Parrot and Olivier in American

The short list for the Man Booker Prize was released today. Given to the best novel of the year written by a citizen of the Commonwealth of Great Britain or the Republic of Ireland, last year's prize went to my favorite book from last year, Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall. (See my previous post on Wolf Hall)

Of the six novels on this year's list, I have only read one, Peter Carey's Parrot and Olivier in American. I did like this book, but I found it a little hard to read. The book is told by the two main characters, Olivier, a French aristocrat who is kidnapped and sent to America by his mother to protect him from the machinations going on in France following the Revolution, and Parrot, a Briton sent along as Olivier's servant to look after him. The character of Olivier is loosely based on Alexis de Tocqueville.

The book explores the relationship between the aristocrat and his servant after they come to American, and goes back and forth between first person accounts by the two main characters. I suppose this was the best way to get into the characters of these two men, but I had a problem with the flow of the novel as the perspective switched back and forth. I was able to overcome that problem, because it is a very good story.

Here is a video of Peter Cary being interviewed about the novel.