Status
Available
Call number
Collection
Publication
Bloomsbury USA (2012), Edition: Reprint, Paperback, 384 pages
Description
Fiction. Literature. Historical Fiction. HTML: Once the gleaming "Paris of the East," Bucharest in 1989 is a world of corruption and paranoia, in thrall to the repressive regime of Nicolae Ceau?escu. Old landmarks are falling to demolition crews, grocery shelves are empty, and informants are everywhere. Into this state of crisis, a young British man arrives to take a university post he never interviewed for. He is taken under the wing of Leo O'Heix, a colleague and master of the black market, and falls for the sleek Celia, daughter of a party apparatchik. Yet he soon learns that in this society, friendships are compromised, and loyalty is never absolute. And as the regime's authority falters, he finds himself uncomfortably, then dangerously, close to the eye of the storm. By turns thrilling and satirical, studded with poetry and understated revelation, The Last Hundred Days captures the commonplace terror of Cold War Eastern Europe. Patrick McGuinness's first novel is unforgettable..… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member kidzdoc
Bucharest, 1989. A young British student flies to the Romanian capital to accept a university position that he was not interviewed for, and he does not understand what is expected of him. He is met at the airport by Leo O'Helix a foreign 'professor' who becomes his mentor and closest confidant,
The narrator is introduced to several young underground activists by Leo, and he meets the beautiful Westernized daughter of a powerful minister, with whom he falls in love. He also befriends a retired government official, and helps him to write a secret memoir that is highly critical of the Ceaușescu regime.
As the year progresses, the Ceaușescus' hold on power weakens, which leads to increased crackdowns on dissidents and repression of ordinary Romanians. The narrator finds himself in increasing danger, despite his ties to the British embassy and his friends, as the Securitate is aware of his friends and activities that support the removal of Ceaușescu from poewr.
The Last Hundred Days was an unusual selection for this year's Booker Prize longlist, but it is a thriller that deserved to be there, and it should have been selected for the shortlist, as well. McGuinness, who lived in Romania during the end of the Ceaușescu regime, paints a compelling and convincing portrait of communist Romania, a country where ordinary citizens queue for hours in line without knowing what, if anything, awaits them, whose citizens routinely die of starvation, and where historic churches and other buildings are torn down and replaced with concrete, poorly built monstrosities. This was an impressive debut novel, and I look forward to reading more from its talented author.
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although Leo's teaching responsibilities are a cover for illegal activities that make him a wealthy and respected man. Romania is in a state of increasing crisis, as freedom movements are taking place throughout the communist world, while Nicolae Ceaușescu, one of the last Eastern European dictators, seeks to hold onto power by fear and violent suppression. The narrator is introduced to several young underground activists by Leo, and he meets the beautiful Westernized daughter of a powerful minister, with whom he falls in love. He also befriends a retired government official, and helps him to write a secret memoir that is highly critical of the Ceaușescu regime.
As the year progresses, the Ceaușescus' hold on power weakens, which leads to increased crackdowns on dissidents and repression of ordinary Romanians. The narrator finds himself in increasing danger, despite his ties to the British embassy and his friends, as the Securitate is aware of his friends and activities that support the removal of Ceaușescu from poewr.
The Last Hundred Days was an unusual selection for this year's Booker Prize longlist, but it is a thriller that deserved to be there, and it should have been selected for the shortlist, as well. McGuinness, who lived in Romania during the end of the Ceaușescu regime, paints a compelling and convincing portrait of communist Romania, a country where ordinary citizens queue for hours in line without knowing what, if anything, awaits them, whose citizens routinely die of starvation, and where historic churches and other buildings are torn down and replaced with concrete, poorly built monstrosities. This was an impressive debut novel, and I look forward to reading more from its talented author.
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LibraryThing member Eyejaybee
Very tedious and entirely lacking in any characters for whom one could feel any empathy. Far too heavily steeped in melancholia and squalor, and I get more than enough of them at home!
LibraryThing member john257hopper
This is an interesting semi- autobiographical novel set during the last few months of Ceausescu's rule in Romania in 1989 (though it covers eight or nine months, not the three and a bit months the title implies). The author was present at that time and it shows in the very evocative descriptions by
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the unnamed narrator of the texture of life in Bucharest at this time, the stifling oppression, privations and utter absurdities of Ceausescu's highly personalised rule. It includes some interesting debates on the nature of freedom and the compromises that every Romanian had to make to survive on a day to day basis. Indeed, so much so, that one wonders why the author chose to write this as a novel, with real life characters under disguised names, rather than openly writing a memoir. It is a bit of a slow burn. The first third or so is quite slow moving but it picks up pace. A good read for anyone interested in modern European history or in the modes of thought and action of modern dictators. 4/5 Show Less
LibraryThing member theonearmedcrab
Patrick McGuiness’ novel, “The Last Hundred Days” (2011), is a bit of a misnomer, as it creates an expectation of the run up to the overthrow of the Ceausescu regime and the Romanian revolution of December 1989, whilst in fact it describes life in Bucharest through the eyes of young English
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student, who came to live there in Spring 1989, and stayed up to the day after the overtrow. The fact is, of course, that, say, for 95 of the last 100 days nothing pointed towards a revolution in Romania, and the few pages dedicated to the actual revolution are rather disappointing. The plot itself is rather thin, the happenings and the role of the main character rather unbelievable, and the story does take a while to get underway. Still, the description of life in Bucharest in the last days of the regime, the deceit and conspiracy, the double-crossings and the half-truths pervasive throughout Romanian society at the time, probably gives a very good picture of the contorted reality of those days; as only a well-connected and observant outsider can provide. Mr McGuiness has been there, so much is clear, and his everyday life experiences of the time match well with those described elsewhere, but are all the more realistic from the details he provides. Pity the story isn’t – or at least, so I think, but then, I wasn’t there, of course. Show Less
LibraryThing member gayla.bassham
An impressive evocation of Romania in the age of Ceaucescu. The milieu held my interest as much or more than the plot did. The viewpoint character seemed somewhat colorless to me, but the book still held my attention until the end.
Awards
Booker Prize (Longlist — 2011)
Costa Book Awards (Shortlist — First Novel — 2011)
Authors' Club First Novel Award (Shortlist — 2012)
Wales Book Of The Year (Winner — Fiction — 2012)
Desmond Elliott Prize (Shortlist — 2012)
Language
Original publication date
2011
Physical description
384 p.; 8.28 inches
ISBN
1608199126 / 9781608199129