The Prince of Tides: A Novel by Pat Conroy
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Book Reviews of The Prince of Tides: A Novel
Book Review: The Novel: A collection ofshort stories held together by a dysfunctional family
Summary: 3 Stars
Last month I began to read Pat Conroy's "South of Broad. After reading just over 200 pages, I put it down-utterly disappointed in the novel. I picked up a copy of "The Prince of Tides" instead and began to read it. For the most part I enjoyed the novel about the disfunctional Wingo family. A question to Pat Conroy: Why does you insist making Henry Wingo and his children Catholics? Being a Catholic is not the same as becoming a member of a political party or a citizen of the state of SOuth Carolina. Their "professed" faith adds nothing to the story. In fact I see a anti-Catholic bias since the main characters are anything but Christian in their acts and life style. Other wise I found myself engrossed in the story, until the last two chapters and epilogue. The story just loses energy at the end (Lowenstein, Lowenstein!).Book Review: The ending isn't...
Summary: 3 Stars
Conroy's writing is, as always, spectacular in The Prince of Tides: A Novel.
The protagonist is not your usual hero, again a Conroy trait. The history and cause of the difficulties faced by the protagonist are intense and with occasional humor - another Conroy trait.
The reason I gave this one 3 stars instead of 4 is that I didn't care for the ending. I felt it left too much unresolved - this is NOT a common Conroy trait. If I went further into detail, it would require spoilers.
I recommend the book because the story, regardless of the ending, is such a good one and the writing is first rate.
Book Review: By No Means Conroy's Best
Summary: 2 Stars
I'll admit that I went into reading this book with great expectations, having read 'Beach Music' and 'The Great Santini' and enjoyed them. But I'll also admit that I failed to finish this book, though I skipped around in the second half of it and got a pretty good idea of what the rest of it was like.
Why I failed to finish had to do with the over-the-top nature of the plot and with the repetitive nature of Conroy's storytelling. In every story of his I've read, the basic story is the same - a man who's lost at love and been a failure, sports, too much liquor, a chance at redemption, and a dreadful family that revolves around an abusive father. Fine, many of these are part of Mr. Conroy's own background and, as we all know, authors write what they know. But in this story the elements are blown up to fantastic proportions, creating a kind of grand guignol, a Southern Gothic that almost brings on the giggles a couple of times. The father is more horrible, the beatings are more savage, the mother is more manipulative, the failure of the protagonist more abject, and the family secret more horrible than ever; as if by piling up these elements the author intended to create such an imposing and epic structure that the reader would be awed into complete adoration.
Well, I'm sorry, I didn't buy it. So much so that in fact I abandoned the thing midway through. The writing was often good, the descriptions fine, at times quite beautiful, the characterizations strong, even pungent; you expect all that from a writer of Conroy's quality. But this was for me a hothouse flower of a novel - big, overblown, and reeking with the cloying scent of Southern soap opera.
I just can't recommend this one...not unless big and gaudy is how you like 'em. If so, dig in.
Book Review: a beautifully written mess
Summary: 2 Stars
'The Prince of Tides' is my first Pat Conroy novel and it may very well be my last. Having seen the film adaptation some twenty years back, I thought I knew what the story was about. Wrong, very wrong. The dysfunctional South Carolina family is not only a bit messed up, the author throws in an endless array of the most fantastic elements: wife beating, children beating, a suicidal master poetess, a lover who's husband is a world-renowned violinist, a son who becomes a militant reactionary, a "Free Willy"-type episode involving an albino porpoise, and a brutal rape of family members that was broken up by a pet tiger. Er..., is that all you can think of Pat Conroy? Shouldn't you have included a cousin who was a ballerina turned astronaut before curing the President of tuberculosis?? Although Pat Conroy writes some beautiful prose with awesome dialogue 'The Prince of Tides' reads like he made up the story as he went along. Yes, this is a vicious insult. But after reading 500+ pages of this drivel I think it is justified.
Bottom line: even Oprah would pan such a over-the-top soap opera of novel. A total mess.
Book Review: Disappointing
Summary: 2 Stars
This book promises much but delivers precious little. The first 250 pages or so are really great. The story is engrossing, the characters are vivid, the plot is intricate and beautifully crafted. Then, the novel suddenly transforms into a collection of loosely connected short stories that could have been excised from the book without damaging the plot in the least. Each new episode is more saccharine than the previous one. The language grows more and more pompous with every episode. These weird short stories have endings that are entirely fantastic and completely unconvincing.
Without giving anything away, I can say that the ending of the novel is wildly incongruous with the rest of the work. It feels like everything we have learned about the characters in the 600+ pages has to be thrown out in order to comprehend and accept this extremely disappointing finale. The closing scenes of the book are narrated in a language that is unparalleled as an exercise in pomposity and syrupy sentimentality. What could have been a great book ends up being a cheesy melodrama.