The Sense of an Ending – Julian Barnes

This is a novel that came to me on the strength of recommendations from two sources (and that’s not even counting the Booker judges) but it was not recommended unreservedly by both parties. The matter upon which my acquaintances did, if to varying degrees, agree was a connection between Sense of an Ending and McEwan’s On Chesil Beach.

The novel is divided into two parts and the first is largely concerned with the sexual socio-history of the early sixties, as seen through the eyes of a young man we first meet at the onset of adolescence. There, straight away, is the obvious Chesil Beach connection, a similarity of setting and subject.

On Chesil Beach – Ian McEwan

This is my second read of this novella.

The first time of reading was several years ago, pre-blog. On that occasion I thought the story of wedding night nerves in the fifties was well done, I appreciated the significance of a dark back story, and I was completely buying the disastrous results of a profound failure of communication.