Pure

I ended up feeling a bit let down by Pure. Miller is a luscious writer -- never a word wrong as he sketches a 1785 Paris that is about to boil over (but hasn't yet). He achieves a masterful balance between enough historical detail so that you can see, taste, and (unfortunately) smell the book's sett......more

My second Andrew Miller novel in succession and both have been five star reads. Jean-Baptiste Baratte is an aspiring engineer from the provinces who is commissioned to remove a large pestilent cemetery and church in a poor district of Paris. It soon becomes clear he is viewed as little more than a l......more

The year is 1785, and Jean-Baptiste Baratte is a young engineer from Normandy, summoned to Versailles. He hopes that his mission will be to construct some kind of bridge or impressive new building in the French capital. Instead he is told to empty the abandoned cemetery of Les Innocents, a putrid pi......more

What a disappointment! Miller could have done so much more with this concept (the destruction of Les Innocents in Paris). Unfortunately, the novel is too short; atrocious under development of character, a lack of any cultivated plot and a dismal amount of the ins and outs of the mechanics of such a......more

I am not one of those who thought this book should have garnered an award along with a butt-load of money to boot! From The Guardian ([URL not allowed] ), January 24, 2012: • A vividly told story of life in pre-revolutionary Paris on Tuesday won the 2011 Costa book award in what......more