Bel Canto

Bel Canto is a story about love, mostly. Love, music, language, terrorism, friendship – the book definitely doesn't fail to deliver on those themes.

Set in South America, the story (based on a true story) begins when a large roomful of mostly affluent bureaucrats and CEO's are taken hostage by terrorists during a beautiful soprano opera performance by the book's female lead, Roxanne Coss. From there, the story stays in that same setting. The hostages end up being held captive for over 4 months! During that time, relationships are formed between hostages and terrorists, friendships grow, romances flourish.

It's going to be very difficult to review this book without giving away the ending, but I'm going to try valiantly!

I have to admit, I was a little disappointed by this book. I had read and heard a lot of good things about it, so my expectations were high. There were definitely good parts! I enjoyed many passages about love and language and music. Patchett really has a flourish for colorful language on those subjects! For instance, here's a passage about music I particularly enjoyed:

“How strange his fingers felt after two weeks of not playing, as if the skin he wore now was entirely new. He could hear the softest click of his fingernails, two weeks too long, as he touched the keys. The felt-covered hammers tapped the strings gently at first, and the music, even for those who had never heard the piece before, was like a memory. From all over the house, terrorist and hostage alike turned and listened and felt a great easing in their chests....Had the accompanist played so well? It would have been impossible to remember, his talent was to be invisible, to life the soprano up, but now the people in the living room of the vice-presidential mansion listened to Kato with hunger and nothing in their lives had ever fed them so well.”

Isn't that beautiful? It's passages like that one that saved this book for me. Because of how well-written it is and how beautiful the language is, I have to give it 3 stars.

Read the rest of this review here: http://www.literaryquicksand.com/2016/02/review-bel-canto-by-ann-patchett/

i've said this before and i'll say it again: it was a good book but i had absolutely no interest in it.

i was gifted this book for my birthday and it was the first i picked up post-birthday-spending-spree-tbr because of how interesting it sounded. however, i quickly lost interest because of the way this book carried on, despite it being somewhat of a thriller (or at least that's how the movie adaptation marketed it). it's definitely an interesting story and it's not by any means poorly written, i just didn't care for it at all.

I honestly didn't get this one. The beginning is thrilling, the setting is original, the ending is unexpected. But between the initial suspense and the climax there's not much happening. Several characters develop unexpected relationships with each other, a few come with some sort of self-discovery. Apart from some funny details and a few interesting interactions the novel just drags on and on, I found I had to really struggle to plow through.

I got about 1/4 of the way in, and I just didn't care about anyone or how things would play out. Patchett's attitude seems to be, “why use 3 words when you can use 30 to convey the same thought?”

Also the descriptions of women seemed really objectifying and rooted in the male sexual gaze. It was getting gross.

Finally, the worst sin: this is like going to the theater to see Die Hard but the whole movie is every speaking character reminiscing about their childhood or relationships rather than the hostage plot being the focus. Oh. And OPERA THOUGHTS.

To be fair to Bel Canto, it's probably a 4 star book; however, I came into it with 5-star expectations. Having read [b:Truth and Beauty 5083254 Secrets of Truth and Beauty Megan Frazer http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1239242179s/5083254.jpg 5149972] and seeing the combination of grace and brutal honesty with which Patchett depicted herself and [a:Lucy Grealy 57229 Lucy Grealy http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-F-50x66.jpg], I had the highest expectations for her treatment of fictional characters. And, in some cases, she lives up to expectations.The highlight of the book is clearly Gen, the peon translator, turned by his captivity into essential personnel. The topic of language - who owns which language and what they can do with it - as the supreme power is fascinating and unique and the character is well suited by his theme. His foil, the slightly less multilingual Rubuen - Vice President turned into housekeeper by his captivity is nicely set up and the many conversations between the two really showcase the artificiality of status. Hosokawa's story is also well done. The trope of important business-person stunned by once in a lifetime event into realizing that there's more to life than work and deciding to live like it counts once it may be too late is a little overdone, but that distracts little from how well Patchett does it. The terrorists developing rapport with their hostages portion of the plot is by fair the most lauded and perhaps fell a little flat as a result of that. The developing of relationships didn't really feel organic and the terrorists were depicted as relatively sympathetic from the beginning.However, where the books really falls flat is its female characters. The reader is constantly informed how both Carmen and Roxanne are the most beautiful, smartest, most talented women to ever exist. Every scene staring either of them is filled with male characters perseverating on their beauty. Neither of them have any flaws at all (except maybe an endearing stubbornness.) Roxanne is so beautiful as to sway terrorist organizations. Both of them feel extremely one-dimensional as a result. Music is treated the same way – it's beautiful and uplifting and world changing. We're never really told why, but instead subjected to the same refrain in every musical scene. As someone who could take or leave music as a whole, and definitely opera in specific, it was teeth-gratingly annoying.

I've never thought of myself as someone who would like listening to opera and I mostly just like reading about the history of opera, but this book has actually encouraged me to try listening to the music. The author wrote so beautifully about the way the music makes both the singer and the listener feel, that I'm intrigued. However, the plot was somewhat melodramatic with the love stories and the foreshadowing of the unhappy ending, which is why I gave it the 3 stars.

The unexpected bonds that can grow between people is at the heart of Ann Patchett's Bel Canto. Katsumi Hokosawa, a Japanese industrialist, is having his 53rd birthday party in an unnamed South American country. The country has invited him to this party, to be held at the Vice President's mansion, in the hopes that he will invest there. He has no intention of doing so and declines...until he finds out that they have secured the performance of Roxane Coss for the party. Hokosawa is an opera devotee, and Coss is the world's foremost soprano. So he and his translator, Gen Watanabe, make the trip. No sooner, though, has Coss finished her performance than all the lights go out. Suddenly, the partygoers find themselves surrounded by young men bearing arms. They've come to abduct the president, and when they find out he's not there, they're not quite sure what to do but take the 200+ guests hostage.

The hostages are winnowed down over time to the 39 most important men, including the vice president, ambassadors, businessmen, and of course Hokosawa himself (along with his translator) and Roxane Coss. Days go by, then weeks. Gen the translator finds himself very busy indeed as the guests and the soldiers get to know each other inside the mansion. Relationships of all kinds form: one of ringleaders and Hokosawa become chess partners and teach one of the young soldiers, another soldier with a beautiful voice becomes Roxane's student, romantic entanglements form (it turns out not all those soldiers are boys, after all). Always the question looms: how will this all end?

This is the first time I've read Patchett, and she's a gifted writer: her prose is sensitive, deeply felt, lyrical. She has a strong sense of character, and besides the ending, no action the people she creates on the page (and she creates people, complete with their own emotional truth, rather than just “characters”) feels false. Even the people she spends less time with feel complete and real. The novel is well-paced and plotted...after the initial high drama of the home invasion, little else happens in terms of events and the action unfolds naturally from the unveiling of personalities and the growing bonds between the people at hand.

What keeps this as a very good book rather than great one, for me, is the very end. The action that two people take is...jarring. Trying to contextualize it in terms of what those two have gone through, you can understand that a rash decision might be made, but it still feels off. And it bugged me a lot, because I'd so loved everything that came before and to close on that sour note didn't feel right. It's 98% of a great book, but it could have been 100% of one and that is frustrating.

What a surprise! I only knew a little about this book before diving in and I found it to be an excellent read. The writing is superb and I found the story to be compelling and emotionally moving. I enjoyed the role that music and language played in the interaction between the characters. Would recommend to literary fiction lovers who enjoy character driven stories. A new favorite!

A hostage situation slowly turns into a secluded world in a bubble, where terrorists and hostages communicate in all their different languages, fall in love with opera singing and gradually - through stasis and new emotional connections - learn to forget all about the differences between them. It ends where it has to end, and it's perfect.

Well this was rough. “A house full of hostage takers and hostages, all horny for an opera singer” could have saved me a few hours and would have accurately reflected the entire book. Alas, most of the story I felt like I was watching paint dry, somewhat convinced that when it was done, a beautiful picture might appear. Details emerged, enough of them not to make me quit the book, but not enough to make me forget I was watching paint dry.

The ending was, oddly, exactly what you'd think it would be, chased by a preposterous epilogue.

Do I wish Patchett gave me my time back? No. But did the last page made up for the rest? Also no.

Still, I'm giving it three stars, for lukewarm, absurdist entertainment value.

Short Review: Beautiful, tragic story of a temporary utopia that can never last. In an unnamed Central American country a group of terrorist invade the Vice Presidents house during a dinner party to kidnap the President and overthrow the government. The President did not come to the dinner and so the terrorists keep the rest of the guests instead. This is the story of a long hostage situation and the life the the hostages and captors make together over the months they are together. It is a tragic story, as any hostage situation must be. But temporarily there is hope and love and a new understanding about what life can be.

My full review is on my blog at http://bookwi.se/bel-canto-by-ann-patchett/

Just today, there was a kidnapping in the news of 17 missionaries in Haiti. It made Bel Canto seem relevant.

This story of terrorists vs. hostages starts simply enough with a birthday party in South American for a Japanese titan of industry. What happens before the end really made me wonder what relationships captives and hostage-takers really develop when the ruse doesn't work, which it rarely does.

Still, you are boxed in together, in this case for over four months. Patchett's unique set of international captives made the story even more complicated—often necessitating a translator. The reassessments that captives and rebels made in rethinking their lives and priorities add a level of intricacy I hadn't expected.

The book would probably be even more entertaining to least opera-lovers. They would pick up even more nuances than I experienced.

At times, it seemed the story dragged a little, but it gave this reader a sense of what it would be like to be held captive in the same place with the same people wearing the same clothes for a prolonged period of time. Some were able to flourish. Others didn't. Most grew very complacent with the situation, adapting to the new life of limited entertainment, activity, and stimulation. Some found work to do. Other created work for others.

Overall, an intriguing read and a believable if unexpected ending.