All Quiet on the Orient Express
Encyclopedia
All Quiet on the Orient Express is the second novel by Booker shortlisted author Magnus Mills
, published in 1999. As with his first novel it is a tragi-comedy with an unnamed narrator dealing with apparently simple but increasingly sinister situations.
before setting out on a motorcycle trip to India. He agrees to help the campsite owner, Tom Parker by performing a simple chore, painting a gate but one thing inexorably leads to another and he finds himself drawn in to a succession of disparate tasks, each more complex and time-consuming and from which there appears to be no escape...
Magnus Mills
- Background :Magnus Mills was born in Birmingham and brought up in Bristol. After graduating with an economics degree from Wolverhampton Polytechnic, he started a masters degree at the University of Warwick but dropped out before completion....
, published in 1999. As with his first novel it is a tragi-comedy with an unnamed narrator dealing with apparently simple but increasingly sinister situations.
Plot introduction
The narrator is spending a few weeks camping in the Lake DistrictLake District
The Lake District, also commonly known as The Lakes or Lakeland, is a mountainous region in North West England. A popular holiday destination, it is famous not only for its lakes and its mountains but also for its associations with the early 19th century poetry and writings of William Wordsworth...
before setting out on a motorcycle trip to India. He agrees to help the campsite owner, Tom Parker by performing a simple chore, painting a gate but one thing inexorably leads to another and he finds himself drawn in to a succession of disparate tasks, each more complex and time-consuming and from which there appears to be no escape...
Reception
- the Complete Review's assessment was "not entirely credible, but enjoyable and creepy", all reviews "enjoyed it, and some are very enthusiastic"
- Carey HarrisonCarey Harrison-Life:Harrison was born in London to actors Rex Harrison and Lilli Palmer, and raised in Los Angeles and New York, where he attended the Lycée Français. Subsequently, in Britain, he attended Sunningdale School, Harrow School, and Jesus College, Cambridge....
in the San Francisco ChronicleSan Francisco Chroniclethumb|right|upright|The Chronicle Building following the [[1906 San Francisco earthquake|1906 earthquake]] and fireThe San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, but distributed throughout Northern and Central California,...
comments 'It's not out of idle amusement that the sweetly fiendish author has named his book All Quiet on the Orient Express This marriage of famous titles hides from view (yet points to) its dark, telling twin: Murder onMurder on the Orient ExpressMurder on the Orient Express is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie featuring the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot.It was first published in the United Kingdom by the Collins Crime Club on January 1, 1934 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year under the title of...
the Western FrontAll Quiet on the Western FrontAll Quiet on the Western Front is a novel by Erich Maria Remarque, a German veteran of World War I. The book describes the German soldiers' extreme physical and mental stress during the war, and the detachment from civilian life felt by many of these soldiers upon returning home from the front.The...
. Not since Kafka has an author lured his audience so innocently, so beguilingly, into hell.'