RaveThe Spectator (UK)Stuart has a rare gift ... The novel is darker than Shuggie Bain, but Stuart retains the ingenious Wodehousian similes that characterise his prose ... Elegant.
Kevin Birmingham
MixedFinancial Times (UK)Birmingham devotes too much space to Lacenaire’s seductive story without demonstrating its centrality to Crime and Punishment ... Lacenaire is best seen as just one ingredient of Raskolnikov’s make-up. As such, he is a strange premise for Birmingham’s book. Birmingham is at his best when he inspects the crux of the novel—Raskolnikov’s two murders. He argues convincingly (and contrary to many commentators) that Crime and Punishment is not a story of redemption ... Birmingham excels at close readings of the text, and recounts Dostoevsky’s biography with a novelist’s eye ... It is a pity that Lacenaire’s story takes Birmingham away from the Dostoevsky he captures so well. If readers approach these chapters as an entertaining detour, then The Sinner and the Saint is a superbly written account of Dostoevsky’s creative journey.
Fernando Cervantes
MixedThe Spectator (UK)Cervantes tries to balance academic rigour and a narrative for the general reader. Largely, he succeeds, although occasionally the book feels written for the in-crowd — for whom ‘Nebrija and Vives’ need no introduction. Elsewhere, attempts to popularise result in cliché ... Nonetheless, by providing a rich portrait of a period that is almost unimaginable today (one in which horses elicited preternatural fear, and Columbus and Cortés both thought they’d reached China), Cervantes does make the conquistadors slightly more sympathetic. Or, rather, less monolithic ... With the recent toppling of conquistador statues by Black Lives Matter activists in the USA and indigenous protestors in Colombia, this book comes at a key moment in the public perception of the conquistadors. But despite Cervantes’s persuasive reassessment, it remains difficult to look beyond their massacres and greed.
Alex Christofi
MixedThe Spectator (UK)Christofi includes vivid details of the author’s destitution...He succeeds in conveying Dostoevsky’s (often self-inflicted) hardship. Yet there are omissions in this short book. The zealous faith and the vigorous theology of the novels are routinely underplayed ... Despite ostensibly focusing on Dostoevsky’s loves, the book lacks a thread to connect its narrative ... The trouble is, Dostoevsky in Love feels reconstructed, more a masterpiece of cut and paste than of creative nonfiction. Christofi’s conceit generates a skeletal biography fleshed with quotation ... Newcomers to Dostoevsky will gain a potted biography of a striking figure, but need greater content and context to appreciate his writing. Those familiar with the author may enjoy the ride, but they’ll learn little. Christofi’s innovative approach might be laudable, but the book reads more like one of Dostoevsky’s experimental short stories than one of his great novels.
