Krishna
This is a great book from Ian. He is known for his work Saturday (not read it yet) and also for his earlier works like Amsterdam
This book begins innocuously enough, in a small town castle in England (Chesterfield) in the 1930s. It tracks the family of Jack Tallis, his perpetually sickly wife, and his daughters Cecilia and young Briony, who is thirteen. Briony is artistic and writes stories and has a great imagination. She hopes to be a writer. Cee (Cecilia) has come home from London for the holidays but Briony has written a play to welcome their brother Leon back home. Lola Quincey, her cousin and Lola’s twin brothers arrive and are automatically being given part in the play, but Lola dominates the play from the start and wrecks the plans of Briony by taking away all the parts and reassigning them at will.
Cee meets Robbie Turner, son of a servant in the hall, who has finished his degree courtesy the generosity of Jack. He now wants to do medicine and has the audacity to assume that Jack will fund it. (Jack agrees to fund that as well, as he considers Robbie his protege). Childhood friends Cee and Robbie discover that they are in love and just when things seem to be going well, the entire world of the Tallis family falls apart.
The twins run away in a pique and the town organizes a search. In the semi darkness, Briony discovers that Lola has been assaulted and is convinced that Robbie was the attacker. Robbie is arrested and based on the strong evidence from both the girls, is thrown in jail, his dreams of being a doctor irrevocably wrecked and his jail sentence unbearably long.
The Tallis family cannot withstand this trauma and splits, and Briony discovers too late that she made a terrible, terrible, mistake. Her sister disowns all her family in anger and leaves town, breaking off all contact with the family. Robbie tries to shorten the sentence by exchanging his remaining term for a stint in the Army fighting the Second World War in France against Germany.
Briony discovers that she cannot undo what she has done, even if she wished to. Her life becomes meaningless and she searches for ways to achieve some peace of mind.
The story goes to a fantastic denouement, and is amazingly told. It moves effortlessly from different points of view (Cee, Robbie, Briony) though all of it is told in third person, and moves also effortlessly from one locale to another (war torn France to the castle to hospitals in England) and is brilliant. It keeps your interest and keeps you turning pages.
An excellent read, I would give it a 9/10
— Krishna