The Absolutist

The Absolutist by John Boyne

Fiction

2021 Other Press (first published in 2011)

Finished on April 8, 2022

Rating: 5/5 (Excellent)

Publisher's Blurb:

 

It is September 1919: twenty-one-year-old Tristan Sadler takes a train from London to Norwich to deliver a package of letters to the sister of Will Bancroft, the man he fought alongside during the Great War.

But the letters are not the real reason for Tristan's visit. He can no longer keep a secret and has finally found the courage to unburden himself of it. As Tristan recounts the horrific details of what to him became a senseless war, he also speaks of his friendship with Will - from their first meeting on the training grounds at Aldershot to their farewell in the trenches of northern France. The intensity of their bond brought Tristan happiness and self-discovery as well as confusion and unbearable pain.

The Absolutist is a masterful tale of passion, jealousy, heroism, and betrayal set in one of the most gruesome trenches of France during World War I. This novel will keep readers on the edge of their seats until its most extraordinary and unexpected conclusion, and will stay with them long after they've turned the last page.

What a marvelous novel! I read it over the course of four days and was truly bereft when I turned the final page. It was a great read for my four-hour flight to Nashville. I would have loved to have read all day; the time passed far too quickly!

Boyne's novel opens in 1919 with Tristan's visit to Norwich. The details of his story are deliberately vague, but as the narrative unfolds, we learn more about Tristan and Will's experience in the Great War. Alternating between their training and combat in the war (1916) and Tristan's visit with Will's sister, Marian Bancroft (in 1919), the reader experiences the horrors that these two soldiers suffered during their brief year in battle. As I read, I had to remind myself that Tristan (who lied about his age when he joined up) is just twenty-one when he visits Marian. While not a young boy, he comes across as a much more mature man. Sadly, war steals the innocence and care-free life of the young.

The Absolutist is the fourth novel by John Boyne that I have read, and he is decidedly one of my favorite authors. I wasn't enthralled with The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, but I loved The Absolutist equally as well as The Heart's Invisible Furies and A Ladder to the Sky. These literary works are worthy of multiple readings and discussion, and I'm eager to discover more by Boyne, who has written 13 novels (and 6 YA books). 

I feel as though my brief review does not do justice to Boyne's talent as a writer. Perhaps the following will help to persuade you to give this and any of his other books a chance:

A novel of immeasurable sadness, in a league with Graham Greene's The End of the Affair... Boyne is very, very good at portraying the destructive power of a painfully kept secret... this is a forbidden love story, a gay love story, but one with a terrible twist. ~John Irving, author of A Prayer for Owen Meany

A wonderful, sad, tender book [that] is going to have an enormous impact on everyone who reads it. ~Colm Toibin, author of Brooklyn

 

What begins as a slow-building World War I period piece…grows deeper, more curious, and uneasy as it progresses—and midway through this sad and beautiful story, you realize you’re in the hands of a quiet master…a taut and tragic tale of love and war, with a kick-in-the-gut ending. ~Amazon (Best Books of the Month)

My initial rating for The Absolutist was 4.5/5, but upon reflection while composing this review, I'm bumping that rating up to 5-stars. Highly recommend, particularly to those who loved All the Light We Cannot See and City of Thieves.