Product Description
Maeve Binchy follows the enormous success of Scarlet Feather with a new book, Quentins, that delivers the hallmark storytelling that has kept her millions of fans happy for more than twenty years.
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Quentins
Written by admin on September 5th, 2010 in Literature & Fiction.
Tags: Quentins
If you’re a fan of Maeve Binchy, you’ve already visited Quentins. This restaurant, run by the cool efficient Brenda Brennan and her husband Patrick, is a place that characters in other Binchy novels always seem to be visiting at crucial points in their lives. It’s the sort of place where you’d think “If these walls could talk…”
Ella Brady, the main character of this novel, thinks the same thing. After an affair with a married man goes bad, she throws herself into producing a documentary about Quentins to get her mind off her heartbreak. Along with Ella, we learn about Brenda and Patrick, hear the stories of many Quentins patrons over the years, and even meet Quentin himself. As you’d expect from Binchy, the stories are funny, sad, and heartwarming.
As a bonus to fans of Maeve Binchy, you also get to revisit some of your favorite characters from other novels. Ever wonder what happens to Signora and Aidan from Evening Class? Tom, Cathy, Simon, and Maud from Scarlett Feather? Ria from Tara Road? Pick up this book. You won’t be disappointed.
Rating: 5 / 5
We can all stop mourning Maeve Binchy’s retirement. She’s back and as good as ever with heartwarming stories about ordinary people whose lives are changed while dining at Quentins. The popular Dublin restaurant from her previous novels is at the heart of this story. Its owner, managers, employees, and customers all have a story to tell: Martin, the father with a short fuse, who dines with his son Jody; Maggie, the good student whose parents give her a serious celebration at the restaurant; Drew the visitor whose change of heart changes his life; Mon the waitress who unwittingly unmasks the banker’s book in the plain brown wrapper; Yvonne whose mother’s little white lie creates a new life for Frank and his three daughters; Laura who finds a way to spend Mother’s Day without her children. And best of all, there is Quentin himself, whose encounter with a shabby and eccentric old man sets the whole story in motion.
The fabulous bonus of this book is we find out what happened to some favorite characters from previous books. Ria Lynch’s life was left on hold when TARA ROAD ended, but now we know what happened. Ditto for Tom and Cathy and Simon and Maud from SCARLET FEATHER and the Signora and Aidan from EVENING CLASS.
The story of the restaurant and its people are all brought into focus by Ella Brady who is in charge of developing a documentary about modern day Dublin. Her love affair with an unscrupulous married man has left her life in shambles and nearly destroyed her family and friends. But Ella has a special place in her heart for Quentins and its managers— the unflappable Brenda Brennan, her chef/husband Patrick, and his uniquely appealing brother Blouse. When she chooses to tell Dublin’s story through the people who walk through the door of Quentins she gets more than she bargained for.
So pour yourself a cup of tea and book the best seat in the house for a relaxing time at Quentins.
Rating: 5 / 5
Having thought that Maeve Binchy had retired from her craft in 2001, I was surprised and thrilled when “Quentins” appeared, and I snapped it up.
“Quentins” is by no means Binchy’s best book. It’s a bit tired, a bit confusing, and its tone is ever so slightly cynical. I hope this is not a reflection of Binchy’s state of mind, but merely the subject matter of the plot. The heroine, Ella, a strangely one-dimensional character when compared with Binchy’s usual, sails through an exemplary early life only to fall madly, obsessively in love with the wrong man.
Ella’s story is told with Quentins, a fictional upscale Dublin restaurant, as the backdrop. Through this popular eatery, we meet lots of interesting people, whose stories we learn–and we have the return, however briefly, of some previous Binchy characters as well. But even they do not have the life they had in the original books–they seem somehow two-dimensional. I don’t know whether that was the fault of this reader, who had a lot of trouble keeping all the names straight, or of Binchy herself, who is practically sacred in my eyes!
I would never recommend reading this book as a first taste of Maeve Binchy. But for those of us who have followed her wonderful literary career through the years, and who have read her entire collection, it’s a joy just to be reading another offering when we thought that Binchy had retired from writing. If this were any other author, I would rate the book a 3. But I just can’t do that; the book captured and kept my interest, and although its odd tone made me uneasy, I’m not at all sorry I read it. Binchy fans: Go for it, but don’t expect “Circle of Friends” or its ilk. Binchy newcomers: pick another book, such as the aforementioned, before tackling this one.
Rating: 4 / 5
I’ve observed the following about Maeve Binchy’s books – I tend to like the sprawling, character-driven sagas but find her short story collections dissatisfying. Although “Quentins” has a unified theme related to a documentary film, much of the story involves small sketches of characters which last five to six pages, and are ultimately confusing and somewhat distracting from the central theme. I give this book three stars because of the denouement it provides to some of Ms. Binchy’s beloved characters from other works.
Rating: 3 / 5
Like Scarlet Feathers, this book really let me down. As an avid Binchy reader I expected more. Scarlet Feathers, as her last book before retirement, had extremely unlikable characters and was not up to her previous books. Quentins is even worse as it is so boring and unbelievable. Where is the warmth and intelligence that marked Binchy’s previous books? Ella is unlikable, naive and stupid. If she was so beloved as a child, why did she grow up to be so utterly lacking in self-esteem that she spends two years with a married man and still can’t make up her mind about him after he leaves her and bankrupts her father? This is not the Maeve Binchy I love. For those of you who are first time readers of her books, please read Circle of Friends, a hundred times better than the movie, Copper Beech, Tara Road, Glass Lake to name a few. Her books of short stories are great too. Don’t judge Maeve Binchy’s storytelling ability by this book. I guess everyone is entitled to a couple of clunkers. If she came out of retirement to write this book, I’m afraid it was a mistake.
Rating: 2 / 5