Capital (John Lanchester)

John Lanchester shows poor old Sebastian how to write a decent ensemble novel. I really liked this book. It was well written without being too high-brow and pretentious, it had a plot that moved things along nicely (the sinister postcards and blog). It was funny at times without being heavy handed and deliberate, touching without being too cloyingly sentimental, informative without being 'preachy'. The focus of Pepys Street gave a nice sense of London without it being too sprawling and widespread. I liked the cast of characters very much and I felt that I got a real sense of who they were, I thought Lanchester made you care about them and I wanted to know what would happen to Roger especially.

One thing that confused me though, the blub at the back had something about what life would be like in 2021, which wasn't really reflected in the book (thankfully, I find some of those future prediction things quite embarrassing). Having gone onto the website advertised on the back, I'm guessing the whole future thing was a marketing ploy. I've signed up to it out of curiosity, it's apparently going to tell me what my life's going to be like in the next ten years.