The Tragedy of Arthur Audiobook

" The tragedy of this book is that it was written...and that I read it. "

" This book may be my favorite novel of the year so far. It looks at truth and faith and familial relationships while also incorporating a lot of Shakespeare. Arthur Phillips (the character in the book) is bequeathed a "lost" Shakespeare play from his father, a convicted forger and con man. The first 250 pages are his introduction where he recounts the story of the play and his family's history. Then the last one hundred pages are the play itself. I was expecting it to be painful, but Phillips created a convincing and entertaining psuedo-Shakespearean play. Thumbs up! "

" I stopped at page 121. I thought the premise was very clever and I wanted to like the book. But, Arthur's consistent whining about his life, his father, his work, was too distracting. "

" Some good bits, in particular the character of the father and the character relationships but overall a bit too self-referential, a bit too clever about the Shakespeare references, particularly with the resolution of the conflict. "

" I'm not sure what to make of this story, but it was fascinating, although uglier than I expected. What is reality and what is fiction? "

" This seemed interesting but it's so heavily dependent on densely packed footnotes, and the experience just didn't work on my kindle. "

" Wow. Nabokovian tricksterism meets the Bard. In-jokes for Shakespeare geeks and a poignant story of parent/child relations, hubris, madness, and love. "

" A very interesting and unusual read. Thanks to having read some reviews online, I read the Introduction, then the Play in the back of the book, and then the rest of the Book. This worked really well for me. "

" I enjoyed this book a lot although I am lukewarm about the author's attempt at the end to create his own version of a Shakespeare play. "

" an assured meta-fiction dealing wit W S, and a whole slew of Arthur's. i recommend all of Arthur Phillip's novels. This one is pretty tragic, but in a funny way. Well sometime funny. Plus has a new, never before published Shakespeare play. "

" What a dreadful book. A cast of unlikable characters and an uninteresting Shakesperean pastiche that no one would take for an authentic text. "

" I really enjoyed the book at first, where Arthur describes his and his sister Dana's childhood, but once the characters had grown up I became disinterested. Just another dysfunctional family story. I'm not that into Shakespeare, so even the play at the end didn't help interest me in the book. "

" I didn't listen to the play but the intro was entertaining enough. "

" This one is hard to rate. The sheer conceit, that a previously unknown Shakespeare play has been found, is unique. The play is even included, with footnotes, in the book! But somehow I just didn't care for the characters. The premise is brilliant, however. "

" I've always enjoyed his books and really this one wasn't terrible at all-I'm just so very tired of the bumbling, self-deprecating male paired with the omniscient female, in general. "

" Not only does he write a great novel, Phillips creates a brilliant 'Shakespeare play'. "

" Clever and wildly inventive, certainly, and the prose wonderful as always, but the whole conceit becomes, for me, more than a little wearing long before the end. "

" Phillips once again proves himself to be a creative, talented writer. The intro section runs on a bit and the play is pretty standard Shakespeare, plot-wise. Otherwise this is a really good read. "

" Incredible, interesting tale about a man and his con-man father, and a life of deceit and Shakespeare. The author skillfully weaves fact and fiction in a breathtaking mix. Includes the play, but the story's the thing, really. Quite a fun trip. So meta. "

" Even if he hadn't pulled this off, the book's conceit is good enough that I would've finished this anyway. But he pulls it off! It's meta and Shakespearey and just a really good story. "

" Really wonderful and fun and playful. "