Julian Barnes infamously once wrote in the London Review of Books that The Man Booker Prize "is beginning to drive people mad. It drives publishers mad with hope, booksellers mad with greed, judges mad with power, winners mad with pride, and losers ... mad with envy and disappointment." But now, three times Booker bridesmaid, Julian Barnes is the critics' favourite to win with The Sense of an Ending. In this novella he tells the tale of Tony Webster, a middle-aged man who has lead a wholly unremarkable life. He did fine at school, made friends at university, had a career, one marriage and a calm divorce. But his neat interpretation of the past is suddenly thrown into disarray by the arrival of a lawyer's letter and a mysterious inheritance. He's certainly never tried to hurt anybody. Memory, though, is imperfect. It can always throw up surprises. Find out more and read a free Opening Extract at Lovereading.co.uk The Omnivore has rounded up all the press reviews for The Sense of an Ending to bring you a handy critical digest:
You can imagine a younger or a less confident author taking about three times as long to make the same points. The cleverness resides not only in the way he has caught just how second-rate Webster's mind is without driving the reader to tears of boredom but in the way he has effectively doubled the length of the book by giving us a final revelation that obliges us to reread it. Nicholas Lezard
Its brevity, however, in no way compromises its intensity - every word has its part to play; with great but invisible skill Barnes squeezes into it not just a sense of the infinite complexity of the human heart but the damage the wrong permutations can cause when combined. Michael Prodger
A slow burn, measured but suspenseful, this compact novel makes every slyly crafted sentence count ... the concluding scenes grip like a thriller - a whodunnit of memory and morality, and one which detonates a minor, private apocalypse. Boyd Tonkin
This book is something like a Ruth Rendell; confounding not just readers' suppositions but also those of the narrator ... The result is adroit and unnerving and Barnes's keen intellect has rarely been so apparent. He, like his contemporaries, McEwan, Amis and Rushdie, is a gin-and-tonic novelist: his books are crisp, cool and provide a kick to the head, but they seldom, as is the case here, touch the heart ... Christian House
The book brilliantly gives form to this sense of chronological slipperiness. Time shrinks and expands on the page according to Tony's preoccupations. His failed marriage and career fly by in a handful of lines, while momentary trifles are dwelt upon. The result is an elliptical, deeply unnerving piece of writing, one that never lets the reader settle for long. Adrian Turpin
This novella does not move or satisfy. Partly that may be because of its length, more than a conte, less than a novel, making its story both under-described and over-determined, sketchy yet relentlessly purposeful ... It is [also] a story repelled by the responsibility of having children, and its final disclosure is offputting. David Sexton
It would be a mistake to dismiss this as a mere psychological thriller ... The explanation, when it comes, is unforeseen, almost accidental, and hedged about with a wealth of humdrum detail. Its effect is disturbing - all the more so for being written with Barnesís habitual lucidity. His reputation will surely be enhanced by this book. Do not be misled by its brevity. Anita Brookner
A dexterously crafted narrative of unlooked-for consequences, the book increasingly takes on the momentum of a taut horror tale: a 21st-century successor to the great suspense novellas - quivering not just with tension but with psychological, emotional and moral reverberations - of late-Victorian and Edwardian masters such as Joseph Conrad, Henry James and Robert Louis Stevenson... Peter Kemp
Read a free Opening Extract from The Sense of an Ending on Lovereading.co.uk. ________________________________________________________________________Want to know what the critics made of the latest book, film or play? The Omnivore rounds up newspaper reviews, bringing you a cross section of intelligent opinion.