Well who knew?! Jerry Archer writes a good read! And here I was thinking he wrote mind-numbingly boring political sagas for what I like to call the ‘Dad market’. And other than the whole perjury thing, and of course the Bridget Jones’ cameo (like our old friend Mr Rushdie – what is it with that film?!) these were all my previous thoughts on Mr Archer.
Well, that is until I read Kane and Abel, which I don’t mind admitting I loved! Funny things happened when toting this book around with me - people were actually interested in my reading it – none more so that the lady on the tram who one day into reading it on my way to work, stopped me to tell me she’d read it four times before, the first time being when she was 13 and that it was amazing. Yikes. Combined with the fact it’s had 30 imprints or something, I began to think early on that this one couldn’t be too bad!
Spanning a lifetime and covering many countries, Kane and Abel follows the lives of two characters (go on, have a stab at their names…) from very different backgrounds whose lives firstly mirror each other, and then in the later years begin to intertwine and affect one another, often unbeknownst to them. From birth to death, the reader shares their fortunes as well as misfortunes and although the supposed twist is pretty glaringly obvious, I often found myself reading this open mouthed at times. Yes, even in public.
I also happened to be reading this on a pretty awesome California road trip (shout out to the lovely Misses Nisha and Mirielle and of course lady of the moment Jessica!) and whilst Kane and Abel is mostly set between Chicago, New York and Boston, being in America and on holiday certainly enhanced my liking of this book. Not least the fact that during my trip I was staying with a family, whose ancestors had emigrated to the US from Europe, much like Abel.
So all in all I really enjoyed this one, and I would say if you’re heading on your hols this year and haven’t read it, it’s definitely worth packing.
Now for a gratuitous pic of my holibobs (sans book sadly)
How funny that you read this book. I remember Mum and Dad had it on the shelf at our old house for years - I remember asking Mum what it was about when I was about eight. She was very vague! Never fancied a JA book before, but might read this now.
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