What do you think?
Rate this book
Ordinary Thunderstorms
One May evening in London, Adam Kindred, a young climatologist in town for a job interview, is feeling good about the future as he sits down for a meal at a little Italian bistro. He strikes up a conversation with a solitary diner at the next table, who leaves soon afterward. With horrifying speed, this chance encounter leads to a series of malign accidents, through which Adam loses everything - home, family, friends, job, reputation, passport, credit cards, cell phone - never to get them back.
The police are searching for him. There is a reward for his capture. A hired killer is stalking him. He is alone and anonymous in a huge, pitiless modern city. Adam has nowhere to go but down - underground. He decides to join that vast army of the disappeared and the missing who throng London's lowest levels as he tries to figure out what to do with his life and struggles to understand the forces that have made it unravel so spectacularly. Adam's quest will take him all along the river Thames, from affluent Chelsea to the gritty East End, and on the way he will encounter all manner of London's denizens - aristocrats, prostitutes, evangelists, and policewomen - and version after new version of himself.
Ordinary Thunderstorms, William Boyd's electric follow-up to his award-winning Restless, is a profound and gripping novel about the fragility of social identity, the corruption at the heart of big business, and the secrets that lie hidden in the filthy underbelly of every city.
The police are searching for him. There is a reward for his capture. A hired killer is stalking him. He is alone and anonymous in a huge, pitiless modern city. Adam has nowhere to go but down - underground. He decides to join that vast army of the disappeared and the missing who throng London's lowest levels as he tries to figure out what to do with his life and struggles to understand the forces that have made it unravel so spectacularly. Adam's quest will take him all along the river Thames, from affluent Chelsea to the gritty East End, and on the way he will encounter all manner of London's denizens - aristocrats, prostitutes, evangelists, and policewomen - and version after new version of himself.
Ordinary Thunderstorms, William Boyd's electric follow-up to his award-winning Restless, is a profound and gripping novel about the fragility of social identity, the corruption at the heart of big business, and the secrets that lie hidden in the filthy underbelly of every city.
Audiobook
First published August 11, 2009
498 people are currently reading
3574 people want to read
About the author
William Boyd
69 books2,484 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.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,002 reviews
Read
November 20, 2022
Ordinary Thunderstorms - combination fast-paced thriller and sprawling Charles Dickens-like London saga.
During an interview, William Boyd recounts Charles Dickens both opened and closed Our Mutual Friend with a scene at a river in London. Ah, London, the British author continues, the most cosmopolitan, diversified city in the world, even outflanking New York; London, a city spread out over many hundreds of square miles - and unlike other cities, London’s vitality and uniqueness is as manifest at its edges as it is at its center.
At the time of the novel's publication in 2010, Mr. Boyd had been living in London for over twenty years. He set out to capture the verve and pulsing rhythms of the city, now his city, in Ordinary Thunderstorms, his tenth novel. And, oh, yes, a London river plays a major part in the story from beginning to end.
What a humdinger. Ordinary Thunderstorms features four interlinking narratives with characters ranging from rich and powerful to off the radar homeless. Readers will come away knowing a fair amount about pharmacology, private security companies, police work, housing projects, religious cults, charities, London hospitals, climatology as well as the Thames and Chelsea Bridge.
The person at the eye of Mr. Boyd's fictional storm is one Adam Kindred, a tall, single, 31-year-old British climatologist returned from the US to London to take a job interview for an attractive university post. But, but, but . . . right on page 10 Adam makes a decision that will forever change his life.
A life changer in Chapter One reminds me of the author who made a specialty of such - none other than Georges Simenon with his 100+ existential roman durs (hard novels).
True to form, William Boyd has Adam Kindred enter the flat of Dr. Philip Wang, an immunologist he met at a restaurant that evening, enter to drop off a file the scientist left behind, only to find Wang slumped on his bed with the handle of a knife protruding from his blood soaked sweater. "Pull it out," Wang says. Playing the part of a true gentleman, Adam obliges. Moments later Wang is dead.
Should Adam call the police? Aaaah! What an impossible twist of cruel fate. With Wang's blood on his fingers and under his fingernails and his fingerprints on the knife, what chance does he stand to prove his innocence? Adam doesn't hang around to find out. Nope. He decides to go underground until the police nail the real killer.
For Adam, going underground to maintain his freedom means shedding all traces of his former self. Thus William Boyd has constructed the ideal framework to explore one of his abiding themes - the nature of identity, its fluidity, its mutability. Who would you be without your name and your role within society? How and where would you live without job or money? Why would you continue your struggle for survival? Adam is about to find out, big time.
Similar to many other first-rate literary novelists, Mr. Boyd judges character to be at the epicenter of a cracking story - hardly a surprise for anybody familiar with the author's other novels - A Good Man in Africa, Brazzaville Beach, Restless, to name just three. The author has woven a phalanx of colorful, memorable women, men and children into his narratives. For Ordinary Thunderstorms, in addition to Adam, here are five of my favorites:
Rita Nashe- Young, attractive policewoman who doesn't take any guff from her fellow men officers. Rita fumes against her superiors when they can't provide her with reasonable answers as to why they let a bloke with no ID and two automatic weapons go, a scruffy, snarly bastard obviously up to no good. For the bulk of the novel, Rita works for the river police, the perfect job for her since she herself has been living on a boat on the Themes with ailing old dad.
Lord Ivo Redcastle - "Ivo, for all his silly debaucheries and pretensions, was still an absurdly handsome man. In fact, Ingram thought, there was something faintly creepy about how handsome he was: the thick, longish black hair swept off his forehead to one side, forever flopping down, the straight nose, the full lips, his height, his leanness - he was almost like a cartoon of a handsome man." These reflections are from his brother-in-law Ingram, a CEO of a large pharmaceutical corporation. Ingram's wife talked him into placing Ivo on the Board of Directors for family's sake. Turns out, not such a good idea.
Mhouse - Adam's rescuer and tormentor, Mhouse peddles her wares as a prostitute on the streets and lives in a housing project filled with junkies, thugs and crooks - lowlife at its lowest. But Mhouse can be so, so sweet, especially to her six-year-old lovable son, Lion.
Jonjo - "Everything in his life had been running fairly smoothly - no complaints, thanks - until Kindred arrived. He had survived the Falklands War, Northern Ireland, Gulf War I, Bosnia, Gulf War II, Iraq and Afghanistan - and only when the Kindred element intruded had everything gone arse-over-tit." Does Jonjo, a muscular hunk with a clef chin, sound like the type of gent to upset or have turned against you? A string of players in the novel find out the hard way.
Gaven Thrale - An old graybeard Adam meets at a church offering free meals for anybody willing to listen to its cult message. When Adam says he's homeless due to a series of nervous breakdowns, Gaven doesn't believe him - he knows, like himself, Adam is a well-educated intellectual forced to go underground to escape the law.
Ordinary Thunderstorms is a page-turner, a novel chock-full of twists and surprises, a novel that makes for an exciting read, a thrilling read. Pick up a copy to find out for yourself just how exciting and thrilling.
Novelist par excellence, William Boyd, born 1952
"He felt strange being back, acknowledging the huge changes his life had undergone since he had first camped out there. So much had happened to him: it was as if he were packing years of living into fraught, dense weeks; determinedly racing through a whole life's catalogue of experiences as fast as possible, as if time were running out." - William Boyd, Ordinary Thunderstorms
April 21, 2012
Good Reads now makes recommendations, amazon makes recommendations, my friends here guide my impulses of what to put on my wishlist, I have a shelf of unread books that is quietly groaning under the weight of past purchases, and yet, and yet.....
Certain elements come together: I've just sold two books - never mind that, in the past weeks, five have come in for the two going out - it's November and I'm feeling end-of-the-yearish, days-drawing-in-ish, and even if I do buy a lot of my books online, I would never want to forgo the pleasure of going into a bookshop, and, as it happens, the place where I give English classes on a Wednesday morning boasts a 19th century barn that was, in its time, a home, a post office, a local lending library, and is now a lovely little bookshop:
Does this happen to you? You buy a book (OK, three) online, but then it takes three, four days, a week maybe for them to reach you. Yes, there is that wonderful moment when you open the package and feel the heft of the pages and imagine the joy they will bring you. But somehow the mood has passed slightly: they go onto the TBR shelf, and wait. Patiently. Maybe months, maybe years. But when you go into a bookshop and just pick up something on a whim; it's the only thing in the shop that really draws your eye, it's the very thing you need at this particular moment and you take it home and start reading straight away - that is sheer joy.
That's how Ordinary Thunderstorms came to me. The right thing at the right time. After one real heavyweight, with two non-fiction on the go, I needed something fast and furious that at the same time would not make me feel guilty for totally wasting my time. Mr Boyd's thriller fits the bill as no other could. It's perfectly calibrated to wind up the tension at the exact moment where momentum slows, it is satisfyingly familiar and yet surprising at one and the same time, the puzzle is solved in roughly the form that you would have hoped for, but the detail is ultra-modern, using internet forums and suspicion of insider trading to push the plot to its conclusion. And Mr Boyd gives little knowing nods to the reader, and uses words that pull you up for a moment - borborygmus? - and is playful, he's obviously having fun writing this. There is the odd slight implausibility, but utterly forgivable in view of the pleasure afforded. Mr Boyd manages to fulfill all the expectations you have of a thriller in an admirably original way. Ian McEwan, eat your heart out.
Certain elements come together: I've just sold two books - never mind that, in the past weeks, five have come in for the two going out - it's November and I'm feeling end-of-the-yearish, days-drawing-in-ish, and even if I do buy a lot of my books online, I would never want to forgo the pleasure of going into a bookshop, and, as it happens, the place where I give English classes on a Wednesday morning boasts a 19th century barn that was, in its time, a home, a post office, a local lending library, and is now a lovely little bookshop:
Does this happen to you? You buy a book (OK, three) online, but then it takes three, four days, a week maybe for them to reach you. Yes, there is that wonderful moment when you open the package and feel the heft of the pages and imagine the joy they will bring you. But somehow the mood has passed slightly: they go onto the TBR shelf, and wait. Patiently. Maybe months, maybe years. But when you go into a bookshop and just pick up something on a whim; it's the only thing in the shop that really draws your eye, it's the very thing you need at this particular moment and you take it home and start reading straight away - that is sheer joy.
That's how Ordinary Thunderstorms came to me. The right thing at the right time. After one real heavyweight, with two non-fiction on the go, I needed something fast and furious that at the same time would not make me feel guilty for totally wasting my time. Mr Boyd's thriller fits the bill as no other could. It's perfectly calibrated to wind up the tension at the exact moment where momentum slows, it is satisfyingly familiar and yet surprising at one and the same time, the puzzle is solved in roughly the form that you would have hoped for, but the detail is ultra-modern, using internet forums and suspicion of insider trading to push the plot to its conclusion. And Mr Boyd gives little knowing nods to the reader, and uses words that pull you up for a moment - borborygmus? - and is playful, he's obviously having fun writing this. There is the odd slight implausibility, but utterly forgivable in view of the pleasure afforded. Mr Boyd manages to fulfill all the expectations you have of a thriller in an admirably original way. Ian McEwan, eat your heart out.
November 12, 2024
Suppose you're having dinner and have a little chat with the elderly guy at the next table, but when he leaves you realize he forgot his briefcase. It contains the info where he lives and you bring it to him, just to find him bleeding and dying on his bed. What do you do?
Our lead, Adam Kindred, makes an interesting choice and loses everything in life, so he has to start all over again, from scratch. The police is looking for him, and so is a hired killer, but there is one kind of person in a big city that almost everyone tries to avoid: homeless people. So he becomes one of them and lies low for a while. What follows is quite the adventure and will throw all sorts of people in Adam's way, and make a brand new person of him all over again.
Quite an engaging read on the whole, with memorable characters too.
Our lead, Adam Kindred, makes an interesting choice and loses everything in life, so he has to start all over again, from scratch. The police is looking for him, and so is a hired killer, but there is one kind of person in a big city that almost everyone tries to avoid: homeless people. So he becomes one of them and lies low for a while. What follows is quite the adventure and will throw all sorts of people in Adam's way, and make a brand new person of him all over again.
Quite an engaging read on the whole, with memorable characters too.
August 2, 2010
Stop me if you‘ve heard this one before. An innocent person discovers someone who has just been murdered, and then they stupidly pick up the weapon, end up covered in blood and then they’re accused of the crime. That scene has played out so many times in pop entertainment that I think anyone with more than ten working brain cells would instantly know that the one thing you should never do if you find a body is pick up the murder weapon.
Then I met Adam Kindred in Ordinary Thunderstorms. Adam is a British climatologist who had been living in the U.S., but is trying to get a job in London following a painful divorce. After his job interview, Adam stops for some lunch and strikes up casual conversation with Dr. Philip Wang. Wang leaves a file at his table, and Adam decides to do a good deed and return it to him at his hotel. When he arrives at the hotel room, he finds that Wang is dying after being stabbed. With his last breaths, Wang begs Adam to pull out the knife.
You see where this is going, right?
Dumb-ass Adam yanks out the knife, gets himself covered in blood, and Wang promptly dies. (This is also exactly what they tell you NOT to do from a medical standpoint if you ever find someone with a knife stuck in them.) Adam still might have been able to convince the cops that he didn’t kill Wang, but instead of contacting them immediately, he has a complete mental meltdown and decides to stop at the pub and have a few drinks first. Before he can get his shit together, he’s attacked by Wang’s killer and barely escapes. Completely freaking out, Adam goes turtle and instantly joins the ranks of London’s homeless.
As Adam hides out by dropping off he grid, other characters become entangled in the events that the murder started. There’s a beautiful police woman who discovers the body and struggles with the disapproval of her aging damn-dirty-hippie father. The CEO of a pharmaceutical company is excited that a breakthrough discovery of a new drug is leading to a blockbuster merger, but he’s starting to worry about his business partners. A young prostitute hustles to make the rent and care for her son. And the ex-soldier hired to kill Wang is getting seriously angry that he can’t find Adam Kindred.
Describing Adam‘s discovery of the body probably makes you think that this a pretty standard thriller. But the story does not follow the usual storyline you see in these types of books. One of the more interesting points is the many ways that Adam reinvents himself as he’s on the run.
This was an exciting story that gives wildly different views of London life. From the richest executives living the high life to the poorest street people, all the characters are fully formed and unique. For starting with such a clichéd set-up, the plot has a lot of surprises.
Then I met Adam Kindred in Ordinary Thunderstorms. Adam is a British climatologist who had been living in the U.S., but is trying to get a job in London following a painful divorce. After his job interview, Adam stops for some lunch and strikes up casual conversation with Dr. Philip Wang. Wang leaves a file at his table, and Adam decides to do a good deed and return it to him at his hotel. When he arrives at the hotel room, he finds that Wang is dying after being stabbed. With his last breaths, Wang begs Adam to pull out the knife.
You see where this is going, right?
Dumb-ass Adam yanks out the knife, gets himself covered in blood, and Wang promptly dies. (This is also exactly what they tell you NOT to do from a medical standpoint if you ever find someone with a knife stuck in them.) Adam still might have been able to convince the cops that he didn’t kill Wang, but instead of contacting them immediately, he has a complete mental meltdown and decides to stop at the pub and have a few drinks first. Before he can get his shit together, he’s attacked by Wang’s killer and barely escapes. Completely freaking out, Adam goes turtle and instantly joins the ranks of London’s homeless.
As Adam hides out by dropping off he grid, other characters become entangled in the events that the murder started. There’s a beautiful police woman who discovers the body and struggles with the disapproval of her aging damn-dirty-hippie father. The CEO of a pharmaceutical company is excited that a breakthrough discovery of a new drug is leading to a blockbuster merger, but he’s starting to worry about his business partners. A young prostitute hustles to make the rent and care for her son. And the ex-soldier hired to kill Wang is getting seriously angry that he can’t find Adam Kindred.
Describing Adam‘s discovery of the body probably makes you think that this a pretty standard thriller. But the story does not follow the usual storyline you see in these types of books. One of the more interesting points is the many ways that Adam reinvents himself as he’s on the run.
This was an exciting story that gives wildly different views of London life. From the richest executives living the high life to the poorest street people, all the characters are fully formed and unique. For starting with such a clichéd set-up, the plot has a lot of surprises.
February 12, 2020
Ordinary Thunderstorms by William Boyd started off really well for me but ended up being a little disappointing.
It started off as a 4 star effort, as the main character - Adam (alias John) - got himself into a real pickle by no fault of his own. He then made a series of decisions that were kind of believable, but became somewhat outlandish, this became more so as the story rolled on.
There was some intrigue thrown in, particularly in the field of pharmaceutical science and finance. This did illustrate to me how much money is in big pharma, but also how corrupt the financial system can be. It almost encourages bad behaviour.
But some of the characters acted in ways I found hard to believe such as with Rita, the police officer - this became more pronounced as the story progressed. The unbelievability spoiled it a bit for me. It degenerated into a 2 star effort in the last third.
But having said all of this, Boyd can write, so as this was my first book by this author I'm keen to try another one by him.
This book was okay.
3 stars.
It started off as a 4 star effort, as the main character - Adam (alias John) - got himself into a real pickle by no fault of his own. He then made a series of decisions that were kind of believable, but became somewhat outlandish, this became more so as the story rolled on.
There was some intrigue thrown in, particularly in the field of pharmaceutical science and finance. This did illustrate to me how much money is in big pharma, but also how corrupt the financial system can be. It almost encourages bad behaviour.
But some of the characters acted in ways I found hard to believe such as with Rita, the police officer - this became more pronounced as the story progressed. The unbelievability spoiled it a bit for me. It degenerated into a 2 star effort in the last third.
But having said all of this, Boyd can write, so as this was my first book by this author I'm keen to try another one by him.
This book was okay.
3 stars.
February 5, 2015
A Superb Novel!
After reading about Wm. Boyd’s multi-award winning novels I recently purchased this mystery/thriller. After a few pages I was completely hooked. It is an extraordinary story, excellent plot and has many interesting characters. Don’t hesitate to give this gifted writer a serious look.
After reading about Wm. Boyd’s multi-award winning novels I recently purchased this mystery/thriller. After a few pages I was completely hooked. It is an extraordinary story, excellent plot and has many interesting characters. Don’t hesitate to give this gifted writer a serious look.
July 10, 2015
Description: It is May in Chelsea, London. The glittering river is unusually high on an otherwise ordinary afternoon. Adam Kindred, a young climatologist in town for a job interview, ambles along the Embankment, admiring the view. He is pleasantly surprised to come across a little Italian bistro down a leafy side street. During his meal he strikes up a conversation with a solitary diner at the next table, who leaves soon afterwards. With horrifying speed, this chance encounter leads to a series of malign accidents through which Adam will lose everything - home, family, friends, job, reputation, passport, credit cards, mobile phone - never to get them back. The police are searching for him. There is a reward for his capture. A hired killer is stalking him. He is alone and anonymous in a huge, pitiless modern city. Adam has nowhere to go but down - underground. He decides to join that vast army of the disappeared and the missing that throng London's lowest levels as he tries to figure out what to do with his life and struggles to understand the forces that have made it unravel so spectacularly. His quest will take him all along the River Thames, from affluent Chelsea to the sink estates of the East End, and on the way he will encounter all manner of London's denizens - aristocrats, prostitutes, evangelists and policewomen amongst them - and version after new version of himself. William Boyd's electric follow-up to Costa Novel of the Year Restless is a heart-in-mouth conspiracy novel about the fragility of social identity, the corruption at the heart of big business, and the secrets that lie hidden in the filthy underbelly of everyday city.
Opening: LET US START WITH the river - all things begin with the river and we shall probably end there, no doubt - but let us wait and see how we go. Soon, in a minute or two, a young man will come and stand by the river's edge, here at Chelsea Bridge, in London.
What better book to crack open in an storm where our leccy supply is decidedly on/off, and big print is best under torch light. We have flood warnings too.
Gleick's Chaos theory started with a 'hands behind the head and whimsy alot in the grass on a hill, looking up' view of the clouds, do you remember that? There is a lot of chaos going on here, and also a lot of 'fate' and 'predestination' a la Buddhism credo.
This book has the opening quote:
I was in Boyd's thrall whilst reading 'Ordinary Thunderstorms' and was impatient to know if all the strands could be joined by the end and they were... just, by the skin of their teeth.
Read in one sitting because I just couldn't put this book down, yet there are some sections that are flawed. For instance, were the initial behaviours the actions of a sane man or did Boyd wish to inflict us with the fatalism of The Dice Man for his main character.
You can see why I couldn't award that final star, as much as this entertained.
LATER (upon the good ship dilemma) - many reviews state that it is well known that no-one should touch a murder weapon therefore this tale lacks credibility, yet Dr Wang was not dead when he pleaded for the knife to be removed: what would you have done?
5* Any Human Heart
4* Restless
TR Waiting for Sunrise
4* Ordinary Thunderstorms
4* Brazzaville Beach
2* Solo
3* Armadillo
WL Sweet Caress
3* A Haunting
Opening: LET US START WITH the river - all things begin with the river and we shall probably end there, no doubt - but let us wait and see how we go. Soon, in a minute or two, a young man will come and stand by the river's edge, here at Chelsea Bridge, in London.
What better book to crack open in an storm where our leccy supply is decidedly on/off, and big print is best under torch light. We have flood warnings too.Gleick's Chaos theory started with a 'hands behind the head and whimsy alot in the grass on a hill, looking up' view of the clouds, do you remember that? There is a lot of chaos going on here, and also a lot of 'fate' and 'predestination' a la Buddhism credo.
This book has the opening quote:
Ordinary thunderstorms have the capacity to transform themselves into multi-cell storms of growing complexity. Such multi-cell storms display marked increase in severity and their lifetime can be extended by a factor of ten or more. The grandfather of all thunderstorms, however, is the super-cell thunderstorm. It should be noted that even ordinary thunderstorms are capable of mutating into super-cell storms. These storms subside very slowly.
'Storm Dynamics and Hail Cascades'
by LD Sax and WS Dutton
I was in Boyd's thrall whilst reading 'Ordinary Thunderstorms' and was impatient to know if all the strands could be joined by the end and they were... just, by the skin of their teeth.
Read in one sitting because I just couldn't put this book down, yet there are some sections that are flawed. For instance, were the initial behaviours the actions of a sane man or did Boyd wish to inflict us with the fatalism of The Dice Man for his main character.
You can see why I couldn't award that final star, as much as this entertained.
LATER (upon the good ship dilemma) - many reviews state that it is well known that no-one should touch a murder weapon therefore this tale lacks credibility, yet Dr Wang was not dead when he pleaded for the knife to be removed: what would you have done?
5* Any Human Heart
4* Restless
TR Waiting for Sunrise
4* Ordinary Thunderstorms
4* Brazzaville Beach
2* Solo
3* Armadillo
WL Sweet Caress
3* A Haunting
August 3, 2011
I recently finished reading William Boyd's latest novel, Ordinary Thunderstorms. It took me forever because I kept abandoning it then picking it up again. I mean, surely it couldn't be that awful all the way through to the final page. Could it? Well, no. Somehow, it actually got worse before disappearing up its own bottom with a grim squelch. I had to check that this was the same William Boyd who wrote Restless and Armadillo. Tragically, it was.
I'm not Boyd's biggest fan, but have generally found him to be fairly readable, in a can't-find-anything-else-in-Luton-Airport-Smiths-and-the-plane's-about-to-leave kind of way. He can handle whimsy and more serious themes reasonably well, and there's a level of intelligence that marks him out as a reliable if not exactly must-read author. So what happened?
Ordinary Thunderstorms starts off with a ridiculous (and seen-it-all-before) premise - innocent man witnesses murder when he goes somewhere no sensible (or even stupid) human being would even think of venturing. He then - surprise, surprise - pulls the knife out of the victim (the only person in the western world who's never watched CSI or a million other police procedurals) and dithers about informing the police for reasons so inane I can no longer recall them. He then goes into hiding - in a tent on a grassy bank alongside the Thames, mind - and becomes feral, vicious and cunning. The guy's a respected meteorologist or something. Doesn't he have any better ideas than that? The casual murder he carries out is as incongruous and silly as the fey, dopey, facile affair he conducts with an investigating policewoman.
Sorry if I've ruined it for you but, trust me, I've saved you eight quid and days of ploughing through dung wondering whether it can possibly get any stinkier. Trust me, it does. Pathetic, implausible, lazy, idiotic, cretinous, moronic...and I haven't even opened my thesaurus yet.
I'm not Boyd's biggest fan, but have generally found him to be fairly readable, in a can't-find-anything-else-in-Luton-Airport-Smiths-and-the-plane's-about-to-leave kind of way. He can handle whimsy and more serious themes reasonably well, and there's a level of intelligence that marks him out as a reliable if not exactly must-read author. So what happened?
Ordinary Thunderstorms starts off with a ridiculous (and seen-it-all-before) premise - innocent man witnesses murder when he goes somewhere no sensible (or even stupid) human being would even think of venturing. He then - surprise, surprise - pulls the knife out of the victim (the only person in the western world who's never watched CSI or a million other police procedurals) and dithers about informing the police for reasons so inane I can no longer recall them. He then goes into hiding - in a tent on a grassy bank alongside the Thames, mind - and becomes feral, vicious and cunning. The guy's a respected meteorologist or something. Doesn't he have any better ideas than that? The casual murder he carries out is as incongruous and silly as the fey, dopey, facile affair he conducts with an investigating policewoman.
Sorry if I've ruined it for you but, trust me, I've saved you eight quid and days of ploughing through dung wondering whether it can possibly get any stinkier. Trust me, it does. Pathetic, implausible, lazy, idiotic, cretinous, moronic...and I haven't even opened my thesaurus yet.
August 6, 2021
Readers who pick up Ordinary Thunderstorms, having not read William Boyd before, expecting a high octane chase thriller through the tough streets of London maybe disappointed. For me, William Boyds intention is to amuse as well as thrill reading like one of Graham Greenes 'entertainments' with a Dickensian cast of characters.
Happily, for me, I am a big fan of the author and was thoroughly entertained. A big suspension of disbelief is required early on but if you manage to do that, you will have a great time.
Warmly recommended.
Happily, for me, I am a big fan of the author and was thoroughly entertained. A big suspension of disbelief is required early on but if you manage to do that, you will have a great time.
Warmly recommended.
December 31, 2025
Last read of 2025 - a 50p charity shop paperback purchase reaps a bargain thriller read! A believable premise, well written and keeps my interest throughout.
September 3, 2017
Βαθμολογία: ★★★
Ένα μυθιστόρημα με αρκετή αγωνία, καλογραμμένους χαρακτήρες και ενδιαφέρουσα πλοκή. Δυστυχώς δεν κατάφερα να ξεπεράσω ότι ολόκληρο το βιβλίο βασίζεται σε μια εντελώς ηλίθια απόφαση του πρωταγωνιστή στις πρώτες σελίδες.
Ένα μυθιστόρημα με αρκετή αγωνία, καλογραμμένους χαρακτήρες και ενδιαφέρουσα πλοκή. Δυστυχώς δεν κατάφερα να ξεπεράσω ότι ολόκληρο το βιβλίο βασίζεται σε μια εντελώς ηλίθια απόφαση του πρωταγωνιστή στις πρώτες σελίδες.
July 15, 2020
Ωραία ιστορία στη σύλληψη και στη βάση της,έδωσε το στίγμα των "πρακτικών" που ακολουθούνται από φαρμακοβιομηχανίες πολυεθνικού χαρακτήρα και πόσο αδίστακτοι μπορούν να γίνουν οι εμπλεκόμενοι.Αρκετά δυνατό ήταν και ό,τι αφορούσε τον κεντρικό ήρωα,παρόλα αυτά,το διαδικαστικό κομμάτι της αστυνομικής έρευνας χώλαινε λιγάκι.
3,5 ⭐
3,5 ⭐
July 22, 2010
Ordinary Thunderstorms is an extremely flawed novel. It's ostensibly a mystery, but it never completely solves that mystery. The protagonist makes a series of very odd choices that don't strike me as being believable. The ending is kind of a non-ending with a lot of loose threads, yet it's clearly not setting up a sequel. Yet, I give it 4 stars for the beauty of the writing. Boyd does an amazing job describing his characters and the setting. He uses an astounding vocabulary, but doesn't sound like he's using a thesaurus. The imagery in this book is incredible. It's just the plot that was weak and full of holes. I suppose I should have given this book three stars, but I was impressed enough with the word craft to give it an extra.
The narration was very good. Gideon Emery puts emphasis on all the right parts, but doesn't sound like he's acting out the part.
I liked this book a lot, but it's probably not a good choice for those who want a tight plot and a solid wrap-up in their mysteries.
The narration was very good. Gideon Emery puts emphasis on all the right parts, but doesn't sound like he's acting out the part.
I liked this book a lot, but it's probably not a good choice for those who want a tight plot and a solid wrap-up in their mysteries.
February 8, 2020
Loved other books by Boyd, but this one bored me. May give it a try some other time since Boyd is a favorite author. May be a matter of right book, wrong time.
September 13, 2011
William Boyd is Scottish by descent, was born in Ghana, and educated in Scotland and France. He completed a PhD in literature at Oxford. He is to my thinking a hybrid, an intellectual who has written a dozen novels, won awards but is considered British because he lives there part of the time. (You will see where I am going with this.) I have always been curious about his books, though Ordinary Thunderstorms, his 12th novel, is the first I have read. It won't be the last.
Recently I have come across several discussions on various lit blogs about highbrow vs lowbrow novels and whether or not literary fiction is passe because it doesn't sell well. Some see a trend where literary authors are trying their hands at genre fiction is an effort to sell more copies of their novels. Others see it as a marketing ploy by publishers in an effort to sell more books.
I find most of this speculation to be hogwash, though I am pretty sure marketing personnel are the key suspects. After all, it is their job. I think an author should write what he or she wants to write, should experiment, not always write the same story over and over for the sake of fans, income or profits. Basically, if an author can write well, I will read just about any novel by that author despite subject matter or genre.
William Boyd has a pretty solid reputation as a literary writer. Ordinary Thunderstorms was marketed as a "literary mystery about crime and punishment." See what I mean? Well, it is tremendously exciting, it does involve murder, crime, the dastardly side of big pharma, and the underbelly of London. The violence is brutal and the mystery is complex. Not one truly admirable character inhabits its pages.
However, the novel is about identity. Adam Kindred has returned to the country of his birth after many years in the United States. He is in London to interview for a job. A respected and successful climatologist, he has made a mess of his personal life. While he intends to start anew in London he was surely not planning the drastic transformation he undergoes.
Within 24 hours he is a prime suspect for a murder he did not commit. He makes the decision to go "underground" for a while until he figures out what to do. He goes about as far underground as a person can go in a major metropolis, sleeping in a park, begging for food, and becoming a man with no social identity.
In an interview, William Boyd says his intention was to write about what happens to a person who loses everything that makes him who he is. One thing that happens is that a person who loses his social identity finds he still has a self. Adam is intelligent, resourceful, often impulsive and foolish, a risk taker where people he cares for are involved. His innate goodness and humanity bring him up against a couple of true psychopathic personalities. His intelligence and something like bravery make him a Dickensian character in a modern world.
William Boyd calls no attention to himself as an author, but in straightforward prose tells us a powerful and exciting tale full of heart while it is steeped in all manner of human degradation.
In no way would I call the novel lowbrow. I suppose one could read it just for the thriller aspect, as Boyd does not write in any sort of wordy or obscure manner. He is certainly several cuts above Brad Thor, David Baldacci, and the like. Does that mean he is highbrow?
May 5, 2020
A thoroughly enjoyable and captivating thriller, that sees a man return to the UK after his divorce, sit in a café, meet a strange, whom he offers to help and ends up getting involved in a global conspiracy. Boyd captures London quite well in this book, the idea that in a city so big, so diverse and so faceless people can get lost and disappear; yet also reinvent themselves. I really liked this book. 7 out of 12
February 8, 2020
Hm. This was my first William Boyd and I have to confess I did not know what to make of it. Throughout my entire read, I felt both confused and a bit dazed - I just could not work out what this novel was trying to be... It clearly is not a literary novel - it does not seem to stand for something, it is not an obvious metaphor for things deeper than those that happen in it. It seems to be a thriller - certainly there is mystery here and it is set in the world of the pharma industry, there is an unresolved murder and there are intrigues and machinations behind the scenes. But for this to be enjoyable, the “whodunnit” aspect would have needed to be dominant, and it wasn’t. What was dominant was the slow decline of the protagonist from life-competent scientist to homeless bum. Now in itself, this type of theme may be interesting, but only if it stands for something else, and then we are reading a literary novel, which, as I pointed out above, we are not. So I really don’t know how to read this.
So let me just share a few observations with you:
Narrative mode
For the most part, William makes his characters speak through 3rd person point of view. As there are several characters in focus in different chapters, the perspective changes frequently and I found this to be an engaging aspect of the novel. But the first chapter starts with a paragraph that introduces the opening scene from the point of view of an omniscient narrator - the type we are used to in Victorian literature, used to excellent effect by the likes of Dickens or Thackeray. I must admit, it was this omniscient view that drew me in and made me buy the novel. To my disappointment, I can report that this omniscient narrator disappeared without trace from the novel after the first paragraph, never to make an appearance again. So why open the novel in this narrative mode? Did Boyd forget about his Victorian narrator? I must admit I felt cheated a bit - it certain feels sloppy (unless I am missing something).
Characters
When building some of the characters in his novel, William uses a technique that allows a character to emerge from a plethora of details and facts given about his lifestyle. And this is excellent technique - but it is difficult to master, since the details need to be spot on and consistent for this to work. And certainly in the case of Ingram, the CEO of the pharma company at the heart of the proceedings, I did not think William pulled this off.
Here’s some evidence: Early on in the novel, we are told that Ingram likes his chauffeur to drop him off at Holborn tube station on his daily journey to work, starting just after he has breakfast at 7.30am. He then takes the tube for his last few stops, because he likes to mingle with ‘real people’, likes to observe those not in charge of a large industrial company, blend in and take note. At Bank, he gets off and enters a glass-and-steel office block where his company occupies several floors.
So far so good. It is clear what William is trying to do. We, as readers, are supposed to feel invited into a world we may not know, we travel as Londoners on the tube, we share the life of a modestly eccentric CEO. But for this to work, the clues William leaves for us to build into a live character need to make sense. These, I am afraid, do not:
- No CEO is likely to have a leisurely breakfast at 7.30am. If you leave the house at that time in the morning and choose a car as your mode of transport, you will go nowhere fast. From the clues I have I’d guess it would take him at least an hour in rush hour to get to his office, probably longer. If he left at 7.30, he’d be at his desk at 9ish. The City (investment bankers and stockbrokers) will have been at work for 2 to 3 hours by that time. I don’t think any CEO would do this.
- You choose to go on the London Underground to conduct sociological studies? In rush hour? Really? We know he travels from Holborn to Bank, so he’s taking the Central Line, going East, at 8ish in the morning. The experience he will have is one of intense claustrophobia, pressed tightly against his fellow-Londoners, gaze firmly fixed to the floor, the ceiling, or a fellow-passenger’s coat some two inches away from his nose. I don’t think he’d develop much of an idea of what the lives of normal people are like from this activity, but of course I am not Ingram, and perhaps I am just not empathetic enough. The only thing to be said about taking the tube, rather than the car, is that the tube will get you to your destination, while a car will be stuck in traffic going nowhere. Actually, he’d have more leisure observing the real world from behind the tinted windows of his stationary limousine, coming to think about it...
- Somebody explain to me how it is possible to be dropped off at Holborn station in rush hour. The car cant travel West to East, as traffic does not flow that way on High Holborn, so he needs to be on Kingsway. Good luck stopping in the bus lane anywhere near the station...
- He gets off at Bank and walks to a glass-and-steel tower where his offices are. Well.... there is no such tower anywhere close to Bank. The closest is Tower 42, but that’s not a modern tower, and all the shiny new skyscrapers are on Bishopsgate or the insurance part of the City. Better to go to Liverpool Street Station or perhaps Tower Hill and walk up? Better still, take the first few stops of your journey on the tube, tell your driver to meet you at Bank (where you can stop, round the corner on Walbrook) and then drive the last few 100s of meters.
Granted, my points seem pedantic, and I think to some extent they are. But we need to remember why William dumps all this information on us. He wants to build a world that the reader does not know and then invite the reader in, for the reader to enjoy something from the inside that is not part of their normal lives. And for most readers, that will work. Most readers do not live in London, and most readers have not worked in the City of London. But I do, and have, and so to me it is obvious that William has not done his research on this one. Why is this important to me? Because I don’t know anything else - I do not know the world of pharma, or high-society gatherings, or homeless people. So how am I to trust that William creates authentic, believable environments in those aspects? Once bitten, twice shy, I am afraid - I must admit I lost trust in William’s ability to do that after the first part of the novel.
Paul Auster
The main character in the story is a scientist who comes to London for an interview. After the interview, he goes to a restaurant to have something to eat. Here, he starts chatting with a fellow diner. This person, his lunch finished, leaves and forgets a paper file with his address on it. The main character decides to hand-deliver the file to that person’s address, and, in walking up to the flat, finds the door unlocked. He enters, only to find his ex fellow diner lying in a pool of blood, stabbed. On the dying man’s insistence, he pulls the knife out, gets blood all over himself and his fingerprints all over the knife, panicks, runs from the scene of the crime, and.... goes to the police to report what happened, like any right-thinking individual would. Only... he doesn’t. Instead, he panicks some more, gets drunk, does not trust himself to go back to his hotel, sleeps rough, wanders the streets aimlessly for a day, finds a conveniently hidden spot on the Thames, and literally goes to ground on this concealed patch of land.
Huh. This is the aspect of the novel that left me profoundly bemused and dissatisfied. If you look at the sequence of events I just listed, we start off with an educated, life-competent individual, and end up with a scared homeless person. The journey from confident intellectual to lost outcast happens within a day, and is brought about by decisions that range from odd to bizarre. The character’s development feels exactly like the journey of characters in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy. But Auster’s novel is a literary novel, the journey from the core to the fringe of modern society is a metaphor for something else, it may call into question how much we are proper members of society in the first place, or it may highlight some other theme. In William’s novel, it does not stand for anything, it injects a weird disillusionist strain into an otherwise straightforward narrative, its potential for comment on the human condition is in no way echoed in other aspects of the novel, and the result is... well, simply odd, I am afraid.
But as I said, I did not know what to make of this. I am sure other readers have different opinions, and indeed the novel was recommended by GR friends whose verdict I greatly value. So perhaps I am missing things, or I am exaggerating something that is not in focus for others. About the quality of William Boyd as a writer there cannot be any doubt - the list of literary prizes to his name is impressive testimony of his competence.
So I am back where I started. I am confused. I should pick up another one of William’s novels to see whether they are similar, but for now, I think I will give William a rest.
So let me just share a few observations with you:
Narrative mode
For the most part, William makes his characters speak through 3rd person point of view. As there are several characters in focus in different chapters, the perspective changes frequently and I found this to be an engaging aspect of the novel. But the first chapter starts with a paragraph that introduces the opening scene from the point of view of an omniscient narrator - the type we are used to in Victorian literature, used to excellent effect by the likes of Dickens or Thackeray. I must admit, it was this omniscient view that drew me in and made me buy the novel. To my disappointment, I can report that this omniscient narrator disappeared without trace from the novel after the first paragraph, never to make an appearance again. So why open the novel in this narrative mode? Did Boyd forget about his Victorian narrator? I must admit I felt cheated a bit - it certain feels sloppy (unless I am missing something).
Characters
When building some of the characters in his novel, William uses a technique that allows a character to emerge from a plethora of details and facts given about his lifestyle. And this is excellent technique - but it is difficult to master, since the details need to be spot on and consistent for this to work. And certainly in the case of Ingram, the CEO of the pharma company at the heart of the proceedings, I did not think William pulled this off.
Here’s some evidence: Early on in the novel, we are told that Ingram likes his chauffeur to drop him off at Holborn tube station on his daily journey to work, starting just after he has breakfast at 7.30am. He then takes the tube for his last few stops, because he likes to mingle with ‘real people’, likes to observe those not in charge of a large industrial company, blend in and take note. At Bank, he gets off and enters a glass-and-steel office block where his company occupies several floors.
So far so good. It is clear what William is trying to do. We, as readers, are supposed to feel invited into a world we may not know, we travel as Londoners on the tube, we share the life of a modestly eccentric CEO. But for this to work, the clues William leaves for us to build into a live character need to make sense. These, I am afraid, do not:
- No CEO is likely to have a leisurely breakfast at 7.30am. If you leave the house at that time in the morning and choose a car as your mode of transport, you will go nowhere fast. From the clues I have I’d guess it would take him at least an hour in rush hour to get to his office, probably longer. If he left at 7.30, he’d be at his desk at 9ish. The City (investment bankers and stockbrokers) will have been at work for 2 to 3 hours by that time. I don’t think any CEO would do this.
- You choose to go on the London Underground to conduct sociological studies? In rush hour? Really? We know he travels from Holborn to Bank, so he’s taking the Central Line, going East, at 8ish in the morning. The experience he will have is one of intense claustrophobia, pressed tightly against his fellow-Londoners, gaze firmly fixed to the floor, the ceiling, or a fellow-passenger’s coat some two inches away from his nose. I don’t think he’d develop much of an idea of what the lives of normal people are like from this activity, but of course I am not Ingram, and perhaps I am just not empathetic enough. The only thing to be said about taking the tube, rather than the car, is that the tube will get you to your destination, while a car will be stuck in traffic going nowhere. Actually, he’d have more leisure observing the real world from behind the tinted windows of his stationary limousine, coming to think about it...
- Somebody explain to me how it is possible to be dropped off at Holborn station in rush hour. The car cant travel West to East, as traffic does not flow that way on High Holborn, so he needs to be on Kingsway. Good luck stopping in the bus lane anywhere near the station...
- He gets off at Bank and walks to a glass-and-steel tower where his offices are. Well.... there is no such tower anywhere close to Bank. The closest is Tower 42, but that’s not a modern tower, and all the shiny new skyscrapers are on Bishopsgate or the insurance part of the City. Better to go to Liverpool Street Station or perhaps Tower Hill and walk up? Better still, take the first few stops of your journey on the tube, tell your driver to meet you at Bank (where you can stop, round the corner on Walbrook) and then drive the last few 100s of meters.
Granted, my points seem pedantic, and I think to some extent they are. But we need to remember why William dumps all this information on us. He wants to build a world that the reader does not know and then invite the reader in, for the reader to enjoy something from the inside that is not part of their normal lives. And for most readers, that will work. Most readers do not live in London, and most readers have not worked in the City of London. But I do, and have, and so to me it is obvious that William has not done his research on this one. Why is this important to me? Because I don’t know anything else - I do not know the world of pharma, or high-society gatherings, or homeless people. So how am I to trust that William creates authentic, believable environments in those aspects? Once bitten, twice shy, I am afraid - I must admit I lost trust in William’s ability to do that after the first part of the novel.
Paul Auster
The main character in the story is a scientist who comes to London for an interview. After the interview, he goes to a restaurant to have something to eat. Here, he starts chatting with a fellow diner. This person, his lunch finished, leaves and forgets a paper file with his address on it. The main character decides to hand-deliver the file to that person’s address, and, in walking up to the flat, finds the door unlocked. He enters, only to find his ex fellow diner lying in a pool of blood, stabbed. On the dying man’s insistence, he pulls the knife out, gets blood all over himself and his fingerprints all over the knife, panicks, runs from the scene of the crime, and.... goes to the police to report what happened, like any right-thinking individual would. Only... he doesn’t. Instead, he panicks some more, gets drunk, does not trust himself to go back to his hotel, sleeps rough, wanders the streets aimlessly for a day, finds a conveniently hidden spot on the Thames, and literally goes to ground on this concealed patch of land.
Huh. This is the aspect of the novel that left me profoundly bemused and dissatisfied. If you look at the sequence of events I just listed, we start off with an educated, life-competent individual, and end up with a scared homeless person. The journey from confident intellectual to lost outcast happens within a day, and is brought about by decisions that range from odd to bizarre. The character’s development feels exactly like the journey of characters in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy. But Auster’s novel is a literary novel, the journey from the core to the fringe of modern society is a metaphor for something else, it may call into question how much we are proper members of society in the first place, or it may highlight some other theme. In William’s novel, it does not stand for anything, it injects a weird disillusionist strain into an otherwise straightforward narrative, its potential for comment on the human condition is in no way echoed in other aspects of the novel, and the result is... well, simply odd, I am afraid.
But as I said, I did not know what to make of this. I am sure other readers have different opinions, and indeed the novel was recommended by GR friends whose verdict I greatly value. So perhaps I am missing things, or I am exaggerating something that is not in focus for others. About the quality of William Boyd as a writer there cannot be any doubt - the list of literary prizes to his name is impressive testimony of his competence.
So I am back where I started. I am confused. I should pick up another one of William’s novels to see whether they are similar, but for now, I think I will give William a rest.
August 18, 2011
"Ordinary Thunderstorms","William Boyd","1408802473","review","A young, successful climatologist moves from the USA to London after a divorce. He has just been interviewed for a prestigious position for which he will probably be hired. Following the interview something happens, and through a series of bad luck and bad choices he finds himself on the run from the police and from an ex-commando hit man. He finds himself penniless, with no identity and living in the streets, or rather behind some bushes on the banks of the Thames.
He gets involved with a prostitute and her young son, and also a cultish fringe religion which attracts the homeless because of free meals..The Church of John Christ, and then a policewoman. None of them know his true identity. I did not find the characters believable and didn't care for any of them. The book started out with a good premise, but wasn't feeling the middle or the unresolved ending.
He gets involved with a prostitute and her young son, and also a cultish fringe religion which attracts the homeless because of free meals..The Church of John Christ, and then a policewoman. None of them know his true identity. I did not find the characters believable and didn't care for any of them. The book started out with a good premise, but wasn't feeling the middle or the unresolved ending.
August 16, 2015
PROTAGONIST: Adam Kindred, climatologist
SETTING: London
SERIES: Standalone
RATING: 4.75
A chance encounter leads a man to lose everything—his identity and his life as a respected professional—in this chilling psychological adventure
Publicity Contact: Katherine Beitner, Katherine.beitner@harpercollins.com
Adam Kindred is a promising young climatologist who is in London for a job interview with a prestigious university. After the interview, he is in the mood for an Italian dinner. If only he had chosen Chinese or Greek, perhaps his life wouldn’t have gone completely down the tubes. At the restaurant, he meets another lone diner, with whom he has a brief conversation. After the meal, he realizes that the other man, Dr. Philip Wang, has left behind a file folder. Not having anything better to do, Adam decides to return the folder and perhaps share a drink with Philip. But when he enters the apartment, he finds that he has interrupted a murder and that Dr. Wang is in his death throes. Foolishly, Adam removes the knife from Wang’s gut. He means to go to the police, but is deterred when he is almost attacked at his hotel. From that point on, he is a desperate man on the run, a man who has to give up everything just to survive.
One of the first things that Adam does is to try to find a safe place to shelter. He builds a little niche for himself by the Chelsea Bridge, and for the first time in his life sleeps rough. He can’t use his credit cards or bank accounts; ultimately, he survives by begging. He has rapidly moved from thriving professional to scruffy homeless man, leaving behind a life of relative luxury for one with very few assets—and surprisingly not missing his old life very much at all! Several encounters with others prove fortuitous, one resulting in his association with the Church of John Christ which provides him to some temporary shelter with a woman who is down on her luck and her young son. Eventually, he takes on another person’s identity and is able to hold a job and even rent an apartment. But that doesn’t mean that the danger that he is in isn’t always there; an extremely motivated hired killer is always one step behind him.
ORDINARY THUNDERSTORMS was a fascinating study of a resourceful young man who relies on his wits and a bit of luck to survive. He realizes that most of his problems have to do with the meeting with Wang—what was in the folder that was so threatening that it led to his murder? Using the skills he had in his former life, Adam researches Wang’s professional accomplishments and finds that he was on the verge of exposing the malfeasance of a major pharmaceutical company who were about to put an asthma drug on the market despite the fact that drug trials had shown it to have problems.
Boyd did a masterful job of building a suspenseful narrative with a riveting plot and flowing prose. I found the book quite un-putdownable. The preface of the book points out that ordinary thunderstorms have the capacity to transform themselves into multi-cell storms of great ferocity. That’s a perfect analogy for what happened to Adam, a perfectly ordinary man who is transformed into a person of great complexity. ORDINARY THUNDERSTORMS is a remarkable book, and I highly recommend it.
SETTING: London
SERIES: Standalone
RATING: 4.75
A chance encounter leads a man to lose everything—his identity and his life as a respected professional—in this chilling psychological adventure
Publicity Contact: Katherine Beitner, Katherine.beitner@harpercollins.com
Adam Kindred is a promising young climatologist who is in London for a job interview with a prestigious university. After the interview, he is in the mood for an Italian dinner. If only he had chosen Chinese or Greek, perhaps his life wouldn’t have gone completely down the tubes. At the restaurant, he meets another lone diner, with whom he has a brief conversation. After the meal, he realizes that the other man, Dr. Philip Wang, has left behind a file folder. Not having anything better to do, Adam decides to return the folder and perhaps share a drink with Philip. But when he enters the apartment, he finds that he has interrupted a murder and that Dr. Wang is in his death throes. Foolishly, Adam removes the knife from Wang’s gut. He means to go to the police, but is deterred when he is almost attacked at his hotel. From that point on, he is a desperate man on the run, a man who has to give up everything just to survive.
One of the first things that Adam does is to try to find a safe place to shelter. He builds a little niche for himself by the Chelsea Bridge, and for the first time in his life sleeps rough. He can’t use his credit cards or bank accounts; ultimately, he survives by begging. He has rapidly moved from thriving professional to scruffy homeless man, leaving behind a life of relative luxury for one with very few assets—and surprisingly not missing his old life very much at all! Several encounters with others prove fortuitous, one resulting in his association with the Church of John Christ which provides him to some temporary shelter with a woman who is down on her luck and her young son. Eventually, he takes on another person’s identity and is able to hold a job and even rent an apartment. But that doesn’t mean that the danger that he is in isn’t always there; an extremely motivated hired killer is always one step behind him.
ORDINARY THUNDERSTORMS was a fascinating study of a resourceful young man who relies on his wits and a bit of luck to survive. He realizes that most of his problems have to do with the meeting with Wang—what was in the folder that was so threatening that it led to his murder? Using the skills he had in his former life, Adam researches Wang’s professional accomplishments and finds that he was on the verge of exposing the malfeasance of a major pharmaceutical company who were about to put an asthma drug on the market despite the fact that drug trials had shown it to have problems.
Boyd did a masterful job of building a suspenseful narrative with a riveting plot and flowing prose. I found the book quite un-putdownable. The preface of the book points out that ordinary thunderstorms have the capacity to transform themselves into multi-cell storms of great ferocity. That’s a perfect analogy for what happened to Adam, a perfectly ordinary man who is transformed into a person of great complexity. ORDINARY THUNDERSTORMS is a remarkable book, and I highly recommend it.
July 6, 2022
Πόσο ωραίο, πόσο ωραία πέρασα διαβάζοντας το, δε βαρέθηκα στιγμή, είχε ενδιαφέρον εξαρχής και πολύ καλά έκανα που το είχα βάλει στο μάτι, άργησα να το πάρω αλλά με δικαίωσε. Μπράβο και στη μεταφράστρια για την εξαιρετική δουλειά της.
Θα ήθελα να είναι η αρχή μιας σειράς βιβλίων με κεντρικούς ήρωες τον Κιντρεντ και τη Ρίτα, υπάρχει χώρος να αναπτυχθούν κι άλλες ιστορίες, αλλά δεν... 5 αστέρια όμως όπως και να 'χει! Σ.σ. ιδανικό για παραλία!
Θα ήθελα να είναι η αρχή μιας σειράς βιβλίων με κεντρικούς ήρωες τον Κιντρεντ και τη Ρίτα, υπάρχει χώρος να αναπτυχθούν κι άλλες ιστορίες, αλλά δεν... 5 αστέρια όμως όπως και να 'χει! Σ.σ. ιδανικό για παραλία!
June 27, 2016
Τρία βιβλία του Γουίλιαμ Μπόιντ έχουν μεταφραστεί μέχρι στιγμής στα ελληνικά (Το γαλάζιο απόγευμα, Η απειλή, Τοπικές καταιγίδες), τα έχω και τα τρία στην συλλογή μου και έτσι αποφάσισα να διαβάσω άμεσα κάποιο από αυτά, επιλέγοντας το συγκεκριμένο ελέω βολικού μεγέθους (έχω την έκδοση τσέπης). Λοιπόν, αν και στο Goodreads δεν έχει και καμιά τρομερή βαθμολογία (εδώ που τα λέμε ούτε στα Amazon.com και Amazon.co.uk), προσωπικά μου φάνηκε ένα απόλυτα ψυχαγωγικό θρίλερ, με ωραία πλοκή, ενδιαφέροντες και καλογραμμένους χαρακτήρες και πολύ καλή, λογοτεχνική γραφή.
Πρωταγωνιστής της ιστορίας είναι ο Άνταμ Κίντρεντ, ένας κλιματολόγος, που μια λάθος κίνηση θα τον οδηγήσει στο επίκεντρο μιας κατά τα φαινόμενα μεγάλης συνωμοσίας στον κόσμο των φαρμακοβιομηχανιών, με την αστυνομία και έναν πληρωμένο δολοφόνο να είναι στο κατόπιν του. Ο Άνταμ θα βγει στο περιθώριο, θα ενταχθεί στην κοινότητα των "εξαφανισμένων" του Λονδίνου, θα γνωρίσει αλήτες, πόρνες και ιεροκήρυκες, και θα ανακαλύψει άλλες πλευρές του εαυτού του, που δεν ήξερε ότι υπάρχουν. Μέσα σε όλα αυτά, θα προσπαθήσει να μάθει την αλήθεια, όποια και αν είναι αυτή...
Η πλοκή ικανοποιητικότατη, με αρκετή αγωνία και ρεαλιστική δράση, οι χαρακτήρες πολύ ενδιαφέροντες στην πλειοψηφία τους, καλογραμμένοι και κατά κάποιο τρόπο όλοι τους λιγάκι συμπαθητικοί (ναι, ακόμα και οι κακοί!), οι περιγραφές των διαφόρων καταστάσεων, της πόλης του Λονδίνου και του κόσμου του περιθωρίου πάρα πολύ ωραίες και παραστατικές, η ατμόσφαιρα σούπερ. Εντάξει, η πλοκή μπορεί να έχει κάποιες ευκολίες και χρήσιμες συμπτώσεις για να προχωρήσει ομαλά, δεν έχει σημασία όμως, είναι οπωσδήποτε ενδιαφέρουσα. Γενικά πρόκειται για ένα πολύ καλό βιβλίο, καλογραμμένο, ευκολοδιάβαστο και ενδιαφέρον, ό,τι πρέπει για μια ψυχαγωγική ανάγνωση στην παραλία. Βέβαια, όπου και αν το διαβάσετε θα είναι εξίσου ψυχαγωγικό, αλλά λέμε τώρα...
Πρωταγωνιστής της ιστορίας είναι ο Άνταμ Κίντρεντ, ένας κλιματολόγος, που μια λάθος κίνηση θα τον οδηγήσει στο επίκεντρο μιας κατά τα φαινόμενα μεγάλης συνωμοσίας στον κόσμο των φαρμακοβιομηχανιών, με την αστυνομία και έναν πληρωμένο δολοφόνο να είναι στο κατόπιν του. Ο Άνταμ θα βγει στο περιθώριο, θα ενταχθεί στην κοινότητα των "εξαφανισμένων" του Λονδίνου, θα γνωρίσει αλήτες, πόρνες και ιεροκήρυκες, και θα ανακαλύψει άλλες πλευρές του εαυτού του, που δεν ήξερε ότι υπάρχουν. Μέσα σε όλα αυτά, θα προσπαθήσει να μάθει την αλήθεια, όποια και αν είναι αυτή...
Η πλοκή ικανοποιητικότατη, με αρκετή αγωνία και ρεαλιστική δράση, οι χαρακτήρες πολύ ενδιαφέροντες στην πλειοψηφία τους, καλογραμμένοι και κατά κάποιο τρόπο όλοι τους λιγάκι συμπαθητικοί (ναι, ακόμα και οι κακοί!), οι περιγραφές των διαφόρων καταστάσεων, της πόλης του Λονδίνου και του κόσμου του περιθωρίου πάρα πολύ ωραίες και παραστατικές, η ατμόσφαιρα σούπερ. Εντάξει, η πλοκή μπορεί να έχει κάποιες ευκολίες και χρήσιμες συμπτώσεις για να προχωρήσει ομαλά, δεν έχει σημασία όμως, είναι οπωσδήποτε ενδιαφέρουσα. Γενικά πρόκειται για ένα πολύ καλό βιβλίο, καλογραμμένο, ευκολοδιάβαστο και ενδιαφέρον, ό,τι πρέπει για μια ψυχαγωγική ανάγνωση στην παραλία. Βέβαια, όπου και αν το διαβάσετε θα είναι εξίσου ψυχαγωγικό, αλλά λέμε τώρα...
December 11, 2010
Immensely enjoyable, Ordinary Thunderstorms is a literary thriller set in the world of global pharamceutical companies and packed with enough plot twists for half a dozen novels.
It takes the reader on a whistlestop tour of London society, from millionaires to illiterate prostitutes via academics, hospital porters, dissolute lords, police officers and self-styled African bishops.
The plot springs into life within the first few pages when, after a chance encounter in a cafe, the hero, Adam Kindred, stumbles upon a violent crime. From that point on his life will never be the same.
I was reminded in places of a Hitchcock film and certainly this novel has all the ingredients. But it's not just thrills and spills. There's also terrific characterisation, some lovely description that you barely register as the need to unwind the plot drives you on, and above all, lots of humour.
I took this on holiday and even Ryanair didn't seem too bad.
It takes the reader on a whistlestop tour of London society, from millionaires to illiterate prostitutes via academics, hospital porters, dissolute lords, police officers and self-styled African bishops.
The plot springs into life within the first few pages when, after a chance encounter in a cafe, the hero, Adam Kindred, stumbles upon a violent crime. From that point on his life will never be the same.
I was reminded in places of a Hitchcock film and certainly this novel has all the ingredients. But it's not just thrills and spills. There's also terrific characterisation, some lovely description that you barely register as the need to unwind the plot drives you on, and above all, lots of humour.
I took this on holiday and even Ryanair didn't seem too bad.
December 28, 2009
I was disappointed in this book. William Boyd is one of my favourite authors (Any Human Heart is one of my top 20). I just found this that was a holiday-type thriller paperback. The descriptions of living rough in London were evocative and vivid but the characters only ever appeared to be on a superficial level and I didn't really care for them or feel for them which would be crucial to the plot getting under your skin. Shame I was hoping for so much more.
June 1, 2015
First let me clarify that this one-star rating is abiding by Goodreads rules - 'did not like it'. Not terrible, certainly, but I couldn't say I liked it.
Why, especially as I'm a fan of his other novels?
First off, I found the premise hard to believe. A man witnesses a murder and seems likely to be framed for it. He's inveigled into touching the murder weapon, leaving his fingerprints, getting covered in blood etc. The actual moment when he's persuaded to do this is realistic enough - the dying man simply wants him to pull the knife out. I have no quarrel with that and I found it a powerful emotional moment. But I do quarrel with what happens afterwards. Instead of going to the police and telling his story, as any innocent chap would do, he decides to live rough on a patch of waste ground in Chelsea. This seems extremely hard to believe.
Boyd hints later on that his protagonist had depression and was possibly looking for a way to reboot his life. But this isn't introduced early enough. It looks as though he thought of it half-way through the writing and scribbled it in.
Also, several points seem badly thought through. The murderer, a trained assassin, is supposed to have used a breadknife. Go downstairs now and look at your breadknife. Breadknives are flimsy. Would you choose that as a stabbing weapon? Not if you had other things at your disposal, and if a house has a breadknife it probably has more serious knives too. Or a screwdriver. And if you were an assassin you could probably use the gun that's also in your pocket. So 'breadknife' seems like Boyd wasn't thinking very hard. Indeed, the assassin seems to be a bit of a bungler, but you're never quite sure if Boyd intends him to be. In another scene, he kills a hooker by tossing her into the river, but doesn't make sure she's actually dead. And this isn't so she can then come back and spoil people's plans. She's certainly dead. But it doesn't look as though Boyd made the assassin either careful enough, or deliberately idiotic. It's just an unconvincing character.
Usually, I'll happily settle down with a Boyd because his characters are such singular and interesting people. But in this novel, they seemed thinly drawn. Also, there were too many of them, and I think he may have had trouble making them distinct enough. Although plots need red herrings, with people who look significant but aren't, the red herrings here are irritating rather than enriching.
There are good points, of course. The protagonist's eventual reboot with a new identity is persuasively done. There are a few clever twists, such as the assassin being arrested, mistaken for the protagonist. There's a religious cult that recruits homeless people and gives them all the name 'John'. There are a lot of loose threads that aren't definitively tied up, which echoes the theme of randomness, and mean it works well as a 'slice of time' novel. Not everything can be neatly answered - and that's fine and realistic. But this is also perhaps where the novel's overall flaw might lie. The protagonist is a climatologist before he goes on the run - hence the title 'Ordinary Thunderstorms'. So we're supposed to be aware of how our fortunes can be as changeable as the wind. The trouble is, I don't find there was much mileage in that as an idea. Boyd hasn't used it to create an intriguing story world. It seems to be an excuse for a bit of a random and rambling book that could have been better executed.
So: disappointing, but I'll certainly pick up more Boyd.
Why, especially as I'm a fan of his other novels?
First off, I found the premise hard to believe. A man witnesses a murder and seems likely to be framed for it. He's inveigled into touching the murder weapon, leaving his fingerprints, getting covered in blood etc. The actual moment when he's persuaded to do this is realistic enough - the dying man simply wants him to pull the knife out. I have no quarrel with that and I found it a powerful emotional moment. But I do quarrel with what happens afterwards. Instead of going to the police and telling his story, as any innocent chap would do, he decides to live rough on a patch of waste ground in Chelsea. This seems extremely hard to believe.
Boyd hints later on that his protagonist had depression and was possibly looking for a way to reboot his life. But this isn't introduced early enough. It looks as though he thought of it half-way through the writing and scribbled it in.
Also, several points seem badly thought through. The murderer, a trained assassin, is supposed to have used a breadknife. Go downstairs now and look at your breadknife. Breadknives are flimsy. Would you choose that as a stabbing weapon? Not if you had other things at your disposal, and if a house has a breadknife it probably has more serious knives too. Or a screwdriver. And if you were an assassin you could probably use the gun that's also in your pocket. So 'breadknife' seems like Boyd wasn't thinking very hard. Indeed, the assassin seems to be a bit of a bungler, but you're never quite sure if Boyd intends him to be. In another scene, he kills a hooker by tossing her into the river, but doesn't make sure she's actually dead. And this isn't so she can then come back and spoil people's plans. She's certainly dead. But it doesn't look as though Boyd made the assassin either careful enough, or deliberately idiotic. It's just an unconvincing character.
Usually, I'll happily settle down with a Boyd because his characters are such singular and interesting people. But in this novel, they seemed thinly drawn. Also, there were too many of them, and I think he may have had trouble making them distinct enough. Although plots need red herrings, with people who look significant but aren't, the red herrings here are irritating rather than enriching.
There are good points, of course. The protagonist's eventual reboot with a new identity is persuasively done. There are a few clever twists, such as the assassin being arrested, mistaken for the protagonist. There's a religious cult that recruits homeless people and gives them all the name 'John'. There are a lot of loose threads that aren't definitively tied up, which echoes the theme of randomness, and mean it works well as a 'slice of time' novel. Not everything can be neatly answered - and that's fine and realistic. But this is also perhaps where the novel's overall flaw might lie. The protagonist is a climatologist before he goes on the run - hence the title 'Ordinary Thunderstorms'. So we're supposed to be aware of how our fortunes can be as changeable as the wind. The trouble is, I don't find there was much mileage in that as an idea. Boyd hasn't used it to create an intriguing story world. It seems to be an excuse for a bit of a random and rambling book that could have been better executed.
So: disappointing, but I'll certainly pick up more Boyd.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 29, 2023
I really became invested in this story and its characters. A man’s life is completely upended when he stops by the apartment of a dinner companion to return a briefcase that was left behind at a restaurant, only to be pulled into a murder in progress. Shortly after, he becomes acutely aware that the murderer is now after him as a witness and loose end that needs to be eliminated, so he goes into hiding, basically becoming a vagrant, unable to use his ID, credit cards, access his bank accounts, etc. How exactly he navigates this while evading the murderer and the police, who now suspect him of the murder since he was the last known person to be in contact with the victim, is really something to wrap your head around. Meanwhile, we also learn that the murdered man worked for a pharmaceutical company, and his research might hold the cure for asthma, but who has serious concerns that the data from the drug trials has been tampered with and related deaths have been covered up. With billions of dollars to be made by a big pharma company on such a revolutionary drug, it’s little wonder he was eliminated. The tension builds as the story goes on, with one fascinating twist and turn after another, and I couldn’t wait to get to the end to see how the author would work it all out - would our flawed hero prevail, or would the murderer for hire win out? And what about the new drug - would it make it to market with its flaws neatly kept a secret, or would the coverup be exposed? With the way the story was going, anything could be possible. We do find out about the drug, and the way the author handled that was super satisfying, but everything about the hero and the villain was completely left up to the reader’s imagination…argh! While I sometimes appreciate this technique, with the rest of the story telling so compelling, I just wanted the author to tell me what happened. But I guess this time it’ll just need to be an ending of the imagination. 🙄
January 10, 2012
I like William Boyd's writing a lot, and have read everything of his apart from his spoof biography of painter Nat Tate, which I must track down. My favourite WB books are The New Confessions and Any Human Heart, which were both long sagas taking in a lot of events and people through the whole of the twentieth century, and I feel that he pulls off such monumental tasks with great skill. He also does small worlds very well, such as those in Brazzaville Beach and A Good Man in Africa. So how does he do with a 'straightforward' thriller? Not so well, in my opinion, though I state here that the book is a fine competitor among other thrillers; that may just be another way of saying that WB has dumbed his style down a bit to get into the thriller genre, and I think a man of his skills shouldn't need to. I missed the literary flourishes of his other work, and, occasionally, got annoyed at the thrillerish one-dimensional characters, as if he's sometimes saying 'this character won't be hanging around too long, so you don't need so much information'. Good story, anyway: after a chance meeting, a man is blamed for a murder orchestrated by shadowy types that John Le Carre has already marked out for villainhood - an international pharmaceutical company. So far so North-by-Northwestish. What does such a man do? How does he hide in a place like London? As you do for many thrillers, you have to suspend your disbelief pronto - which I have no problem doing - and enjoy the ride. Respectable Adam Kindred - rather Bunyanesque name, I thought, and kind of disapproved of WB trying a bit too hard to convince us that Adam is an ordinary bloke - has to not only hide from the law and the brutal killer the company has sent after him, but, in time-honoured fashion, has to solve the crime, and the scam at its centre, himself, as nobody else will. And I did enjoy the ride, and am sorry if this sounds a bit scathing, but I look forward to the next WB with the hope that he gets back to 'being literary'. Whatever that means.
November 27, 2013
The most astonishing thing about William Boyd's fine new novel is how hackneyed its opening chapter is. It reads so much like a parody of thriller conventions that you expect Alfred Hitchcock to waddle out and drawl, "Good eve-en-ning."
On the first page, we learn that a young climatologist named Adam Kindred has "no idea how his life is about to change in the next few hours -- massively, irrevocably -- no idea at all." Okay, then, we're ready for excitement -- massively, irrevocably ready: Noticing that a man at a nearby table has left behind some scientific papers at a restaurant where he's eating, Adam calls the man and offers to take the papers to his apartment. But when Adam arrives a few minutes later, he discovers that the man has just been stabbed. "The file," the dying man whispers. "Whatever you do, don't -- ."
And then -- damn the luck! -- he dies right before he can tell Adam what to do with the file. Should he call an ambulance? The police? "NO! NO! RUN!" he thinks, realizing this will "probably be one of the most important decisions of his life." And if you doubt that assessment, it's repeated 10 lines later: "So he made his decision, one of the most important decisions in his life."
As a reader, this is the kind of opening that makes me think, "NO! NO! RUN!" But Boyd is the author of a dozen respected novels, shortlisted for the Booker, winner of the Whitbread and the Somerset Maugham and the Costa Novel of the Year. Surely, you keep hoping, his first thriller will get better than this.
And it does.
Once Boyd lays out that thread-worn crisis, in fact, the rest of his novel quickly grows rich and engaging. He creates the wide spectrum of London -- from its lawless slums to its posh boardrooms -- with arresting cinematic detail. And the many characters who populate these pages, from drug-dealing prostitutes to drug-making chief executives, are surprising and sympathetic.
But what really interests Boyd in "Ordinary Thunderstorms" -- and what will make you self-conscious about every step you take -- is the way a single, random event can spark a storm of complex reactions. By kindly offering to return that folder of lost papers, Adam finds himself swept up in a deadly plot to silence a rogue medical researcher who was about to blow the whistle on a faulty new asthma drug. The police assume he stabbed the doctor, while the murderer is determined to rub out an inconvenient witness. In a moment of panic, Adam abandons his life and disappears onto the streets of London, sleeping by the side of a highway, begging for coins and snacking on pigeon.
For a pampered academic, it's like falling into some ghastly negative image of London. Previously invisible people become Adam's friends and colleagues: addicts and runaways, illegal immigrants and religious fanatics, the kind of nameless people who are pulled dead from the Thames.
This is a novel about the frailty of identity, the anonymity of modern city life, the frightening and thrilling possibilities of personal reinvention. Boyd gives a harrowing sense of how close and yet how distant the nether life of a large city is, accessible to anyone willing or forced to step outside the web of modern technology: "No cheques, no bills, no references, no mobile phone calls -- only payphones -- no credit cards, only cash -- nothing. That's how you disappear in the twenty-first century -- you just refuse to take part in it. You live like a medieval peasant: you scrounge, you steal, you sleep under hedges."
What follows is the story of a hunted man, the chapters propelled along thrillingly at just the right moments by sudden reversals, revelations and reprisals. Penniless and hunted, Adam has few resources to mount a criminal inquiry or pursue a pharmaceutical scandal, but he toughens up quickly on the streets and manages an ingenious investigation to clear his name. Nevertheless, through it all, he's madly pursued by a retired British soldier-turned-hit-man who honed his grisly techniques in Afghanistan. I'm still trying to blot out of my mind what he does to a captured man's hands. . . .
The novel's most impressive quality is the way Boyd rotates through a large group of characters, allowing us to experience this crisis from a variety of perspectives -- each slanted and usually wildly mistaken. Adam, his determined assassin, a tenacious young policewoman and the wealthy president of a pharmaceutical company are all racing to understand what's happening to them. Boyd reminds us that we're pattern-hungry creatures, deeply biased toward the belief that events are connected, that motives underlie actions. But sometimes the only connection is the one we imagine. And kill for.
Admittedly, the evils of big pharma felt like a fresher theme a decade ago, when John le Carré wrote "The Constant Gardener," but Boyd provides a slick primer on the way new drugs are marketed -- from helpful public service announcements to anodyne branding commercials, all designed to bully government regulators, stoke public demand and maximize profits. Chemicals and genes aren't the only thing being manipulated here.
"Ordinary Thunderstorms" never sounds too polemical, though, because at the center of this Death Star of corporate malignancy, Boyd places one of his most complex and humane characters: Ingram Fryzer, president of Calenture-Deutz Pharmaceutical. He's a corporate tycoon, a man of impeccable taste and extraordinary power, but ultimately he has no more control over his life than poor Adam. Once this storm of fraud and conspiracy gets roaring, nobody can manage it.
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/20...
On the first page, we learn that a young climatologist named Adam Kindred has "no idea how his life is about to change in the next few hours -- massively, irrevocably -- no idea at all." Okay, then, we're ready for excitement -- massively, irrevocably ready: Noticing that a man at a nearby table has left behind some scientific papers at a restaurant where he's eating, Adam calls the man and offers to take the papers to his apartment. But when Adam arrives a few minutes later, he discovers that the man has just been stabbed. "The file," the dying man whispers. "Whatever you do, don't -- ."
And then -- damn the luck! -- he dies right before he can tell Adam what to do with the file. Should he call an ambulance? The police? "NO! NO! RUN!" he thinks, realizing this will "probably be one of the most important decisions of his life." And if you doubt that assessment, it's repeated 10 lines later: "So he made his decision, one of the most important decisions in his life."
As a reader, this is the kind of opening that makes me think, "NO! NO! RUN!" But Boyd is the author of a dozen respected novels, shortlisted for the Booker, winner of the Whitbread and the Somerset Maugham and the Costa Novel of the Year. Surely, you keep hoping, his first thriller will get better than this.
And it does.
Once Boyd lays out that thread-worn crisis, in fact, the rest of his novel quickly grows rich and engaging. He creates the wide spectrum of London -- from its lawless slums to its posh boardrooms -- with arresting cinematic detail. And the many characters who populate these pages, from drug-dealing prostitutes to drug-making chief executives, are surprising and sympathetic.
But what really interests Boyd in "Ordinary Thunderstorms" -- and what will make you self-conscious about every step you take -- is the way a single, random event can spark a storm of complex reactions. By kindly offering to return that folder of lost papers, Adam finds himself swept up in a deadly plot to silence a rogue medical researcher who was about to blow the whistle on a faulty new asthma drug. The police assume he stabbed the doctor, while the murderer is determined to rub out an inconvenient witness. In a moment of panic, Adam abandons his life and disappears onto the streets of London, sleeping by the side of a highway, begging for coins and snacking on pigeon.
For a pampered academic, it's like falling into some ghastly negative image of London. Previously invisible people become Adam's friends and colleagues: addicts and runaways, illegal immigrants and religious fanatics, the kind of nameless people who are pulled dead from the Thames.
This is a novel about the frailty of identity, the anonymity of modern city life, the frightening and thrilling possibilities of personal reinvention. Boyd gives a harrowing sense of how close and yet how distant the nether life of a large city is, accessible to anyone willing or forced to step outside the web of modern technology: "No cheques, no bills, no references, no mobile phone calls -- only payphones -- no credit cards, only cash -- nothing. That's how you disappear in the twenty-first century -- you just refuse to take part in it. You live like a medieval peasant: you scrounge, you steal, you sleep under hedges."
What follows is the story of a hunted man, the chapters propelled along thrillingly at just the right moments by sudden reversals, revelations and reprisals. Penniless and hunted, Adam has few resources to mount a criminal inquiry or pursue a pharmaceutical scandal, but he toughens up quickly on the streets and manages an ingenious investigation to clear his name. Nevertheless, through it all, he's madly pursued by a retired British soldier-turned-hit-man who honed his grisly techniques in Afghanistan. I'm still trying to blot out of my mind what he does to a captured man's hands. . . .
The novel's most impressive quality is the way Boyd rotates through a large group of characters, allowing us to experience this crisis from a variety of perspectives -- each slanted and usually wildly mistaken. Adam, his determined assassin, a tenacious young policewoman and the wealthy president of a pharmaceutical company are all racing to understand what's happening to them. Boyd reminds us that we're pattern-hungry creatures, deeply biased toward the belief that events are connected, that motives underlie actions. But sometimes the only connection is the one we imagine. And kill for.
Admittedly, the evils of big pharma felt like a fresher theme a decade ago, when John le Carré wrote "The Constant Gardener," but Boyd provides a slick primer on the way new drugs are marketed -- from helpful public service announcements to anodyne branding commercials, all designed to bully government regulators, stoke public demand and maximize profits. Chemicals and genes aren't the only thing being manipulated here.
"Ordinary Thunderstorms" never sounds too polemical, though, because at the center of this Death Star of corporate malignancy, Boyd places one of his most complex and humane characters: Ingram Fryzer, president of Calenture-Deutz Pharmaceutical. He's a corporate tycoon, a man of impeccable taste and extraordinary power, but ultimately he has no more control over his life than poor Adam. Once this storm of fraud and conspiracy gets roaring, nobody can manage it.
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/20...
November 7, 2016
“Bill, love. There’s a shot at the next Bond novel, but you’re going to need a calling card. Well, I say a calling card. I mean a thriller. Show ‘em you can do all the explosions and action, the kiss-kiss bang-bang stuff, all right? Oh, and can you knock it out in a couple of weeks?”
This imagined conversation with his agent is the only explanation for why the author of Any Human Heart would reach for such a toolbox of clichés and preposterous plot-twists. The title sets the tone. Ordinary Thunderstorms – an observation sufficiently vague and fatuous that it’s not really worth making: “Hey man, it’s like if history was weather, you know? So storms, that would be like a war happening, maybe. And heat waves, they could be, I don’t know, revolutions.”
A man wrongly accused of murder goes into hiding by sleeping rough a few streets away from where the murder was committed. And this is in modern London – only it must be a modern London where there is no CCTV and all the police are off doing something else, because he manages to wander those streets and scrounge from those cafés and nobody recognizes him. Maybe that’s thanks to the week’s growth of beard, which as any fan of 1950s movies knows is better than cosmetic surgery when it comes to disguising your identity.
At one point early on, an ex-SAS hired killer comes up behind our hapless hero. Indeed, although our hero doesn’t know it, he puts a gun to his head. But not to worry, because the hero has his briefcase in his hand and he spins around at the mere mention of his name, knocking the assassin out before he can shoot. Now, I know some ex-SAS blokes, and if I tried that with them I’d be a red paste on the pavement before I’d moved three inches. They wouldn’t actually even need a bullet, but that’s a detail. Point is, try that manoeuvre right now. Get a briefcase and see how fast you can spin around and clout somebody with it, given that a trained soldier could pull that trigger in less time than it takes you to twitch.
The lack of research or even thought that has gone into the story is what makes me suspect Boyd was just churning it out to get the 007 gig. The book is full of sentences like this: “Later, Adam found it hard to explain why he had reacted so violently to hearing his name.” That plot-glitch, which Boyd is attempting to patch with a bit of authorial woo, would have been easy to fix. Boyd could simply have had the guy press the gun nozzle to Adam’s head; we’d all accept somebody might react violently to that. But instead we just get the scene and then the excuse. This is a story written with pedal to the metal and no thought for revision.
The editing is slapdash too. For example, somebody is eating their “breakfast cornflakes in the morning” – whew, glad we got that straight. We’re told that “conspiracies multiply incrementally”. Sure you didn’t mean “exponentially”, Bill? Somebody drives along “in” a scooter, creating the impression that the book was written by somebody whose first language isn’t English – of which further evidence is provided in the phrase “as they left the church they were bade farewell”.
But such infelicities pale when put alongside the outrageous contortions of the story. While hiding out from the murder charge, Adam starts a relationship with a local policewoman. Surely this must be intended as a parody? Even the notion that a former research scientist could pass himself off for months as an apparently uneducated hospital porter… How could you stand to keep up the pretence? I find it hard to spend a day in a house without books, and yet for weeks on end this guy can convince everyone around him that he barely scraped one GCSE? What with that and his close combat briefcase skills, he’s a rival to the freakin’ Jackal.
You might wonder how come the book didn’t go out of the window long before the end. The reason is that our household somehow ended up with two copies, and my wife and I enjoyed reading it in parallel and grumbling to each other about all the mistakes, absurdities, and ass-pulls. If you read it in that way, there are plenty enough of those to keep you entertained – and I still wonder if that’s what the author intended all along. Probably so does he.
This imagined conversation with his agent is the only explanation for why the author of Any Human Heart would reach for such a toolbox of clichés and preposterous plot-twists. The title sets the tone. Ordinary Thunderstorms – an observation sufficiently vague and fatuous that it’s not really worth making: “Hey man, it’s like if history was weather, you know? So storms, that would be like a war happening, maybe. And heat waves, they could be, I don’t know, revolutions.”
A man wrongly accused of murder goes into hiding by sleeping rough a few streets away from where the murder was committed. And this is in modern London – only it must be a modern London where there is no CCTV and all the police are off doing something else, because he manages to wander those streets and scrounge from those cafés and nobody recognizes him. Maybe that’s thanks to the week’s growth of beard, which as any fan of 1950s movies knows is better than cosmetic surgery when it comes to disguising your identity.
At one point early on, an ex-SAS hired killer comes up behind our hapless hero. Indeed, although our hero doesn’t know it, he puts a gun to his head. But not to worry, because the hero has his briefcase in his hand and he spins around at the mere mention of his name, knocking the assassin out before he can shoot. Now, I know some ex-SAS blokes, and if I tried that with them I’d be a red paste on the pavement before I’d moved three inches. They wouldn’t actually even need a bullet, but that’s a detail. Point is, try that manoeuvre right now. Get a briefcase and see how fast you can spin around and clout somebody with it, given that a trained soldier could pull that trigger in less time than it takes you to twitch.
The lack of research or even thought that has gone into the story is what makes me suspect Boyd was just churning it out to get the 007 gig. The book is full of sentences like this: “Later, Adam found it hard to explain why he had reacted so violently to hearing his name.” That plot-glitch, which Boyd is attempting to patch with a bit of authorial woo, would have been easy to fix. Boyd could simply have had the guy press the gun nozzle to Adam’s head; we’d all accept somebody might react violently to that. But instead we just get the scene and then the excuse. This is a story written with pedal to the metal and no thought for revision.
The editing is slapdash too. For example, somebody is eating their “breakfast cornflakes in the morning” – whew, glad we got that straight. We’re told that “conspiracies multiply incrementally”. Sure you didn’t mean “exponentially”, Bill? Somebody drives along “in” a scooter, creating the impression that the book was written by somebody whose first language isn’t English – of which further evidence is provided in the phrase “as they left the church they were bade farewell”.
But such infelicities pale when put alongside the outrageous contortions of the story. While hiding out from the murder charge, Adam starts a relationship with a local policewoman. Surely this must be intended as a parody? Even the notion that a former research scientist could pass himself off for months as an apparently uneducated hospital porter… How could you stand to keep up the pretence? I find it hard to spend a day in a house without books, and yet for weeks on end this guy can convince everyone around him that he barely scraped one GCSE? What with that and his close combat briefcase skills, he’s a rival to the freakin’ Jackal.
You might wonder how come the book didn’t go out of the window long before the end. The reason is that our household somehow ended up with two copies, and my wife and I enjoyed reading it in parallel and grumbling to each other about all the mistakes, absurdities, and ass-pulls. If you read it in that way, there are plenty enough of those to keep you entertained – and I still wonder if that’s what the author intended all along. Probably so does he.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 9, 2011
I'm not quite sure what Boyd was going for here: a straight thriller, or a playful pastiche. Neither worked, for me, and it left the book as an uncomfortable amalgam of the two. I'm a sucker for stories about identity, and about missing people, but part of the reason this disappointed was that the protagonist was rather flat, and I never felt as if I got inside his skin. Some of the secondary characters were the same, from the ex-SAS coldhearted killer to the prostitute with a heart of gold, speaking in cliche, acting perfectly within stereotype.
I liked the way London was drawn in the book, and Boyd's ingenuity in creating Kindred's life off the grid, and eventual assumption of a new identity.
Too many themes seemed to offer interest (the maritime police, the church), but they were never given space to develop, and so became rather mundane and obvious hooks on which to hang a particular plot device.
I still read it to the end, because I wanted to know how it turned out. But when I got there, I didn't feel that the time spent had been worth it. It's too shallow.
I liked the way London was drawn in the book, and Boyd's ingenuity in creating Kindred's life off the grid, and eventual assumption of a new identity.
Too many themes seemed to offer interest (the maritime police, the church), but they were never given space to develop, and so became rather mundane and obvious hooks on which to hang a particular plot device.
I still read it to the end, because I wanted to know how it turned out. But when I got there, I didn't feel that the time spent had been worth it. It's too shallow.
April 7, 2010
In his tenth novel, Boyd takes a stab at the ""wronged-man-on-the-run"" plot, with mixed results. While some critics thought it a ""snappy page-turner, a true thriller"" (Philadelphia Inquirer), others felt the story falters under the weight of clunky writing and tiresome clich̩s. This came as a surprise to reviewers, who were accustomed to the elegant, precise prose in Boyd's earlier works. Ordinary Thunderstorms may not appeal to the conventional thriller fan. It perhaps works best as a novel that explores identity, anonymity in modern urban life, reinvention, and the tumultuous domino effect that can result from one fateful decision. This is an excerpt from a review published in Bookmarks magazine.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,002 reviews