Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon | Spoiler-free book review 📖
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- Опубліковано 12 гру 2024
- A rare standalone book review, and a hearty reading recommendation from me: Glorious Exploits absolutely lives up to its name.
Clips used:
1) TV show 'Barbarians', to illustrate use of Latin
2) Movie 'Gladiators', to show Russell Crowe being forced, well, into many things, but specifically here into speaking with a southern English accent
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Thank you so much for watching.
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This book is the real deal! Let me know if you’ve read it too 👀
Glad to hear from you. Funny, I added this one today to my stack tbr 🎉
I loved this one. One of the most original books I’ve ever read 👌
@ great timing! Hope you love it.
@@petrageciova5719 it’s fantastic isn’t it!
Loved Lennon's narration with his Irish lilt. In Ukraine we struggle with how to treat Russian culture. This novel allowed me to ponder the question of the culture of the enemy who came to kill you in a more objective way since it's set so far back in time. Also, duality of the prisoners who can recite Euripides and commit atrocities at the same time gave me something to consider on the relationship of poetry and war. Definitely a memorable read.
That’s such an interesting perspective. Thank you for sharing, and sorry you have to relate a historical war to a very real and present one 🫂
I think this has got to be the most enthusiastic I have ever heard you recommend a book, Ben. Naturally, after reading several of your previous recommendations, I would be a fool not to follow through with this one. I have placed Glorious Exploits on my TBR list for reading in 2025.
Do it!!! It’s an absolute banger of a novel.
love a solo review! almost wish you'd done a spoiler section because that epilogue!!! ahhh
A very satisfying ending indeed! 👀 Glad you enjoyed!
Sounds so so good. Definitely gonna get the audio & borrow it from the library too. I always love that experience when I can.
Do it!!! It's such a brill experience and I hope you love it as much as I did.
i've been excited for this one since i saw it shortlisted for the wdfp - and now winner! i very much enjoyed your review & intro re language & dialect in classical stories!
Thank you for watching - glad you enjoyed the intro! Was worried I might have gone on a bit too long before actually talking about the book 😂 But it’s such an interesting topic!
noooo dw i love that kinda stuff, it's so interesting! i could happily listen to half a video of context & research lol
Oh good, glad I’m not the only one 🤗
This has been probably my favourite read of this year- humour, depth and heart- so much heart. Also, the author’s tribute to his wife in the acknowledgments was both touching and hilarious.
Has all of those things in spades, doesn’t it! And I’ll have to go back and re-read the acknowledgements 👀
Haha, Ben, love those googly eyes! I love the U.S. book cover too. It's been on my tbr. Now I hope Libby gets the author-narrated audiobook, because that sounds awesome!
The setup doesn't sound odd to me, probably because so many old movie plots were basically, "Hey, kids, let's put on a show!" (e.g., Holiday Inn -- Bing Crosby/Fred Astaire 1942).
And when you said the two main guys wanted to cast prisoners, I also thought of The Producers (1967 and 2005 versions) -- and then you quoted one of the guys saying, "We're producers!" Probably not a coincidence 😃
Ooh I love those connections - he knows what he's doing 😅
It’s on the list! I’m hoping to get it done before the year is out.
Get on it!!! But don’t tell me if you don’t like it.
Loved that you focused on accents and dialects and how they are used - and not and what it implies. Very much intentional though possibly unconsciously so (still not justifiable).
- Glad you enjoyed the book!
I can see why it happens, but there's something a bit icky about tapping into prejudices as a shorthand 😶
I really want to read this but am saving it for my book club choice in a couple of months. Sounds great!
It will be worth the wait. Hope your whole book club loves it!
Picked it up from your recommendation and love this books craft so far
Ahhh I’m so pleased! Hope it continues to be brilliant for you.
I absolutely LOVED this book! I listened to it on audio & then went out and bought the book and reread it! I have been telling everyone to read this! Excellent video, Ben.
So glad to hear it this! Pleased in general to see so much love for it in the comments. Such a fantastic book.
Been dithering about this book but you’ve convinced me!
Woohoo - you won't regret it!
I loved this book so much! It’s making my best of year list for sure. Glad you liked it!
It’s a corker, isn’t it! Glad to hear you loved it too ♥️
Great review. The only book I've given 5 stars to this year and I think you really captured the hard-to-define magic of it
From the blurb, I expected a caper. Greeks with Irish accents trying to pull off a crazy plan against the odds. Was not expecting a really beautiful tale of people dealing with love and loss, hope and the power of storytelling. As you say, its hard to put your finger on exactly why this works. Getting that mix of emotions to blend, play off each other and feel real is a big ask but somehow it just comes together in a really special way.
One of my favourite reading moments of the year was the scene involved the phase "You don't rob a man of his suffering ... that's his". This is no lightweight comedy. There's much more to this than meets the eye
It’s the perfect balance of beauty and fun and sadness and… just everything I want in a book. You’re totally right that balancing these things is really hard, so I have no idea how he did it. Magic!
I started this the other day. I'm reading a print copy plus listening to the (excellent) audio. I am about halfway through now and just adore it. It's brilliant. My teenage daughter introduced me to it a few months ago but I put it off, thinking it sounded a bit gimmicky. It's not at all. There's a real heart beating through it. I'm off to read some more...
You're doing it the way I did - loved it so much! Glad you are loving it too. You're totally right that it has a lot of heart.
I;m sold. You had me at great audio and funny is a bonus I need.
It's brilliant - hope you love it!
Not usually a fan of debut novels, but I might have to give this a go.
I can hardly believe he's knocked it out of the park so well on his first book!
Yes, I read it earlier this year. One of the more interesting concept novels; incredible debut.
Really blew me away. What an achievement to write something like this on your first go!
I checked this book out twice from the library and failed to get to it. Hopefully third time will be the charm soon!
It will be worth the wait!
I forget, does Derek Jarman’s Sebastian use Aramaic? Do the soldiers speak Latin?
Had never heard of this before, but Googled it and seems like yes.
Also learned that it was “successfully aimed at a very specialized homosexual audience” so maybe I will have to watch 😂
@ I don’t know Ben are you specialized enough to watch??? It’s not my favorite of his films, I like the Caravaggio and the Edward I ones best, both with his muse Tilda Swinton. And now Pedro, Gay men just love Tilda, she did her films with Luca G too.
But Saint Sebastian was of course my Gay Renaissance painting crush. If I had been Catholic I hoped I would have had the forethought to pick him as my Saint for confirmation or what ever it is they do.
It is believed that his images, along with Christ may have been brought to Africa by the Portuguese and sparked the African Nail Figures. Magical elements embedded in their bellies and then you make a wish and hammer a spike into their bodies, like the piercing arrows of Sebastian.
It took me a moment to get used to the very modern Irish narration, but when we got to the ship's captain who was clearly meant to be actually Irish I just gave in and rolled with it 😂 One thing I've been wondering about though, is the god on the ship. I can't work out if it's just a random Pulp Fiction reference or if it has some other significance. I guess I should read Medea and see if it turns up there.
The Irishness is definitely jarring to start, but having read it now I couldn’t imagine it any other way! I actually read a really good theory about the ship, but now can’t remember what it was… 🤦♂️
@@benreadsgood 😂 Do let me know if it comes back to you
I might have to stop listening to you because I have too many books on my want-to-read list and I just added this one. (And there's a better cover for the book than the one you've got! I mean, if you like googly eyes, that is.)
The US cover is my favourite! Definitely captures the spirit of the book really well. And I would apologise, but this one is definitely worth adding to the TBR!
Sounds fab - adding this to my 2025 list now.
You won’t regret it! Certified corker.
Glorious Exploits is on my audio TBR
It’s brilliant on audio!
Thank you thank you! I've been waiting none too patiently for your review and had begun to fear you didn't like it. But this one was worth waiting for. And 100 percent agree about the audio version.; swoonworthy as I said elsewhere. It doesn't seem to have made much of a splash on this side of the Atlantic (the NYT review was mixed) but it seems to have received a rave from the New York Review of Books (paywalled for me), so maybe that will change. I do worry that the US cover will make it appear like a Mel Brooks send-up, but that's the only point on which we disagree. Another reason to follow your recommendations religiously.
Haha sorry to keep you waiting! Often when I delay a review it’s either because I liked it so much I want to do it justice… or I didn’t understand it and need to do more research before opening my mouth 😂
Hopefully it can build some steam in the US soon! Not sure if it’s the same over there, but in the UK some books really only find their feet once they are released in paperback.
It's been on my Kindle for a while now. I need to get to it. Every time those googly eyes look at me I feel guilty …
@@benreadsgood The trouble with recommending this book is that once you start trying to explain the concept to someone they'll look over your shoulder to check if the bar is still open. And if we're playing the casting game, I submit Mescal as Gelon, Barry Keoghan as Lampo. But whomever the choices, it could be a grand movie.
I would be so on board with that casting!
I think I missed something with this book as I found it rather boring with quite a conventional narrative. I didn't feel anything for the characters. It read like typical Irish fiction of two modern lads having a go at putting on a play but set in ancient Greece which maybe was the point but it didn't work for me. I'm clearly in the minority though as a lot of people are putting it on their best books list.
That's okay, life would be boring if we all had the same reactions to every book! BUT if you ever find yourself willing to give it another try, perhaps the audio is the way to go!