The Luminous Life Of Lilly Aphrodite (2009) - Plot & Excerpts
For some reason, this book stayed on my unread shelf for a long time. Perhaps the name and cover put me off (I actually prefer the American version's name and cover, The Glitter Ball, though the life of Lilly Aphrodite seems more appropriate). So when I finally got around to reading it, I was very pleasantly surprised! Colin's writing style is rich and evocative and she certainly crafts a beautiful sentence. She manages to switch between small detailed and conversational sections and wider time sweeps masterfully, enabling her to cover a large portion of Lilly's life from birth to orphanage to film star, as well the rise of cinema, and briefly covers the political landscape of pre-WWII Germany (without ever making this a book about war).Her characterisation of Lilly is so convincing that I wondered whether I was reading a fictionalised biography of someone who really existed. The flashes into the lives of other characters also adds to the ephemeral atmosphere of the time, and while adeptly depicting the squalor and poverty of the time, Colin manages to avoid the novel being miserable, instead a little shabby glittery.My only criticism of the novel is that Ilya's arrival is so late and brief that I found it difficult to be moved by their love story, I never really got to grips with his character or why the otherwise impenetrable Lilly loved him. I can't exactly pinpoint why I didn't much care for this book. It was overwritten, but so are a lot of early twentieth-century historical fiction books, and this one had some pretty good moments. It's not as ambitious or poignant as it tries to be, but it manages to be pretty interesting. Must be the characters, I guess. I am so sick of the neglected orphan girl with the ethereal beauty and the quiet but somehow wildly entrancing presence. Can someone please write about an ugly orphan girl? Who is actually ugly, not one of those obnoxious "ugly" characters who call themselves ugly constantly but still seem to have an endless amount of men falling in love with them? Or an ugly rich girl? Just an ugly girl in general? I keep reading about these eerily beautiful characters, and I'm so tired of it. It's not that interesting of a character to begin with, and now it's just so overdone. So that annoyed me. Also the love interests were boring, and there was a lot of the love-at-first-sight, inexplicably-drawn-to-one-another thing, and that's quite boring as well. The stuff about the changing Berlin film industry between the Wars had so much potential to be interesting, but by that point in the book, I had lost all interest in the characters and the story. I don't regret reading this book, but there are better ones out there. Unless it sounds really interesting to you, I wouldn't recommend it.
What do You think about The Luminous Life Of Lilly Aphrodite (2009)?
Interesting book...gave a perspective on Berlin pre-WWI to pre-WW2 from one person's life
—aleesha
Definitely one of the better books I read this summer.Well written and well researched.
—Sam
Really enjoyed it, great punch in the stomach at the end!
—ach94er
