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    Beatlebone
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    Beatlebone
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    Beatlebone
    Audiobook6 hours

    Beatlebone

    Written by Kevin Barry

    Narrated by Kevin Barry

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    A searing, surreal novel that bleeds fantasy and reality-and Beatles fandom-from one of literature's most striking contemporary voices, author of the international sensation City of Bohane

    It is 1978, and John Lennon has escaped New York City to try to find the island off the west coast of Ireland he bought nine years prior. Leaving behind domesticity, his approaching forties, his inability to create, and his memories of his parents, he sets off to find calm in the comfortable silence of isolation. But when he puts himself in the hands of a shape-shifting driver full of Irish charm and dark whimsy, what ensues can only be termed a magical mystery tour.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrilliance Audio
    Release dateNov 17, 2015
    ISBN9781511322003
    Unavailable
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    Reviews for Beatlebone

    3.5/5

    83 ratings11 reviews

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    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      Lyrical and magical and essentially Irish. Set in 1978 we spend time with John the macrobiotic father/doubter/searcher rather than John the Beatle. This an unselfconsciously ambitious novel that mostly succeeds. Delightful.
    • 3/5
      moving and immersive at times. not really for me, but maybe for someone else. i liked the more dialogue-heavy sections where we get to listen to the characters, especially john of course who is a magnetic literary creation.
    • 4/5
      A surreal, poetic and wild tribute to John Lennon by another of Ireland's talented young writers. This book imagines Lennon travelling round the west of Ireland trying to reach an island he owns while evading the attention of the press. This leads to a series of strange encounters and reminiscences, some of which have some factual basis, and explorations of his Liverpool Irish roots. There is also a chapter about two thirds of the way through in which Barry explains his own motivations and how the book germinated, but for the most part the style is inspired by Lennon. I found this a very enjoyable read.
    • 4/5
      I completed [[Kevin Barry]]'s new novel, [Beatlebone], this morning. Barry's writing is excellent. His character building and sense of time and place are impeccable as always.This story is primarily told from the viewpoint of a well known, successful star in the music world who is going through a nervous breakdown. Through his rambling thoughts and attempts to find a place of peace and quiet to get his head together, while trying to avoid the hounds of the press, the reader is taken on a voyage of frustration, exploration and analysis of how dwelling on the negatives of the past can haunt and trouble one's mind in the present. We are also treated to a ring-side view of how a creative mind works.While this is an imagining of the thoughts of this musician the author inserts a section in the book from his own viewpoint as he researched for the book and he describes the facts behind the story that prop up his fictional telling of events.Barry is sympathetic to the troubled character and his self exploration.For those of you who want to know who the character is you will find his name behind the spoiler mask. John Lennon. This story takes place in 1978 which was a time when Lennon had a nervous breakdown. This is the author's imaginings of what that could have been like. It does not come across as Barry claiming what it was like, but I felt he was using the situation to give people an insight of how the black dogs of depression can creep up on anyone, even someone who appears to have everything.I think Kevin Barry is one of the best writers I have ever read. This book, however, deals with dark matters and is not one someone should turn to if looking for a cheery read.
    • 3/5
      A quirky piece of historical conviction that convincingly puts us in the head of a genius on the brink. The double act between John and Cornelius is very enjoyable, but the story seems to run of steam when other characters get involved - somewhat confirmed by the puzzling digression towards the book's end. Arguably a short story spread too thinly.
    • 2/5
      This novel is rooted in the fact that John Lennon bought an island off the coast of Ireland and is premised on the idea that he went to visit the island in 1978 for primal scream therapy. Getting to the island is most of the trip as hordes of media and the weather put up roadblocks. It's really more of a story about a character named "John Lennon" who happens to be a celebrity put into rural Ireland and Barry's philosophical musings put into the dialogue. It kind of has aspirations of being a Joyce or Becket work without the same skill. Frankly it's kind of boring. My favorite part was the non-fiction chapter which is a travelogue of Barry's research trip to the locales in the novel.
    • 3/5
      This is the 2nd book I have read by Barry. City of Bohane was very creative and the writing was excellent but it didn't work on all levels. This book about a fictional account of John Lennon trying to visit an island off the West Ireland coast that he owned(this was true) got good reviews so I thought I would try it. The writing was excellent and the concept was intriguing, but it did not totally work. It had the same rambling aspect as his first book. If you want to get into Western Ireland and read some snappy creative writing, then you might enjoy this.
    • 4/5
      Last Friday, award-winning Irish novelist Kevin Barry was in Princeton to read from his novel Beatlebone. You may recall, as I did not, that John Lennon bought a small island off far Western Ireland and made two visits there. Beatlebone describes a fictional third visit in 1978, two years before he was murdered. He’s being hounded by media and his own creative demons, and he just wants to get away to this unpeopled dot in the ocean, though heavily and loudly populated by gulls and terns, and slick with guano. He has a driver, Cornelius O’Grady, who began, Barry said, as a peripheral character, but as sometimes happens, became vitally important to the book. He’s John’s guide to the mysteries of Ireland, his goad, and his sounding board.Much of the book is their dialog, which Barry delivered deliciously:About my situation, Mr. O’Grady?Yes?I really don’t need a f--- circus right now. The most important thing is no one knows I’m out here.Cornelius fills his mug from a silver pot and runs his eyes about the room.John, he says, half the newspapermen in Dublin are after piling onto the Westport train.Oh for f—sake!But we aren’t beat yet. The train’s an hour till it’s in. We’ll throw a shape lively.The lack of punctuation requires a little extra reader attention, but it isn’t difficult to follow. What you have is a surreal picture of a 38-year-old man who’s known incredible highs and inevitable lows, seen-all, done-all, who just needs to get out from under the weight of himself for a while. He’s a creative genius tied up in his own knots. On the island, he hopes to find inspiration for his next great album, Beatlebone.I asked Barry how he captured Lennon’s voice. He said it was a real job of work and it took him about a year. He listened to and transcribed an awful lot of You-Tube videos. Lennon “could go from light to dark, from playful to paranoia, all in one sentence.” And because readers of the book are likely to have some sense of Lennon’s manner of speaking, that voice had to be convincing. And, he said, “the difficulty of the project created part of the attraction.” That perverse Irish nature at work, bringing us gifts.As Steve Earle said in a laudatory review in The New York Times, “Only a literary beast, a daredevil wholly convinced he was put on this planet to write, would ever or should ever attempt to cast a person as iconic as John Lennon as a character in a tale of his own invention.”Kevin Barry’s previous novels have all won awards, and Beatlebone won the 2015 Goldsmiths Prize for literature that "breaks the mould or extends the possibilities for the novel form."
    • 4/5
      In 1978, John Lennon, vulnerable and somewhat adrift, temporarily abandons The Dakota in New York City where he is a full-time stay at home dad, to travel to Dorinish Island in Clew Bay in the west of Ireland. His local driver, Cornelius O’Grady, isn’t the swiftest, but is a companion for John during the trip.In keeping with the mystic reputation of the area, John sees some ghosts and has a mystical experience or two. Kevin Barry suggests that much of the world is hidden just a touch beyond our senses. “There is the feeling of things unseen travelling behind the hedges.” Cornelius tells his charge “Listen at all times, John. Do listen to what’s around you,” and later elaborates: “You can see very little in this world, John. But you can hear fucken everything.”Barry breaks the narrative to include a chapter about his research and his visits to Dorinish and nearby Achill Island. He even sees and possibly hears -some ghosts himself, continuing the theme of hidden worlds.
    • 3/5
      Not my standard kettle of fish, writing-wise, but, being about John Lennon, of course I had to give it a go, didn't I?

      And to be honest, while it took a bit to get dialed into Barry's semi-existentialist style, once I did, I actually found myself quite enjoying the book. And it was on its way to at least a four, and more than likely five-star rating.

      But then Barry did three inexplicable things.

      The first was at the exact two-thirds point where he stopped all forward momentum and gave us, instead, a bit of a memoir of the author coming to write the book. As I said, it took a bit of time and effort for me to get invested in this story, so the last thing I needed was what could have just as effectively served as an afterward or author's note shoehorned into the narrative. Pulled me right out and I found it hard to get back to the story afterward.

      The second was profoundly terrible section about the "lost Beatlebone tapes" ...yes, I believe it was him tying back to the ranting (I'll leave it to you to read the book to understand this bit), but it was horrible, and once again, mere pages from the end, yanked me forcibly from the narrative.

      The third and final piece? All I'll say is, the author robbed us of the island adventure John was to go on.

      So, a five-star book becomes a generous three-star. Maybe I'm too old to fully grasp this semi-experimental style, but I just felt like the author ruined what could have been a classic story.
    • 3/5
      In Kevin Barry’s “Beatlebone,” John Lennon is literally and figuratively seeking an island of solitude where he can recover from depression. It is 1978, the Beatles are over and a slumping career, loss of inspiration, excessive inane public attention and memories of a traumatic childhood trouble him. Cornelius O’Grady is his largely incompetent Irish driver who is ostensibly there to get him to his island and to keep the paparazzi at bay. However, in the process, he manages to guide John to some the lesser-known but colorful locations in Western Ireland while carrying on a peripatetic conversation. The dialogue between John and Cornelius provides the focus of the novel and never disappoints. Through this, Barry captures Lennon’s caustic humor and self-criticism while also exploring ideas about his childhood and creative process.Despite providing the reader with an intriguing portrait of probably one of the best-known figures of the 20th Century, the novel falls short of bringing us closer to the man. Instead, its focus seems to be Barry, himself: his own inventive process, his homeland in Western Ireland and the characters living there. Not unlike his previous work, this novel is highly creative but the constantly shifting perspectives, settings and narrative styles offer challenges that most readers may find off-putting. Unfortunately, buried amongst all that innovation is some wonderfully lyrical writing and many interesting thoughts that might have been more accessible with a less fractured narrative style.