Greene’s only novel in the first-person, we hear almost entirely from Bendrix who, through a chance encounter, is thrust back into memories of a long, passionate, but abruptly ended affair with Sarah. If you read more for narrative though, you’ll also love this book. And the characterisation so believable, by virtue perhaps of how brave, harsh, and cold it is. Greene’s writing in this book is, well, stunning. Frequently I shuddered, the language sending me staring away from the page, looking and feeling like I’d been bonked on the head. If you read for prose, for instance, you’ll love The End of the Affair. We all read for different parts of the same reasons. I just like travelling, don’t make me choose one!) But re-read it I did, and found that I still love this novel with goosepimply gusto. So it was with some trepidation that I read The End of the Affair again, a book I’d always cited when asked that impossible question: What’s your favourite book? (A little like being asked what your favourite country is. You hold its lofty status sacrosanct for years, only to venture back into such a film or book and find that with the passing of time or the added layers of sophistication (snobbery) in you, it has rotted behind your back. You’ll know what it’s like to experience something as a younger person: a film, a book, a place, and then to long remember it as wonderful.
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