An Instance of the Fingerpost: Explore the murky world of 17th-century Oxford in this iconic historical thriller

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Rosina wrote: "Each of the four narrators has a different mystery, and the killing of Dr Grove is perhaps the least absorbing, though I found the testing of the poison by Stahl - the early forensic science - most..." It can often be just as you say, a turn off. But then I have enjoyed some of those, notably some of the Bronte works, some of Austin, etc. It depends on whether their story and characters are interesting. I can handle slow and overlook over-wordy, and even at times the dreaded purple prose provided story/character work well. I assume the whole book is written in this manner. And as such, calling it a mystery or even an historical one is a disservice to potential readers. This is a literary novel about a mystery. And from what I am able to perceive is that it is severely wordy and overlong. I was not surprised to learn he is an Oxford man. His style strongly suggests it. The word pretentious resonates loudly for me.

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An Instance of the Fingerpost ( ISBN 0-425-16772-0) is an historical mystery novel by Iain Pears which was first published in 1997. A murder in 17th Century (1633) Oxford is related from the contradictory points of view of four of the characters, all of them unreliable narrators. The four characters are: a Venetian medical student, a man intent on proving the innocence of his father, a cryptographer, and an archivist. The evidence appears to lead to Sarah Blundy who confesses to the crime and is sentenced to hang. The setting of the novel is just after the English Civil War, when the king's authority is not yet settled, and conspiracies abound. I was willing to go along with the suggestion that Nancy was the messiah, and that there was one in each generation, but the fact that she was resurrected without much opposition and then sent abroad did seem rather a wet squib ending. Da Cola is familiar with the heresy that holds that a messiah is born in each generation, and is betrayed, sacrificed and rises again (foretelling Sarah's fate), but I've been unable to confirm that it's a real historical heresy, even with the use of Google. Montanism is/was real, and a woman called Prisca was one of the leaders, but the bit about the regular appearance of Messiahs might be an invention (or might be that Pears has access to more information than Wikipedia!) Yes, seems to be a Marmite book as I'm the same as Jill on this one, and also struggled with Pears' The Portrait.

This book is really quite polarizing. People either like it or dislike it. I'm so on the fence about reading it. These days, being older and hopefully a little wiser, I have so many books I want to read that I've become more careful when it comes to choosing them. A fascinating book but I found it a slow read as the style reflects the period. I can not call it gripping and the murder mystery is not the prime interest, but I liked how the various narrators each interpreted, and reported, the facts from their own point of view. Even the final and most complete version is influenced by the narrator's feelings. Iain Pears, like Stewart, is a respected academic, the author of a monograph on eighteenth-century collectors, but he's not too proud to publish crime novels under his own name. His Italian art-world romps have titles like The Bernini Bust and The Raphael Affair: they're light and ingenious and they sell well; and their success has encouraged him to move ever further into the mainstream. Before the war, he had unearthed an obscure Provençal poet of the fourteenth century, Olivier de Noyen, and a philosophical manuscript, 'The Dream of Scipio', written by a fifth-century Roman aristocrat, Manlius Hippomanes. This mysterious text links the three men, as does their love for a woman - Sophia, Rebecca, Julia - a kind of Universal Muse who wafts inspiringly through time.

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The idea that Sarah was a Messiah is what Wood believes, not real truth (even in-book). There can be natural explanations both for her resurrection and ascension, and even for her healing powers, if they truly exist.Writing Arcadia did produce odd effects in ways that an ordinary book or ebook could not; scenes became more episodic and vignette-like; the demands of shifting from one point of view to another, and then to multiple ones in different worlds, required different ways of writing. Most peculiarly of all, I found that the story was most easily structured by looking at it visually; whole strands were expanded or even deleted simply to create a more pleasing shape in the writing program I was using. On every occasion, the more satisfactory the appearance, the better the story read, and I still haven’t quite figured out how that works. Thom wrote: "Interestingly I never cared for the various series based on his books. I'd watch a few episodes and that was it. Talented as he may have been, I doubt he's a good one for me." There are many beautiful passages, certainly, but the central aspects of the book would have been better treated in a study of real writers than in this oddly fictionalised form of scholarship.

An Instance of the Fingerpost by Iain Pears: 9781573227957 An Instance of the Fingerpost by Iain Pears: 9781573227957

Roman Clodia wrote: "Yes, seems to be a Marmite book as I'm the same as Jill on this one, and also struggled with Pears' The Portrait. Was not Hypatia the greatest philosopher of Alexandria, and a true martyr to the old values of learning? She was torn to pieces by a mob of incensed Christians not because she was a woman, but because her learning was so profound, her skills at dialectic so extensive that she reduced all who queried her to embarrassed silence. They could not argue with her, so they murdered her.”For the first time, she did want more. She did not know what she wanted, knew that it was dangerous and that she should rest content with what she had, but she knew an emptiness deep inside her, which began to ache.” I thought both books are crafted thoughtfully - the monologue form in Portrait, and the well-integrated historical research here ranging from medicine to Restoration politics and religion - but I felt bogged down in all the minutiae and dead ends. Do you know, the only people I can have a conversation with are the Jews? At least when they quote scripture at you they are not merely repeating something some priest has babbled in their ear. They have the great merit of disagreeing with nearly everything I say. In fact, they disagree with almost everything they say themselves. And most importantly, they don't think that shouting strengthens their argument.” I began Arcadia – a novel conceived and written for an app – over four and a half years ago when a lot of people were musing about digital narrative. After working my way through three publishers, two designers, four sets of coders and a lot of anguish, I am no longer surprised that few others have done anything about it. I also understand why the NHS database could go five times over budget and not work. What should be a simple task – write story, create software, publish – turns out to be anything but in practice. Olivier is purportedly a great poet, but the only fragments of his verse we encounter are '(in the wholly inadequate 1865 translation of Frédéric Mistral) "My eyes have stabbed my soul..." ' This is more than inadequate, it is an appalling cop-out. Manlius's classical wit is marked with a similar ellipsis: 'They swapped aphorisms about water, played with quotations from Pliny about his garden...' What aphorisms? Which quotations? And Julien's great intellect is evident only in his knowing silences.

An Instance of the Fingerpost - AbeBooks An Instance of the Fingerpost - AbeBooks

The bestselling An Instance of the Fingerpost (1997) marked a new departure for Pears; far more structurally and stylistically ambitious than the Italian series, it suggested that he was developing his voice as a serious novelist, as did his move from HarperCollins to Cape. But, on the evidence of the new novel, it looks as if An Instance of the Fingerpost may have been a one-off. Jill wrote: "I was willing to go along with the suggestion that Nancy was the messiah, and that there was one in each generation, but the fact that she was resurrected without much opposition and then sent abroad did seem rather a wet squib ending. ." One of the things I found annoying was when the narrator said something about what he had done or said that was a mistake which he would tell us about later. Immediately led me to think well that was obviously the wrong decision, but I will find out later, then if there was reference to it, it was just glazed over. Mod Abigail wrote: "I gave up a little way into Prestcott’s narration. Am not surprised to hear that Sarah was not dead after the hanging because of all the blood da Cola described when he came in on the “autopsy.” If..." Ebooks are now quite venerable in computing terms, but it is striking how small an impact they have had on narrative structure; for the most part, they are still just ordinary books in a cheap format. An analogy is the early days of cinema, when film-makers did little more than plonk cameras in front of a stage and film a play. It took some time before they realised that by exploiting the new possibilities the technology offered – cutting, editing, closeups, lighting and so on – they could create a new art form that did not replace theatre, but did things theatre could not. Computing power properly understood and used can perhaps eventually do something of the same; not supplant orthodox books – which are perfectly good in most cases – but come into play when they are insufficient.The action - what there is of it - in The Dream of Scipio moves between 5th-, 14th- and 20th-century Avignon. Our scholar-hero is Julien Barneuve, a 1930s French intellectual whose failure to intervene decisively in public life leads him into the service of the Vichy regime. IMO, much of Sarah's messianic character was in Wood's mind. The resurrection is explained by Lower's eagerness to get the body. Wood had no way of knowing if she arrived in America, particularly if she changed her name. The boat was so crowded no one would take accurate notice of the people debarking. And I assumed the mother lied about her conception.