About this title: Shortlisted for the Booker Prize Time's Arrow tells the story, backwards, of the life of Nazi war criminal, Doctor Tod T Friendly. He dies and then feels markedly better, breaks up with his lovers as a prelude to seducing them and mangles his patients before he sends them home...Escaping from the body of the dying doctor who had worked in Nazi concentration camps, the doctor's consciousness begins living the doctor's life backwards, aware only that he is living the life of a horrible man at a horrible place in time.
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Book shows minor use. Cover and Binding have minimal wear and the pages have only minimal creases. A tradition of southern quality and service. All books guaranteed at the Atlanta Book Company. read more
Description: Acceptable. Shows definite wear, and perhaps considerable marking on inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Good. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Date Published: 1992-05-28
ISBN-13:9780140171662ISBN:0140171665
Description: Good. Pages are clean and unmarked, though tanned. Cover shows light wear and creasing.; 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed! Free Delivery Confirmation! Ships same or next business day! read more
Edition: First Edition
Binding: Softcover
Publisher: Harmony Books, New York
Date Published: 1991
ISBN-13:9780517585153ISBN:0517585154
Description: Very Good. 0517585154. Ucorrected Proof edition. Crease to lower corner of rear wrapper. Bookshop sticker on rear wrapper.; 8vo 8"-9" tall. read more
Edition: First American Edition, First Printing
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Harmony Books, New York, New York, U.S.A.
Date Published: 1991
ISBN-13:9780517585153ISBN:0517585154
Description: Near Fine in Near Fine jacket. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. An excellent hardcover copy, barely used. The binding is solid and square, and the hinges are firm. The covering of gray cloth on the spine and black, textured paper on the boards shows virtually no wear. The text of the novel is clean and unmarked. The dustjacket is also excellent, with the lightest kind of rubbing and a little disturbance at the top and bottom of the spine. --------------------------------------This is Amis's seventh novel ... read more
Edition: First U.S. Edition
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Harmony Books, New York
Date Published: 1991
ISBN-13:9780517585153ISBN:0517585154
Description: No Illustration. Very Good in Very Good jacket. BRODART DUST JACKET. BLACK HALF-CLOTH COVER. INTERIOR PAGES CLEAN, BRIGHT AND TIGHT. read more
Edition: First Edition
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Harmony Books, New York, New York, U.S.A.
Date Published: 1991
ISBN-13:9780517585153ISBN:0517585154
Description: Good. CLEAN hardcovered book in a full dust jacket protected by a plastic cover. FIRSTAMERICAN EDITION. Attractive and presentable. EXCELLENT VALUE! read more
Description: Amis, Martin., Harmony Books, nd (1991), c1991, 1st U.S. Edition, boards & cloth, fine w/dj, 168 pp, 8vo, "Or The Nature of the Offense" read more
Edition: First Edition
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Harmony Books, New York, NY, U.S.A.
Date Published: 1991
ISBN-13:9780517585153ISBN:0517585154
Description: Very Good + in Near Fine jacket. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. Price NOT clipped, DJ nicely in wraps. Stated First Edition & First Printing. Light shelf wear. read more
"It is perhaps Martin Amis greatest misfortune that in decade plus since he wrote Time's Arrow telling tales backwards has become so in vogue. Following the film Memento, movies and novels both have grasped on to the device, sometimes using it well where it fits, more often just relying on it to make a story seem more clever than it is. Yet few tales better suit the backwards telling of a tale than Time's Arrow, which begins at the death of an American doctor, Todd Friendly, where an errant spirit enters him at death and proceeds to live his life in reverse. Some reviewers oddly complain that there is not enough explanation as to the why of this premise -- as if most modern stories suffer from lack of explosition! -- but that is far from the point.
Amis here tackles one of the Herculean tasks of writing -- finding a wholly original way to examine perhaps the most over examined topic of the second half of the 20th century. Guided only by Dr. Friendly's "second spirit" we live the whole of his life in reverse as the narrator tries to understand a world where people derive sustenance from toilets and garbage pails regurgitate at meals, and eventually return perfectly formed food to the super market. So to Amis explores the perverse notion of Nazism, the taking of ash and teeth to build human beings, first molding them in ovens, then applying gas to return them to life, slowly tending them back towards health, eventually sending them off into the world with possessions and dignity gifted to them by their creators.
Obviously by its nature the novel must dwell on this single device. Not only does Amis use it to the fullest, but to his credit he understands that it cannot take him past 200 pages, so he keeps the tale mercifully short, rarely belaboring his premise. As one can see, some loved this novel, others hated it. At less than 180 pages, any reader can pick it up and judge for themselves."
"At first this book was a little confusing, but as i read further into the chapters, i became in love with this book. Both of the plot and the format of this novel is unique. I have never read backwards and i have never read books backward. I don't literary mean reading it backwards, however the story is told backwards. From the death of Tod, a German scientist who worked at the medical part of the Auschwitz, during the Holocaust. The book is unique because it turned the whole Holocaust event upside down. In one of the incidents, the guard who was supposed to take the personal belongings of the Jews, actually putted gold filings into their teeth. I won't spoil more, but i recommend this to people who needs a break from a normal story plot."
"I liked that fact that in this book, it is a kind of self aware second person in the body of a man living forward who is doing the living backward. He identifies himself quite separately from his 'host'. This is a nice mechanic as it allows an interesting dynamic where a character is doing and feeling one thing and another facet of that same character is simultaneously interpreting those same actions and feelings quite differently.
I also thought it was a useful mechanism for looking at a very disturbing time in history without making a book so disturbing you wouldn't want to read it. Martin Amis is very skilled with words and has a very nice turn of phrase every now and again.
Despite all this, I'm really not a fan of wartime books.
The first third of the book where he was setting the scene, I'm afraid I was thinking "Been there, done that, both Red Dwarf and Time Traveller's Wife did this better". I'm not sure on dates, maybe Amis did it first, but for me it has come along afterwards. If I had never seen/read any other backwards stories, this would probably have got a much higher rating."
"Martin Amis is a genius. This is a brilliant, unique book. You may say, 'oh this is just American hyperbole'. Which may appear doubly inappropriate when applied to a British author - an author of whom the British might bestow the moniker 'good', or dare I say it, 'very good'. I jest, this book was nominated for the Booker Award. The Brits love this guy, and rightly so.
I would rank this book as one of the top ten books I have read. I would love to discuss it, but I think it would be a shame to disclose one iota of the story. Don't read other reviews and don't read the back cover - it might give something away. I read the book because it was assigned to me for a class. I did not read reviews or the back cover before I started. I then showed the book to my wife when I was part way through. In doing so, I read a piece of information on the back cover that would have been better left a mystery (a pox on the New York Times reviewer). It diminished my enthrallment but a tiny speck.
What more can I say? Well frankly, lots, but I'll leave it at that.
Oh, wait, one more thing - I plan to read every Amis book that has been published. It was that good."
We guarantee every item's condition, as described on Alibris. If you are not satisfied that an item is as described, return your purchase for a refund.
rating
