Lanny: A Novel

What an extraordinary book. Its delicate but perfect form leaves me with no real way to use my own ordinary language to describe it except to say that it's extraordinary. Beautiful. Lanny and Pete and Jolie will linger in my mind and heart, and Dead Papa Toothwort was terrifying and so much more viscerally true than our benign ideas of Mother Nature, even though both are creative forces. But nature includes death and destruction and raw urgent impersonal force and power, ideas missing from our Mother Nature construction. Part 2 was extraordinary, just the most perfect form for that part of the story, and especially coming on the heels of the ordinary narrative of Part 1. But Part 3 just kept me on the edge of my seat, reading as fast as I could but also being terrified of what I might read. Just such a wonderful, wonderful book. I'll probably read it again, and so that fifth star.

I’m not usually a fan of fantasy but this is closer to Lincoln in the Bardo than Harry Potter. Dead Papa Toothwort is a wonderful creation.Highly recommended but best not try to read it on a phone as you may struggle with the wiggly listening bits and they are well worth reading.

The only reason I picked up this slight otherwise obscure book is that it is on the Booker longest. Honestly, I have no idea what this book was about after reading over 60 pages. Experimental fiction belongs in the realm of the erudite academics who will rave about books that nobody else would understand. They can declare it great art. I feel like this book is like the emperor's new clothes. Because it is so amazing as to be included on the Booker longlist, we should be expected to admire it. Personally, I think it is pretentious crap! There is no linear plot or character development. I usually like two thirds of the Booker longest and I have never ever agreed with their top pick. This book is mercifully brief so perhaps you will get through it. I cannot recommend it to any reader that wants to truly be moved by great fiction.

I was shopping for other books when I came across this and, while I didn't know much about it other than that it was long listed for the Man Booker and was recommended as a July read by the NY Times, I picked it up. What a treat. While I like a lot of postmodern literature, I don't usually find that the stylistic hijinks necessarily help in story telling. Not so here. Porter shows us what literature can accomplish. He sucked me in and I read this in one sitting. I strongly recommend coming to this book with no preconceptions, about its style or subject and instead let Porter surprise you. I intentionally don't want to be more precise because, at least for me, much of the pleasure I got from reading this came from my sheer bewilderment.

Strange book. Didn’t seem to be any growth in the characters and not much of a story. I didn’t get a vague idea even of what the author was trying to say.

This book is set in a picturesque English village with lovely gardens but there is an undercurrent of evil that permeates the story. There is a legend in this village much like our legend of Sleepy Hollow. The book centers on a young couple and their son who is sweet and well liked but different and people don't know quite what to make of him. The boy disappears and the book focuses on the struggle to get him back. All of the characters in the book are changed by this event and it would have been interesting to find out how things would have ended up if the boy had never disappeared. I found the book to be slightly choppy to read with how it transitions between all the different characters.

Lanny by Max Porter is a magical book that tells the story of Lanny, a not quite typical boy, in a twisted, non-traditional and fable-like collage of words and images blown about by the winds of a shadowed folktale. I enjoyed it, and if you can abandon any expectation of a typically told tale, you will enjoy it too. More folktale than novel, it is deep and dark in the way that the best folktales are. Enter the realm of the Green Man, here called Dead Papa Toothwort, and fall into the story.

I loved this book. It is original, beautiful, and written with spare beauty like a poem. It is based around a special little boy but through the voices of those around him, his parents, friend, the village and the spirit of the earth. It is about history, humans and their impact on nature, families, and the magic of childhood. Don't expect a simple linear narrative but let the words flow around you, it is worth it.

Author: Max PorterI absolutely loved Max Porter's debut novel - 'Grief is the thing with feathers' - so my expectations were high for this book. It didn't disappoint. Just wow. Such a unique voice and style. The pages drip with lyrical language and ooze raw emotion. Porter weaves magic through the pages and is utterly spellbinding. Published by Faber and Faber (March 2019) I'd recommend this for well, everyone - although I imagine it is a little like Marmite. You will either love it or hate it but must at least try it to find out.Whilst an absolutely glorious read, this book (as with the first) did take some perseverance for me to get into. I like that. It challenges me and takes me out of my comfort zone with reading. It's all too easy to pick books we know we will enjoy and be able to read without too much dissonance. Max Porter uses techniques and language in a way I haven't experienced before so it takes a handful of pages for my brain to switch into a different way of being and then the serotonin flows. His writing is captivating and powerful - once I am 'in it' enough to be carried by it.It reminds me of the ocean - some pages roll across a shore with familiar rhythm and tidal lyricism, yet others pound and crash like violent waves that toss and tumble you under the surface. It feels vast and inspires awe. At times gasping for breath and others floating on warm salty water enjoying the view.On the surface this becomes a story about a missing boy - a boy from a rural village on the commuter belt to London - but it is also so much more. Assumptions, prejudice, relationships - with each other and the space we exist in. Folklore. Mystery. Violence.Lanny lives with his mum (Jolie - a retired actress come author) and his dad (Robert - a city worker) although it's probably fairer to say he lives mostly in his own world - of ideas, thoughts and the woods. Dead Papa Toothwort and Mad Pete I will let you find for yourselves. The book explores the overlapping lives of different villagers and centuries old beliefs about a 'green man' in their midst.Creativity is at the core of Lanny - both the main character and the book. I can't wait to go back and read it all again.

Lanny is a young boy, growing up in an ordinary village with ordinary people - underneath which Dead Papa Toothwort, an ancient burry man, lies listening to the inane conversation above.The novel is narrated from various viewpoints: Lanny’s Mum, Lanny’s Dad, and Pete, an elderly and accomplished artist. The narratives all centre around the relationship between the narrator and Lanny, leading the reader to imagine this some kind of reminiscence about the formative years of a now great man. And interspersed, we have the bored interjections of Dead Papa Toothwort who presents individual lines of conversations one might hear down the pub (somewhat irritatingly presented in word-art form that is mightily difficult to read on a Kindle).So, for the first half of then novel, we see an emerging friendship between Lanny and Pete as the old painter tries to help Lanny to develop his own artistic skills. Lanny’s parents are happy with this as it provides free childcare, allowing them to pursue their own interests (Lanny’s Mum is a crime writer and Lanny’s Dad works long hours in London).Then, half way through, Dead Papa Toothwort decides to roll the dice and make something interesting happen in the village. This, apparently, is something he is wont to do every century or so. And Lanny disappears. Fingers point, gossip spreads. People question Pete’s motives; they question Lanny’s Mum and Dad’s parenting techniques. Kids at school who ostracised Lanny start to get remorseful...There is something bucolic about the novel. It blends folk tradition with very current withering about house prices and commuting. It bears more than a passing resemblance to Reservoir 13/The Reservoir Tapes in that although Lanny is the glue that binds the story together, it is more of an observational drama about village life and personal interests.Lanny is stunningly well told; the lines drip from the page and the reader is left wanting more. The ending is almost satisfying.Booker longlisted. Surely a shoo in for the shortlist (or more?)

Max Porter's first book, Grief Is The Thing With Feathers was my favourite book of 2015.Lanny is on my list for this year.Sweet Lanny touched my heart.Now & then he stopped my breath until I remembered & let it out like a long, slow breeze.If you know magic you'll get this book in an instant. If you don't, you'll be fine because as you turn the last page, magic will attach itself to you.Not enough stars.

There are no praises that haven’t been heaped on this book yet, and I can’t embellish the accolades any further. But Lanny is a masterpiece. It has exemplar conception, dialogues and characterization. The reading leaves so much thirst quenched and so much more to be desired.Lanny is a precocious boy living with his parents in a village outside of London. He is as much a resident of this world as he is of his imagination. His parents and his art teacher Pete, try to encroach in this alien world, but without much success. Then there is Dead Papa Toothworth, the omnipresent spirit of this idyllic village, who is a chronicler of the community since times immemorial.The layered narrative eventually exposes itself to be a subtle commentary on modern Britain, with its rural and urban life distinctly segregated and the ever growing intolerance. There is also a sweet juxtaposition between the carefree childhood and the vexed adulthood; nuanced by the role reversal between the two when Lanny asks questions like which one of hope and idea has better patience.Lanny’s dialogues and themes compelled me to compare it with Ali Smith’s recent works, but in using a child as the central character, Porter has left the book wide open to interpretation. The idealists amongst us can draw political parallels, the romantics amongst us can enjoy a beautiful story.

This book is unlike anything else I have read and I feel it may take some time to gather my thoughts about it. Once I picked this up I couldn't put it down as it was utterly immersive and captivating in it's style and imagery e.g. multiple narrators with it not always being clear who is talking and the mystical figure of Toothwort. Some moments will stay with me, although not always in a good way (to avoid spoilers I will just say "hedgehog" and leave it there). I can really appreciate the uniqueness and beauty of a story told like this although I am not yet sure if I loved it.