, when people, like Raf, Cherish, Fourpetal, a Lacebark accountant and Win, a Burmese drug-maker get themselves more involved into the mystery of Glow and the secret behind the hyper-intelligent foxes, they eventually give away the terrible secrets of their past!
I liked this story a lot, and in fact, I got so hooked to its mystery that for moments I lost myself in the mining lands of Burma to the dark warehouses in South London. But the climax was quite shocking and more that justifiable and a bit sad on Raf's part. The characters are no doubt quite well-developed and a very convincing type. Raf and Cherish's relationship is more like a drug to the readers, we can't get enough of them, and when we get it, we get addicted to them. And then Lacebark's takeover of power in drug making industry from Burmese Concession to the jails of Pakistan, everything has been portrayed so vividly. It seems that the author is quite a story-teller and the way he has presented his logic and technical explanations behind all those drugs' characteristics, is quite enticing. I loved the author's grip on this suspense and all the twists and turns were kept well-hidden under wraps till the very end and were peeled away layer by layer.
So if you want to wrap yourself up in a hallucination that you hate to give it up, and then do read this book for sure. This book might keep you on your edges till the very end!
P.S. Do not Google anything about this drug called, Glow! Because you won't find anything on it. And if you wanna know all about it, this book is going to be your pal!
July 9, 2017
I'm really getting tired of this kind of books. They are always ultra-dense with culture and social references, lots of drug use and young-generation angst, but there is no real story, all the characters are representations of ideas and not real people and of course, everything is just soooo cool but with no real point. There is nothing here that we haven't all read, heard and talked about a thousand times before. Even though it's so trendy to like this writer right now, I do not feel I can get anything from reading him right now. Maybe in a few years' time, when he gets over his need to impress so much, and starts to use his talent for better things.
March 29, 2016
New review! GLOW, over at my blog for a few weeks: http://tinyurl.com/h5uhnju
It's got financial, social, chemical chicanery! It's got doomed love! Alfred A. Knopf publishes Ned Beauman's third, very accomplished novel.
It's got financial, social, chemical chicanery! It's got doomed love! Alfred A. Knopf publishes Ned Beauman's third, very accomplished novel.
August 3, 2016
An insomniac gets drawn into south London’s criminal underworld in search of the origins of a new Ecstasy-like drug. What might it have to do with his neighborhood's sudden profusion of Burmese people – and hyper-intelligent foxes?
This is Beauman’s most contemporary story, after the bizarre World War II time-travelling of Boxer, Beetle and The Teleportation Accident, and in some ways Glow is refreshingly hip. The chemistry of drugs is a theme that surely capitalizes on the success of Breaking Bad. Like Beauman’s other novels, this one focuses on the unlikely adventures of an endearing antihero, and manages a few moments of sweetness despite fairly filthy sexual content. But at the same time, it lacks the other two’s pure zaniness, and fails to provide any laugh-out-loud moments. I appreciated Glow mostly as a hymn to the hidden charms of Beauman’s native south London; he also has a knack for surprisingly apt metaphors. If you like your novels gritty and current, à la Irvine Welsh or Will Self, you should find this one a quick and enjoyable read.
(See my full review at The Bookbag.)
This is Beauman’s most contemporary story, after the bizarre World War II time-travelling of Boxer, Beetle and The Teleportation Accident, and in some ways Glow is refreshingly hip. The chemistry of drugs is a theme that surely capitalizes on the success of Breaking Bad. Like Beauman’s other novels, this one focuses on the unlikely adventures of an endearing antihero, and manages a few moments of sweetness despite fairly filthy sexual content. But at the same time, it lacks the other two’s pure zaniness, and fails to provide any laugh-out-loud moments. I appreciated Glow mostly as a hymn to the hidden charms of Beauman’s native south London; he also has a knack for surprisingly apt metaphors. If you like your novels gritty and current, à la Irvine Welsh or Will Self, you should find this one a quick and enjoyable read.
(See my full review at The Bookbag.)
July 14, 2014
Coming in at only 249 pages, Glow is a book that should have taken me two days to read, three days tops. Well, that number got blown out of the water as it's taken me a grand total of 18 days, or close enough to 14 pages per day! I think overall too many things just got in the way of Glow - the imminent arrival of the new bub (who at the time of writing this still has not made her much anticipated appearance - stage fright methinks!), long hours at work due to financial year end, the World Cup in Brazil and even the Tour de France. All have come before Glow which you're no doubt thinking doesn't say much for the wow factor of the book...
Well, to an extant you're probably right as the book didn't exactly glow for me either. Rather than being one of those 100 watt bulbs that burn your eyes away by looking into them for to long this book was more like one of those energy saver bulbs that take forever to warm up. I also must be a sucker for a good cover as the psychedelic fox on the front really caught my eye but maybe that says more about me than I'd like to admit...
While trawling through these pages I was very much reminded of those times back in school trying to read through those dense chemistry textbooks, trying to get to the good parts that would tell me what chemicals I'd need to mix so I could blow shit up or create some obnoxious smelling gas that would stink out the neighbours. All I got was a mouthful of words that I could never pronounce and the realization that the chemist vocation wasn't for me. Words like dimethylcathinone, N-methylyhio-tetrazole and monomethylhydrazine still have me stuttering over them!
Seeing as the book is all about drugs and the endless highs that some people are forever chasing, it's only fitting that our story starts in the midst of a rave in the south of London and we are introduced to our chief protagonist, Raf.
Raf is a party drug connoisseur, a man out of sync with the world due to a rare condition known as non-24-hour sleep/wake syndrome (basically his circadian rhythm is set to 25 hours rather than the standard earth day of 24). During the rave Raf meets the exotically beautiful Cherish and through her is drawn into what amounts to be a conspiracy that involves a London pirate radio station, Burmese immigrants and a corrupt global mining company named Lacebark – not to mention Glow and its mysterious origins. Oh, and throw in a few foxes for good measure as not only do they enjoy riding on buses but they play an integral part in proceedings as well.
As mentioned earlier, although the book didn't really shine as bright as it could have, I felt myself gradually warming to it and overall thought it was a pretty good read with a well plotted storyline, a fairly likeable anti-hero in Raf and found that Ned Beauman is rather handy when it comes to similies...
Well, to an extant you're probably right as the book didn't exactly glow for me either. Rather than being one of those 100 watt bulbs that burn your eyes away by looking into them for to long this book was more like one of those energy saver bulbs that take forever to warm up. I also must be a sucker for a good cover as the psychedelic fox on the front really caught my eye but maybe that says more about me than I'd like to admit...
While trawling through these pages I was very much reminded of those times back in school trying to read through those dense chemistry textbooks, trying to get to the good parts that would tell me what chemicals I'd need to mix so I could blow shit up or create some obnoxious smelling gas that would stink out the neighbours. All I got was a mouthful of words that I could never pronounce and the realization that the chemist vocation wasn't for me. Words like dimethylcathinone, N-methylyhio-tetrazole and monomethylhydrazine still have me stuttering over them!
Seeing as the book is all about drugs and the endless highs that some people are forever chasing, it's only fitting that our story starts in the midst of a rave in the south of London and we are introduced to our chief protagonist, Raf.
Raf is a party drug connoisseur, a man out of sync with the world due to a rare condition known as non-24-hour sleep/wake syndrome (basically his circadian rhythm is set to 25 hours rather than the standard earth day of 24). During the rave Raf meets the exotically beautiful Cherish and through her is drawn into what amounts to be a conspiracy that involves a London pirate radio station, Burmese immigrants and a corrupt global mining company named Lacebark – not to mention Glow and its mysterious origins. Oh, and throw in a few foxes for good measure as not only do they enjoy riding on buses but they play an integral part in proceedings as well.
As mentioned earlier, although the book didn't really shine as bright as it could have, I felt myself gradually warming to it and overall thought it was a pretty good read with a well plotted storyline, a fairly likeable anti-hero in Raf and found that Ned Beauman is rather handy when it comes to similies...
The moon is a silver pill half dissolved on the tongue of the night.
... headlights sweeping across the playground like the blank eyes of a wraith.
Someone's windscreen must have got knocked through outside Isaac's block of flats, because in the gutter there are diamonds of safety glass which with this morning's rain has mingled an alluvium of damp white blossom and a few fronds of synthetic wig hair caught on a chicken bone, like the shattered remains of a tribal fetish.And a rather good Wordsmith as well...
An anonymous email address, a pill capsule, a padlocked warehouse door, a joyful look in a girl’s eyes – you just have to push blindly through to the space behind them and hope there’s no void there to trap you.Overall, 3 stars.
February 23, 2014
The main character in this novel is a young man called Raf, who lives in South London, has a sleep disorder and who is feeling lonely after breaking up with his girlfriend. When we first meet him, two things of importance occur – one, he sees a beautiful young girl, called Cherish, who he is immediately besotted by and two, he is offered the ‘new thing’, a drug called Glow. It soon becomes apparent that Raf lives slightly on the margins of society. His sleep disorder means that finding gainful employment is difficult for him and his main way of earning money is by working on computer programmes or walking the dog which guards the transmitter for a pirate radio station.
Mostly set on the streets of London, the story is really a global one; a delightfully woven mixture of various storylines, built around Raf’s longing for Cherish, the fact that his friend Theo, and owner of the radio station, disappears, a multinational company called Lacebark, mysterious Burmese people who suddenly seem to be everywhere, silent white vans who are dragging people off the streets, the drug Glow and lots of foxes... The author manages to take the familiar and turn it into something quite unique and original. In this novel he has taken big business, mixed it with politics and the drug trade and given us an everyday hero – a man more interested in parties, video games and recreational drugs than in fighting multinational crime. Before long Raj, his friend Isaac and a former employee of Lacebark called Mark Fourpetal, are attempting to find out the whereabouts of Theo and Cherish and discover what Lacebark are really up to.
This is a very entertaining novel and, like everything by Ned Beauman, highly original. Only once you have finished this book do you realise quite what a feat he managed to pull off in writing it and making it so believable. I feel that much of what makes the book work are the characters and Raf is such a likeable protagonist, who is often completely out of his depth, but is a caring and kind friend and always brave. Lastly, I received a copy of this book from the publishers, via NetGalley, for review.
Mostly set on the streets of London, the story is really a global one; a delightfully woven mixture of various storylines, built around Raf’s longing for Cherish, the fact that his friend Theo, and owner of the radio station, disappears, a multinational company called Lacebark, mysterious Burmese people who suddenly seem to be everywhere, silent white vans who are dragging people off the streets, the drug Glow and lots of foxes... The author manages to take the familiar and turn it into something quite unique and original. In this novel he has taken big business, mixed it with politics and the drug trade and given us an everyday hero – a man more interested in parties, video games and recreational drugs than in fighting multinational crime. Before long Raj, his friend Isaac and a former employee of Lacebark called Mark Fourpetal, are attempting to find out the whereabouts of Theo and Cherish and discover what Lacebark are really up to.
This is a very entertaining novel and, like everything by Ned Beauman, highly original. Only once you have finished this book do you realise quite what a feat he managed to pull off in writing it and making it so believable. I feel that much of what makes the book work are the characters and Raf is such a likeable protagonist, who is often completely out of his depth, but is a caring and kind friend and always brave. Lastly, I received a copy of this book from the publishers, via NetGalley, for review.
May 27, 2014
(Declaration: we're sorta friends now - in the sense that he's a nice guy and we end up doing events together because showrunners tend to put us up at the same time, but we haven't met more than four times - so I'm biased here. Also, I got sent this book by the publisher. See my remarks on bribery in my review of Samit Basu's "Resistance" for what that means to me.)
This book is like cramming a block of milk chocolate and LSD laced with drug-smuggling and corporate malfeasance directly into your mind and washing it down with Coca Cola and then going to a performance poetry evening featuring polymath biochemists. Whether you enjoy this experience will depend on whether that's what you want a book to do. It is not your daddy's crime thriller. It is not a graceful gazelle of moral-emotional fulfillment or a gritty Scandinavian treatise on sexual violence and futility. It is not even like what Irvine Welsh might write if he were riffing madly on pop culture and conspiracy novels while stoned. It is Ned's book. Make your own decisions.
This book is like cramming a block of milk chocolate and LSD laced with drug-smuggling and corporate malfeasance directly into your mind and washing it down with Coca Cola and then going to a performance poetry evening featuring polymath biochemists. Whether you enjoy this experience will depend on whether that's what you want a book to do. It is not your daddy's crime thriller. It is not a graceful gazelle of moral-emotional fulfillment or a gritty Scandinavian treatise on sexual violence and futility. It is not even like what Irvine Welsh might write if he were riffing madly on pop culture and conspiracy novels while stoned. It is Ned's book. Make your own decisions.
August 10, 2015
Teniendo en cuenta que Beauman es autor de uno de los libros más divertidos, irreverentes e inclasificables que se han publicado en los últimos años, esta segunda aproximación a la obra del joven escritor británico encierra un decepcionante saldo comparativo. En efecto, no es Glow el mejor sucesor de ese monumental El accidente del teletransporte que cabría esperar, pero aún así conserva algunas características interesantes que la convierten en una novela muy loca, imprevisible y camaleónica, una aventura por los subterráneos del narcotráfico que tan pronto se convierte en una emocionante historia de espionaje industrial como en un psicodélico viaje de ácido en busca de un colega desaparecido. No, no os podéis perder a Ned Beauman.
November 19, 2014
Being one of the few (apparently. Opinions vary, but - The Man Booker people aside - they're mostly on the ambivalent end of the scale) who actually loved The Teleportation Accident, and Boxer, Beetle too, I was hoping for more of the same from Ned Beauman, but Glow is very, very different. This is - at its most basic - a whodunnit conspiracy thriller with additional pharmaceuticals (an awful lot of the latter). Lots happens (not going to spoil): most which concerns criminal multi-national goings-on in Burma/Myanmar and other exotic locations, but for the most part, it's very London-centric.
As you'd expect from a Ned Beauman novel, it's a mad and mental ride - but nothing like as insane as I was expecting/hoping. It's actually rather tame in that regard, decidedly less imaginative than his previous novels (the ones I loved). This feels like Ned's bid for the mainstream. Consequently, I've no doubt it will do better, be more popular, than his previous work. I enjoyed it: it's a genuine thriller; it kept me guessing, but I didn't love it. I prefer his usual, totally off his synapses style. I appreciate mine is a minority opinion; please do not let it sway you. If you're in the market for an odder-than-average conspiracy thriller, this cannot fail to please you.
As you'd expect from a Ned Beauman novel, it's a mad and mental ride - but nothing like as insane as I was expecting/hoping. It's actually rather tame in that regard, decidedly less imaginative than his previous novels (the ones I loved). This feels like Ned's bid for the mainstream. Consequently, I've no doubt it will do better, be more popular, than his previous work. I enjoyed it: it's a genuine thriller; it kept me guessing, but I didn't love it. I prefer his usual, totally off his synapses style. I appreciate mine is a minority opinion; please do not let it sway you. If you're in the market for an odder-than-average conspiracy thriller, this cannot fail to please you.
July 30, 2016
Although this is an entertaining read and typical of Ned Beauman's style in his needling attention to the minutiae of his subject, it is very much lacking in comparison to his first two novels. Where they punched the reader into a historical terrain of sex and depravity that made you cringe and laugh at every turn, this merely plods along retaining the readers' interest without inspiring it.
One of the main downfalls I felt was the characters. The lead male was flat, the 'love interest' appeared half formed rather than mysterious, in fact the most intriguing character, Theo, we never meet. However, the prose is solid and flows well, his South London setting is uncannily familiar and the lunacy of secret meetings in McDonalds about giant corporations conspiring with pirate radio stations to the ends of fox crap are brilliantly bonkers. Although this interweaving and subversion of cultures and commodities is still present, there are few of the magically dark turns of phrase, shrewdly outrageous plot twists and intricacies that were so unforgettable in his previous work, which is what makes this a fun but perhaps average read.
One of the main downfalls I felt was the characters. The lead male was flat, the 'love interest' appeared half formed rather than mysterious, in fact the most intriguing character, Theo, we never meet. However, the prose is solid and flows well, his South London setting is uncannily familiar and the lunacy of secret meetings in McDonalds about giant corporations conspiring with pirate radio stations to the ends of fox crap are brilliantly bonkers. Although this interweaving and subversion of cultures and commodities is still present, there are few of the magically dark turns of phrase, shrewdly outrageous plot twists and intricacies that were so unforgettable in his previous work, which is what makes this a fun but perhaps average read.
May 2, 2016
Bij uitgeverij Nieuw Amsterdam, de uitgever van Glow, werd een aantal maanden geleden een hevige discussie gevoerd over de Ned Beauman, en meer precies over zijn boeken. Beauman’s eerste boek Boxer, Beetle (niet vertaald) stond in 2011 op de shortlist voor de Desmond Elliott Prize en in 2012 op de shortlist van de Guardian First Book. Zijn tweede boek De jacht op AdeleDe jacht op Adele (oorspronkelijke titel The Teleportation Accident) stond in 2012 op de longlist voor de Man Booker Prize en won in datzelfde jaar de Encore Award. Bovendien maakte Beauman in 2013 deel uit van de Granta list of 20 best young writers en werd hij door The culture show verkozen tot een van de beste twaalf nieuwe Britse talenten.
Waarom die discussie als uit bovenstaande duidelijk blijkt dat Nieuw Amsterdam een prima slag heeft geslagen met het binnenhalen van deze jonge schrijver? Het probleem is, zo valt te lezen op de site van de uitgever, dat Beauman uitsluitend supergoede recensies krijgt, maar dat zijn boeken nauwelijks verkopen. Gelukkig hebben ze toch besloten om Glow te vertalen onder het motto “We gaan net zolang door met Beauman totdat lezers gaan twitteren: “Hé Beauman, schiet eens op met dat volgende boek!”
Dat is een prima motto, want dat is precies wat iedere lezer (met een Twitteraccount) zal willen doen zodra de laatste pagina van Glow is uitgelezen. Dat komt niet door het verhaal van Raf, maar door de wijze waarop het vertelt wordt. Neem bijvoorbeeld de wijze waarop Glow begint:
Als Raf haar voor het eerst ziet, zit hij op een wasmachine en staat hij op het punt een achtste gram te slikken van iets wat een mengsel blijkt te zijn van speed, mononatriumglutamaat en een experimenteel medicijn tegen sociale fobie bij honden.
Raf komt er niet aan toe om het spul in te slikken, omdat hij zijn ogen niet van 'haar' kan afhouden. Ze is half blank en half iets anders, mogelijk Thais, en ze heeft zo'n gezicht waarvan de hele botstructuur zich zodanig vanuit de jukbeenderen lijkt te vertakken dat het resultaat eruitziet als een 3D-computerafbeelding uit de jaren tachtig omdat het is samengesteld uit een zeer overzichtelijk aantal hoekige platte vlakken, alleen wordt de hoekigheid in dit geval doorbroken door strengen lang zwart haar die zijn losgeraakt uit de speld waarmee ze de rest van achteren heeft opgestoken; verder heeft ze een kleine mond die neigt naar een natuurlijke lichte pruilstand, wat haar wel goed van pas zal komen als ze wil doen alsof ze iets afkeurt zonder in lachen uit te barsten, en draagt ze een zwarte hoodie met openstaande rits over een slordig grijs shirt.
Tussen Raf en het meisje bevinden zich zo'n 60 dansende mensen, omdat op dat moment in de wasserette een kleine rave wordt gehouden. Hij verliest het meisje uit het oog, maar krijgt wel - via, via - een portie glow, de nieuwe drug, volgens kenners de aller-, allerlekkerste drug ter wereld.
Raf vindt het meisje terug, vindt uit waar glow vandaan komt en hoe het gemaakt wordt, en wat het een met het ander te maken heeft. Maar ook welke rol zijn favoriete radiozender speelt, waarom die witte, elektrische bestelbusjes mensen ontvoeren en wat er met die mensen gebeurt en nog veel meer. Tijdens zijn speurtocht dwaalt Raf door heel Zuid-Londen op plaatsen waar hij nooit eerder geweest is en soms zelfs kleine wildernissen zijn ontstaan. Plekken waar vossen zich thuis voelen en chocoladepapiertjes, die eruitzien alsof ze diep van binnen wel weten dat ze niet biologisch afbreekbaar zijn maar die toch hun best doen, gewoon om zich bij de omgeving aan te passen.
Glow is maf, maar niet absurd. Glow lijkt een thriller, maar speelt het slechts. Glow doet soms, heel in de verte denken aan een kruising van Pynchon's De veiling van nr 49 en Inherent Vice, terwijl de witte bestelbusjes net zo veraf, maar toch doen denken aan de bende rolstoelende moordenaars uit Infinite Jest van David Foster Wallace. Dat zijn enorme namen ter vergelijking om zo'n jonge schrijver mee te belasten, maar Ned Beauman kan dat aan. Zijn stijl is uniek, grappig, lastig en geweldig waardoor je Glow in één adem uitleest.
En vervolgens via Twitter om het volgende boek gaat vragen....
Fantastisch vertaald door Wim Scherpenisse & Gerda Baardman.
Waarom die discussie als uit bovenstaande duidelijk blijkt dat Nieuw Amsterdam een prima slag heeft geslagen met het binnenhalen van deze jonge schrijver? Het probleem is, zo valt te lezen op de site van de uitgever, dat Beauman uitsluitend supergoede recensies krijgt, maar dat zijn boeken nauwelijks verkopen. Gelukkig hebben ze toch besloten om Glow te vertalen onder het motto “We gaan net zolang door met Beauman totdat lezers gaan twitteren: “Hé Beauman, schiet eens op met dat volgende boek!”
Dat is een prima motto, want dat is precies wat iedere lezer (met een Twitteraccount) zal willen doen zodra de laatste pagina van Glow is uitgelezen. Dat komt niet door het verhaal van Raf, maar door de wijze waarop het vertelt wordt. Neem bijvoorbeeld de wijze waarop Glow begint:
Als Raf haar voor het eerst ziet, zit hij op een wasmachine en staat hij op het punt een achtste gram te slikken van iets wat een mengsel blijkt te zijn van speed, mononatriumglutamaat en een experimenteel medicijn tegen sociale fobie bij honden.
Raf komt er niet aan toe om het spul in te slikken, omdat hij zijn ogen niet van 'haar' kan afhouden. Ze is half blank en half iets anders, mogelijk Thais, en ze heeft zo'n gezicht waarvan de hele botstructuur zich zodanig vanuit de jukbeenderen lijkt te vertakken dat het resultaat eruitziet als een 3D-computerafbeelding uit de jaren tachtig omdat het is samengesteld uit een zeer overzichtelijk aantal hoekige platte vlakken, alleen wordt de hoekigheid in dit geval doorbroken door strengen lang zwart haar die zijn losgeraakt uit de speld waarmee ze de rest van achteren heeft opgestoken; verder heeft ze een kleine mond die neigt naar een natuurlijke lichte pruilstand, wat haar wel goed van pas zal komen als ze wil doen alsof ze iets afkeurt zonder in lachen uit te barsten, en draagt ze een zwarte hoodie met openstaande rits over een slordig grijs shirt.
Tussen Raf en het meisje bevinden zich zo'n 60 dansende mensen, omdat op dat moment in de wasserette een kleine rave wordt gehouden. Hij verliest het meisje uit het oog, maar krijgt wel - via, via - een portie glow, de nieuwe drug, volgens kenners de aller-, allerlekkerste drug ter wereld.
Raf vindt het meisje terug, vindt uit waar glow vandaan komt en hoe het gemaakt wordt, en wat het een met het ander te maken heeft. Maar ook welke rol zijn favoriete radiozender speelt, waarom die witte, elektrische bestelbusjes mensen ontvoeren en wat er met die mensen gebeurt en nog veel meer. Tijdens zijn speurtocht dwaalt Raf door heel Zuid-Londen op plaatsen waar hij nooit eerder geweest is en soms zelfs kleine wildernissen zijn ontstaan. Plekken waar vossen zich thuis voelen en chocoladepapiertjes, die eruitzien alsof ze diep van binnen wel weten dat ze niet biologisch afbreekbaar zijn maar die toch hun best doen, gewoon om zich bij de omgeving aan te passen.
Glow is maf, maar niet absurd. Glow lijkt een thriller, maar speelt het slechts. Glow doet soms, heel in de verte denken aan een kruising van Pynchon's De veiling van nr 49 en Inherent Vice, terwijl de witte bestelbusjes net zo veraf, maar toch doen denken aan de bende rolstoelende moordenaars uit Infinite Jest van David Foster Wallace. Dat zijn enorme namen ter vergelijking om zo'n jonge schrijver mee te belasten, maar Ned Beauman kan dat aan. Zijn stijl is uniek, grappig, lastig en geweldig waardoor je Glow in één adem uitleest.
En vervolgens via Twitter om het volgende boek gaat vragen....
Fantastisch vertaald door Wim Scherpenisse & Gerda Baardman.
February 24, 2018
Bu kitaba ikinci başlayışımdı. İlkinde 50 sayfa falan okuduktan sonra bırakmıştım. Geçenlerde gözüme çarptı, bu sefer okuyacağım bu kitabı dedim. Okudum ama nasıl okudum bilmiyorum. O kadar çok sıkıldım ki size anlatamam. Konuyu merak ediyorum evet, yazar güzel yazmış tamam ama bir şey o kadar eksik ki gitmiyor kitap. Baya süründü sürekli yanımda taşıdım kitabı. Boş bulduğum zaman okudum fakat ona rağmen zor bitti.
Bir günü 25 saat olarak algılayan bir karakterimiz var. Baya merak ediyorsunuz tabi. “Nasıl ya 25 saat? Ee o zaman işlerini yapacak fazladan 1 saatin olur ehehe” diye yorum yapıyorlar bu karaktere. Yazarda zaten okurların böyle düşüneceğini bildiği için bunun üzerinden anlatmış bize. Nasıl bir rahatsızlık olduğunu. Bazen rahatsızlık mı yoksa bir lütuf mü neymiş bu falan diye. Baş karakteri sevdim mi bilmiyorum. Köpeği Rose’u daha çok sevdim o bir kesin. Sonra Londra’da bu sokak senin bu sokak benin, şuraya giderken otobüse falan bineyim diyen tilkiler var. Bu Tilkiler her yerde. Tüm bunların yanında Breakin Bad’in kristal meth’i gibi Londra’da ki gençlerinde GLOW adında bir uyuşturucusu var. Konu falan süper geliyor değil mi? Düşündüm ki bundan bilim kurgu klasiklerinde ki gibi bir tad alabilirim belki. Yok olmadı… Cherish diye bir ablamız var o da baş kız gibi bir şey. Onun hayatını da ara sıra okuyoruz. Aslında onu okumak baş karakteri okumaktan daha güzel ve heyecanlıydı diyebilirim. Bu kitap o kızın üzerinden anlatılsa daha güzel olurdu. Ayrıca baş karakterin yani Raf’ın bir günü 25 saat olarak algılamasını, bu yaşadığı sorunları kitabın devamında pek göremedim. İlk başında belli bir yerde vardı ondan sonra yoktu sanki. Ya da ben o kadar dikkatli okumadım.
Yazarın bu kitabını fazla beğenmesem de diğer kitaplarını hala merak ediyorum ve kesinlikle bir şans daha vereceğim.
Bir günü 25 saat olarak algılayan bir karakterimiz var. Baya merak ediyorsunuz tabi. “Nasıl ya 25 saat? Ee o zaman işlerini yapacak fazladan 1 saatin olur ehehe” diye yorum yapıyorlar bu karaktere. Yazarda zaten okurların böyle düşüneceğini bildiği için bunun üzerinden anlatmış bize. Nasıl bir rahatsızlık olduğunu. Bazen rahatsızlık mı yoksa bir lütuf mü neymiş bu falan diye. Baş karakteri sevdim mi bilmiyorum. Köpeği Rose’u daha çok sevdim o bir kesin. Sonra Londra’da bu sokak senin bu sokak benin, şuraya giderken otobüse falan bineyim diyen tilkiler var. Bu Tilkiler her yerde. Tüm bunların yanında Breakin Bad’in kristal meth’i gibi Londra’da ki gençlerinde GLOW adında bir uyuşturucusu var. Konu falan süper geliyor değil mi? Düşündüm ki bundan bilim kurgu klasiklerinde ki gibi bir tad alabilirim belki. Yok olmadı… Cherish diye bir ablamız var o da baş kız gibi bir şey. Onun hayatını da ara sıra okuyoruz. Aslında onu okumak baş karakteri okumaktan daha güzel ve heyecanlıydı diyebilirim. Bu kitap o kızın üzerinden anlatılsa daha güzel olurdu. Ayrıca baş karakterin yani Raf’ın bir günü 25 saat olarak algılamasını, bu yaşadığı sorunları kitabın devamında pek göremedim. İlk başında belli bir yerde vardı ondan sonra yoktu sanki. Ya da ben o kadar dikkatli okumadım.
Yazarın bu kitabını fazla beğenmesem de diğer kitaplarını hala merak ediyorum ve kesinlikle bir şans daha vereceğim.
March 20, 2015
I guess I would get more out of this manic book if I was a little more keen about neurochemistry or about drugs or about corporate evil. I'm keen about none of them and therefore not the target audience. But still, the whole thing was fun and short enough to keep me reading. This is my first Ned Beauman book, and I liked it sufficiently to think it's high time I picked up The Teleportation Accident.
November 11, 2015
A corrupt mining company in Burma stumbles across a new drug, glow, for which it wants sole distribution. Its operation moves to London were a local lad gets involved with Burmese revolutionaries to thwart their plans. Interesting, but not many thrills for a thriller.
July 8, 2014
This book was provided to me by the publisher at no cost.
I am not the target audience of this novel. It revolves almost entirely around the drug-taking sub-culture in south London, and that's definitely not my scene. Nor am I particularly enamored of the brisk yet also sometimes fastidiously detailed sex scenes, nor the veering between sparse details on one page and then extravagant description on another. I admit I skimmed portions of the novel.
The fact that I skimmed is actually a back handed compliment, because I did actually want to finish it. My description of it revolving around drugs is true, but a bit unfair, because the drugs are merely a gateway (if you will) into a story about modern colonialism: that is, how the corporations do it. It's a thriller, so there's chases and double crosses and sell-outs; shifty people and honest people and people who got caught in the cross fire. There's also a pirate radio station, raves, and a dog. And the main character's biology works on a 25-hour cycle; I still haven't figured out whether I think this is entirely a gimmick, or if it's a clever little bit of character development. I guess it could be both, but I am leaning towards 'gimmick' because except for making him want to sleep at odd hours (uh, like a lot of twenty-somethings) and function well in the middle of the night sometimes, it didn't have that much impact.
If you are less squeamish (or prudish?) than me about drugs, and want a fairly fast paced thriller that includes corporate evilness, you could do worse than this. But calling Beauman one of the top new British novelists is, based on this example, a bit much.
I am not the target audience of this novel. It revolves almost entirely around the drug-taking sub-culture in south London, and that's definitely not my scene. Nor am I particularly enamored of the brisk yet also sometimes fastidiously detailed sex scenes, nor the veering between sparse details on one page and then extravagant description on another. I admit I skimmed portions of the novel.
The fact that I skimmed is actually a back handed compliment, because I did actually want to finish it. My description of it revolving around drugs is true, but a bit unfair, because the drugs are merely a gateway (if you will) into a story about modern colonialism: that is, how the corporations do it. It's a thriller, so there's chases and double crosses and sell-outs; shifty people and honest people and people who got caught in the cross fire. There's also a pirate radio station, raves, and a dog. And the main character's biology works on a 25-hour cycle; I still haven't figured out whether I think this is entirely a gimmick, or if it's a clever little bit of character development. I guess it could be both, but I am leaning towards 'gimmick' because except for making him want to sleep at odd hours (uh, like a lot of twenty-somethings) and function well in the middle of the night sometimes, it didn't have that much impact.
If you are less squeamish (or prudish?) than me about drugs, and want a fairly fast paced thriller that includes corporate evilness, you could do worse than this. But calling Beauman one of the top new British novelists is, based on this example, a bit much.
August 22, 2019
A satisfying techno-thriller romp through London's underworld, full of corporate misdeeds, exploitation, false identities and a good dog. Beauman is clearly heavily influenced by William Gibson's work, and the story here could have been a side-plot from any of his Blue Ant trilogy. The pacing is pretty janky, and there's a lot of clumsy exposition, but there are some great ideas here, and characters I was drawn to more than expected, particularly Win. I found myself more interested in the backstories of each character than the actual goings-on in the present, though. Beauman also really, really likes similes. Long similes, Blackadder-length similes. Often they're quite entertaining, and sometimes they're laborious. There's plenty to like here, and despite its flaws I was thoroughly into this book.
June 26, 2016
A novel about psychedelic paranoia told by an insomniac drug addict who embodies Big Lebowskian slacker dude-ism just didn’t do it for me. Sure, there’s something to be said about
Glow
's roughshod whimsy and manic imagery (yay, foxes!), but I couldn't get into it. I felt like the designated driver at the bar on New Year's Eve: everyone's tipsiness around you makes your own sobriety seem depressing. I’m sure there’s a complexity here that would blow my mind if I just stuck with it, but when everything is dialed up and skewed, the novelty just wore off. The various encomiums to drug chemistry were interesting though.
February 1, 2016
Wow, ich liebe dieses Buch! Rezension folgt! :)
March 19, 2016
Işınlanma Kazası'nı sevmemiştim. Bu da içimi sıktı bıraz, yer yer lafı çok uzatıyor. Bir daha Ned Beauman okumam.
August 21, 2016
bitti sonunda.
January 24, 2021
Oh my God, how boring was that? How boring were the substories? I can’t believe that I finally finished the book, every page felt like an hour
May 3, 2021
Si lo hubiera leído cuando lo descubrí seguramente no me habría gustado mucho o lo hubiera dejado. Era más joven y hubiera estado esperando otro tipo de libro. Así que justo lo he leído en el tiempo adecuado y tengo que decir que estas son las movidas de libros que me gustan :)
January 31, 2019
Wow, I could not put this book down, it was seemingly addictive, like the glow in the story, I loved it. Highly recommended.
September 1, 2024
Put me in mind of a mash up of The Wind-up Bird Chronicle crossed with Snow Crash - mad, but superb.
Read
November 7, 2015I loved reading this even if some aspects of its authorship and style made me a little sick to my stomach. Located somewhere in the nexus of tech-addled science obsessed cryptothrillers bounded on one side by the high literary ravin' Thomas Pynchon and on the other side by the more prosaic and pedestrian (read: clear and accessible) Max Barry, Ned Beauman's Glow is full of intellectually excited ideas and some of the most beautiful and sophisticated metaphors I've read by any contemporary English language writer. The plot revs along joyously with enough twists and reversals of fortune to satisfy. Some of the characters are quite compelling and memorable as well. I'm thinking particularly of Fourpetal, the brash coward and Win, the gay Burmese wannabe gangster chemist internet troll nerd boy. Win really is the best character, as you can tell from the description. Had the book been more about Win, I can only imagine it would have profited for it. Other characters are a little thin or blend together a bit too much, and the plot and subject matter had potential for more harrowing switchbacks and dense layered craziness towards the end of the book, which is just a little anticlimatic to tell you the truth, but these are forgivable flaws.
My bigger complaint is how much in the text I saw the man pulling the strings behind the curtain. Ned Beauman is obviously a highly curious and intellectually omnivorous individual. Most of the time, this works in his favor. His integration of complex topics of neurochemistry and psychopharmacology into the structure, plot, characters, and metaphors of a lithe literary thriller is much appreciated. But there are moments when the book recalls a bad novel by one of his great influences, John Updike, mainly by occasionally lapsing into undigested research and a sort of repugnantly retrograde male sexuality.
I should make a few disclosures of my own at this point. I have only read one novel by John Updike, by chance due to my travels his awful late career Tristan and Isolde adaptation Brazil, described in Updike's Times obituary as an 'embarassing effort' characterized by 'undigested research and bad dialogue.' And though Glow is actually a very good novel unlike Brazil, the comparison between the two is illustrative for a few reasons. Essentially their flaws and strengths are the same. The difference is that much more of Glow is taken up by its strengths.
But Glow does suffer from the occasional bout of undigested research. For example, Beauman makes a completely unnecessary direct reference to a book called The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy by Jacob Burckhardt. This stuck out to me in particular because I have had occasion to read Beauman's blog in the past. One time I came across a post where he is very excited about a book he has discovered called The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy by Jacob Burckhardt. I love that Beauman feels great enthusiasm about books, and his made up philosophical book within the book entitled "Lacunosities" is an exciting to a Borgesian tradition that I favor quite a lot. But he's not batting 1000 in this regard, to make a completely unnecessary sports reference.
Much more troublingly, Glow exhibits what appears to be an unfortunate sexual fetish that Beauman the author possesses. To be fair, I don't have any evidence from Beauman's blog to back up this claim, and indeed I hope I am wrong about it. But Beauman appears to be have some yellow fever going on. The white male Londoner protagonist that shares more than a few characteristics in common with Beauman himself is quite enamored of Burmese and Japanese women. This fetish is not suggested as such, but I read it out of the fact that this protagonist lusts after a sexy Burmese female interpolation of Che Guevara and James Bond throughout the book. The only other women that I remember getting more than a passing mention in this novel are a couple of Japanese women who hang out around his best friend's apartment for somewhat esoteric reasons. They also serve as objects of male sexual fantasy and perhaps ninja-like wiles. There's a really horrible joke about whether these women have 'let themselves go' near the end of the book.
Again, I hope this is a misreading and I will find a more enlightened take on sexuality in Beauman's other work (actually there are aspects of sexuality that are interesting in this book, but it doesn't bode well that it happens to be the more clinical and scientific side of things where Beauman excels in discussing the subject). Until then, I hope it's an aberration that it reminds me of Updike's abhorrent fetish with depicting an Afro-Brazilian black man fucking a blonde white Brazilian woman as the ultimate transgression.
My bigger complaint is how much in the text I saw the man pulling the strings behind the curtain. Ned Beauman is obviously a highly curious and intellectually omnivorous individual. Most of the time, this works in his favor. His integration of complex topics of neurochemistry and psychopharmacology into the structure, plot, characters, and metaphors of a lithe literary thriller is much appreciated. But there are moments when the book recalls a bad novel by one of his great influences, John Updike, mainly by occasionally lapsing into undigested research and a sort of repugnantly retrograde male sexuality.
I should make a few disclosures of my own at this point. I have only read one novel by John Updike, by chance due to my travels his awful late career Tristan and Isolde adaptation Brazil, described in Updike's Times obituary as an 'embarassing effort' characterized by 'undigested research and bad dialogue.' And though Glow is actually a very good novel unlike Brazil, the comparison between the two is illustrative for a few reasons. Essentially their flaws and strengths are the same. The difference is that much more of Glow is taken up by its strengths.
But Glow does suffer from the occasional bout of undigested research. For example, Beauman makes a completely unnecessary direct reference to a book called The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy by Jacob Burckhardt. This stuck out to me in particular because I have had occasion to read Beauman's blog in the past. One time I came across a post where he is very excited about a book he has discovered called The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy by Jacob Burckhardt. I love that Beauman feels great enthusiasm about books, and his made up philosophical book within the book entitled "Lacunosities" is an exciting to a Borgesian tradition that I favor quite a lot. But he's not batting 1000 in this regard, to make a completely unnecessary sports reference.
Much more troublingly, Glow exhibits what appears to be an unfortunate sexual fetish that Beauman the author possesses. To be fair, I don't have any evidence from Beauman's blog to back up this claim, and indeed I hope I am wrong about it. But Beauman appears to be have some yellow fever going on. The white male Londoner protagonist that shares more than a few characteristics in common with Beauman himself is quite enamored of Burmese and Japanese women. This fetish is not suggested as such, but I read it out of the fact that this protagonist lusts after a sexy Burmese female interpolation of Che Guevara and James Bond throughout the book. The only other women that I remember getting more than a passing mention in this novel are a couple of Japanese women who hang out around his best friend's apartment for somewhat esoteric reasons. They also serve as objects of male sexual fantasy and perhaps ninja-like wiles. There's a really horrible joke about whether these women have 'let themselves go' near the end of the book.
Again, I hope this is a misreading and I will find a more enlightened take on sexuality in Beauman's other work (actually there are aspects of sexuality that are interesting in this book, but it doesn't bode well that it happens to be the more clinical and scientific side of things where Beauman excels in discussing the subject). Until then, I hope it's an aberration that it reminds me of Updike's abhorrent fetish with depicting an Afro-Brazilian black man fucking a blonde white Brazilian woman as the ultimate transgression.
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