Solar

Written by Ian McEwan

Narrated by Roger Allam

Universally acclaimed as one of the world's greatest novelists, Ian McEwan is a Booker Prize-winning, best-selling literary master. He displays a fresh facet of his considerable talent in Solar, a satirical novel rife with blistering humor. Nobel Prize-winning physicist Michael Beard is fast approaching 60, a mere shell of the academic titan he once was. While his fifth marriage falls apart, Michael suddenly finds himself with an unexpected opportunity to reinvigorate his career and possibly save humankind from the growing threat of global warming.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
• Release date: Apr 2, 2010
• ISBN: 9781449808662

Ian McEwan

Ian McEwan (Aldershot, Reino Unido, 1948) se licenció en Literatura Inglesa en la Universidad de Sussex y es uno de los miembros más destacados de su muy brillante generación. En Anagrama se han publicado sus dos libros de relatos, Primer amor, últimos ritos (Premio Somerset Maugham) y Entre las sábanas, las novelas El placer del viajero, Niños en el tiempo (Premio Whitbread y Premio Fémina), El inocente, Los perros negros, Amor perdurable, Amsterdam (Premio Booker), Expiación (que ha obtenido, entre otros premios, el WH Smith Literary Award, el People’s Booker y el Commonwealth Eurasia), Sábado (Premio James Tait Black), En las nubes, Chesil Beach (National Book Award), Solar (Premio Wodehouse), Operación Dulce, La ley del menor, Cáscara de nuez, Máquinas como yo, La cucaracha y Lecciones y el breve ensayo El espacio de la imaginación. McEwan ha sido galardonado con el Premio Shakespeare. Foto © Maria Teresa Slanzi.

Reviews for Solar

[capewood · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

his book was named by the science fiction web site I09.com as one of the best science fiction books of 2010. It is a good book but it is not science fiction. It's the story of a physicist, who made a name for himself early in his career but has not had an original thought since. He manages to parley that original success into a long career but he is a fraud and he knows it.

[eoin-311239 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Another finely tuned study from a true master of the form. McEwan has unbelievable command, sentence to sentence, chapter to chapter which he uses here to flesh out the moment to moment emotional tone of a despicable aging physicist. The real trick is turning a monster into a man, making everyone uncomfortable in the process. I still don't understand why McEwan always puts in something shocking and unlikely in the story. Worth it for the Unintentional Thief story and as serendipitous parring with Banville's The Infinities.

[jonfaith · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I understand, dear Ian. Dr. Beard is deplorable. He is also us: humans, particularly Americans. Imprisoned by his own appetites, he harbors only scenarios for being diversely sated. He's always selfish. He says what people want to here. Such a cad, he knows he needs to stop but can't.

It was appreciated that novel continued along its arc. After the resolution of the mud room in the polar expedition, I feared that Michael would discover self correction. Thank you, dear author.

[decaturmamaof2 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Couldn't finish this one - TOOOOO depressing! Although the writing is good, I could not get 'into' the story line enough to stick with it. :-(

[sarahstenhouse · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Strangley involving tale of the motivations and internal machinations of an extremely selfish scientist. Very convincing psychological portrait.

[juliejb9 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Beautifully written as always. Real toad of a main character at whom you have to laugh or just despise. Chewy bits of science: Beard-Einstein conflation, artificial photosynthesis. You can't help but turn thoughtful about climate change. I still can't believe he got away with using the real Nobel Laureate's name in a work of fiction.

[chellebearss · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I disliked this book and I think the reason why is that I disliked the main character. There are many main characters that the reader is meant to dislike and it makes for great interest in the book but this character I didn't care what happened to him.

[alisony-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Ah, McEwan. I just love this writer. Every book is so different that you start them in perfect anticipation of what he'll throw at you this time.Solar was a great read, possibly one of the funniest of McEwan's that I've read so far. The protagonist is scientist Professor Beard, Nobel Prize Winner, womaniser, egotist and general all round self-indulgent pig. He's a great character - super smart and super dumb in equal measures, a loathsome sloth of a man who rides his professional and personal life largely on the back of his Nobel win. Oftentimes he reminded me of an academic version of John Updike's Rabbit Angstrom, another brilliantly flawed character who is one of my all-time favourites.I always find it very difficult to review a McEwan book as I never want to give too much of the plot away. It's suffice to say that in Solar Beard's professional and personal lives collide in some very unexpected ways which are in turn toe-curlingly embarrassing, laugh out loud funny and page turningly brilliant. A great mix of comedy and tension, and thoroughly enjoyable read.

[iansales_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

You know that old story about the bloke who buys some biscuits in a cafe, then sits at a table with a complete stranger. He eats one of his biscuits, and then is shocked when the other man takes one of the biscuits? McEwan turns that old chestnut into six-pages of over-baked prose in Solar. He later admits it’s a variation on an urban legend, the Unwitting Thief; but then so many parts of this books feel like variations on urban legends. McEwan also thinks airlines serve food on flights between London and Berlin – I didn’t think they bothered anymore for journeys of less than three or four hours, but perhaps I’m wrong. The protagonist is a womanising scientist who has been trading on his Nobel laureate for much of his career. He’s not so much a product of his time as a product of McEwan’s time, because he reads like a lecherous and sexist pig. His marriage is failing, his current job feels like a waste of time, and then he accidentally causes the death of his wife’s lover and frames his wife’s ex-lover for it, and uses it as a springboard to boost his own career. There’s some solid argument for anthropogenic global warming and against all the dumb climate change deniers, but everything esle in the novel is sadly quite bad. The protagonist is unlikeable, the female characters are badly drawn, elements of the plot seem to have been lifted from snopes.com, and there are assorted rants against “postmodernism” – which it is not: McEwan is just ranting against critics of male white privilege. I was much impressed by McEwan’s earlier novels when I read them back in the 1990s, but this century I’ve found them increasingly disappointing. Saturday, in fact, I thought awful. I only continued to read him out of a misplaced sense of loyalty. But after Solar, I purged my TBR of McEwan’s novels and I’ll no longer bother reading him. Life is too short.

[vguy_6 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Quite a fun read with vivid scenes here and there, mainly those of the anti-hero's private life.And some anti-hero: he's fat and selfish and obsessively unfaithful to his women, most of who're rather improbably warm decent types. The science side rather lacks credibility, at least for me as a non-scientist. The fundamental idea of a new power source that somehow combines Einstein's work on light with the deep working of photosynthesis is neat enough as a science-fiction idea. But there seems to be a confusion about what is theoretical science and what is engineering. It's highly improbable that a lazy, burnt out theoretical physicist would hold 17 patents in an industrial process, even if he stole them from somebody else.It's made fairly clear that he doesn't really understand the engineering. A workable revolutionary technical process is unlikely to come from a single (dead) man's notebooks. There seems to be no testing of prototypes; an airforce flypast is on hand for the first switch on which will transform everything! and even more improbable: an American venture on a huge scale doesn't have money to spare for lawyers to fight a challenge from the Brits. All this makes it come across as a bit lightweight.

[flydodofly · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Excellent writer he is, McEwan managed to make the main character so sickly appalling and repulsive and, yes, believable, that I had to put the book down so many times. I also picked it up because of his good writing, but, oh, it was a difficult read.

[devil_llama · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I'm beginning to wonder if contemporary fiction is becoming an impossible task for me. It often begins to seem like work to force a book to its conclusion, when it seems like most of them are simply sex fantasies of middle aged men writing about middle aged, overweight, self-indulgent men having sex with numerous much younger women...oh, and putting some sort of other story around it that takes up about one-quarter of the text and is meant to justify yet another book about middle aged, overweight, self-indulgent men having sex with numerous much younger women. It doesn't help that this book peddles some much abused tropes about women in science (granted, it does present the rationality of the position of women's rights advocates eventually, but that is overlain by the nonsense spouted by the main character, probably to make us realize what an ass he is, but unfortunately handled in a way that makes it look unanswered), environmentalism (again, the author appears to be on the side of the angels, but a denier would find much to like in this book), and the arts (here, I can give nothing. The author basically allowed the main character, a physicist, to have his say on the arts without much dispute, other than putting in a couple of artists who were nice, pleasant people, but still appeared frivolous and ignorant in comparison to physics). The book left a very unpleasant taste in my mouth. If authors want to show us unpleasant characters doing unpleasant things to make us dislike them, fine, but there are ways to do it that don't leave you feeling like you've just swum in the sewer.

[gayla.bassham · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Meh. McEwan can do better.

[gpaisley_2 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

disappointing. annoying character and little point.

[paulrx04 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

His use of english is outstanding!!! So far his other books are as good. WOW!

[jayne_charles_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I was taken aback by the humour in this - you can pretty much rely on Ian McEwan to deliver something satisfyingly literary with the odd titter, but this - at least the first part of it - was full-on hilarious. Reading it in a public place, I was in danger of choking on suppressed laughter. There was a lot of quite dense physics stuff too, but when you add in the slapstick and calculate the arithmetical mean it ends up bang on the funny bone.You could at a pinch read the first section as a stand-alone story, and not bother with the rest - anyone finding the physics bits heavy going might be well advised to do that. The second and third sections are denser, heavier on the physics, and less funny. If you are Ian McEwan you can get away with things other people can't - like including long speeches word for word, and including plot events which appear to have been lifted wholesale from Jeffrey Archer (Jeffrey Archer!!) and which weren't even original when Jeffrey used them. Then, after letting your public think the less of you for several pages, admitting via a character that you did lift them from Archer and they weren't original when he used them etc etc. Either brave, daft, or meaningful in ways I can't discern. Either way, I'm glad I ploughed through to the end. You always come out of his novels with more knowledge than you started, and this one had a playfulness about it that made it probably my favourite by him so far.

[rlangston-1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I like Ian McEwan but could not finish this book - trying too hard to be Malcolm Bradbury, another author I struggle with.

[dalzan_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Summary: In the afterglow of winning a Nobel Prize, Michael Beard lives a dismal life marked by multiple marriages, figurehead positions, and his own gluttony. However, after his most recent wife leaves him, Beard attempts to start living life to the fullest. He stumbles into this new life with a great deal of fanfare and catastrophe: covering up murder, nearly losing his penis to frostbite, and devising a plan to harness the power of the sun to save the planet.

[nyiper · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

My brain couldn't quite keep up with the physics but oh dear me the story of Michael Beard----what a character to behold!! There are a few incredible laugh out loud pieces---almost place holders in Beard's life and then you reach the moment when everything sort of comes to pass and there is Beard---seeing everything come at him at once. Can you like Beard and/or sympathize in any way with his character? He is such a beautifully crafted character---and listening to him speak, in the audio by Roger Allam, is truly wonderful.

[vivl_6 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Darkly satirical in a way that worked, for me, in Amsterdam but flounders in the format of this much longer work. I don't need a sympathetic main character but I won't deny some glimmer of humanity can help. Such a thorough ass really requires an impeccably well-written story to maintain my interest, and this ain't one. There are a few amusing set-pieces and some interesting observations on the state of the planet and its inhabitants but they are lost in endless pages of sadly rather boring writing.

[sbloom42 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Ian McEwan's "Solar" reads much better as a study in the micro echoing the macro than for the story itself. The writing struggles to be humorous, but ends up feeling more pathetic, tragic, and ultimately embarrassing in many sections.

The redemption for this novel is the postscript at the end, which is the text of the Nobel Committee's speech given when the protagonist won his Nobel Prize (long before the action of the book). The prize was for a discovery of the way that tightly bound matter can be unraveled under the right conditions. And that's just what happens to the protagonist. His whole life is spent tying himself in knots, until all the loose ends threaten to tie him down at the end of the story. Somehow, a loose thread is pulled and his concerns (and his life) come undone.

I also enjoyed how the protagonist enumerated all the problems with getting the world to convert to an alternative energy source, and then proceeded to exemplify those problems in his personal life. Greed, selfishness, impatience, indifference, belief in one answer to solve all the problems. These were all traits of his personal life and his relationships. He tried to overcome these traits in others to introduction easy cheap energy to the world, but ultimately failed due, I believe, to his inability to overcome them himself.

I wouldn't recommend this to someone who hasn't read McEwan before. This is far from his best. Stick with "Atonement" or "Saturday" before tackling this non-story with a message.

[georgeslacombe_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Very good book of Ian Mcewan. Narrated in a comic mood with cynical and ironic comments, this book tells the story of Michael Beard, a Nobel Prized Physicist. The protagonist is a selfish chauvinist type the like Dr House from Tv series, and shows the kind of personality that is so in vogue today. He uses his inteligence to manipulate women and the ones that surrounds him, however his inability to deal with true emotions and his focus on near term satisfaction will put him in a very complicated situation. The book can be read as a methafor of our own inability to start doing something to solve the big issues that faces humanity, like global warming. Also it can be seen as how the near term satisfaction can become a very bad future. Michael Beard seems to be a very bad person, exploring women to have sex and friendship to gain status, however the bookalso shows his weak personality, insecure and his undeciseveness. Thos is a good book to read during your vacations, and think how much you share some of Michael Beard characteristics.

[tanya8dogearedcopy · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Solarby Ian McEwannarrated by Roger Allam(P) 2010, Recorded Books11 hours, 50 minutes(includes interview between the author and his editor)This isn’t so much a review as it is a witness testimony, not like on a court stand, but more like what you might see and hear at a religious revival! I admit that, in the past , I have committed the literary sin of not “getting” Ian McEwan. I read On Chesil Beach and Saturday with due diligence and lit-fic sobriety. In doing so, I was underwhelmed by the prose and declared McEwan “overrated” in rendering the psychological thriller to nothing more than a Tale of Anxiety (and at that, of a white older male anxiety!)Then, I saw the light. Someone here on LT (and I'm sorry I cannot remember who!) mentioned that they had heard Ian McEwan read an excerpt from On Chesil Beach out loud with comic flair! And that the audience was not only enthralled, but laughing along with him! Hmmm, perhaps if I hadn’t dismissed my own sense of humour and replaced it with self-righteous literary pretensions, I might have enjoyed On Chesil Beach, and come to think of it, Saturday more than I had. With that in mind, I picked up Solar which I had heard was supposed to be pretty funny. Admittedly, I had also heard that this was not McEwan’s best and, as a validation of that opinion, it was not nominated for a ManBooker award. So it kind of figures, considering the high rate of ironic incidences in my life, that the McEwan that no one seems to like is the one that I absolutely adore!The story features Michael Beard, a Nobel laureate who, when we meet him in his early fifties, is wallowing around in the collapse of his fifth marriage, a deteriorating body, and work in physics that is neither intellectually stimulating nor rewarding. The whole of Solar takes place over the course of about ten years (1999-2009) in which we watch Michael Beard muck his way around and through relationships, work and his health, always holding onto the promise of the next chapter in his life. It would be very easy to attach a lot of symbolic import to various artifices in the novel; but after listening to the interview of the author with his editor, you realize that, in doing so, you would be projecting too much into the novel. It is what it is and; what it is is a very honest portrayal of a man with all the absurdist elements that that may imply. Perhaps those who don’t like this novel don’t want to acknowledge that Michael Beard is very much an Everyman and, by default themselves; but I found common cause with the character for being flawed. Rather than finding Michael Beard an unlikable character, I was morbidly fascinated with his ability to have gotten as far as he had. I often found myself cheering for Michael even while admitting that he brought on most of his problems himself.Roger Allam is a British narrator who delivered Ian McEwan’s novel flawlessly. The production uses British pronunciations, which may sound awkward to American ears, but it does not interfere with the understanding or enjoyment of the story. Allam reads the book “straight,” without comic intonations and also without dropping into the deadly neutral zone :-)I loved Solar and I can’t wait to read McEwan’s next novel!

[kamgeb · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A very interesting work with twists that I wasn't expecting. However, there were no characters in the book that I actually liked. All were rather repulsive.

[nmele_4 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I am loathe to comment on this novel, which centers on a complex but ultimately immoral character. I could not find much sympathy for the protagonist, nor for many of the other people in the story. McEwan's talent carried me along through the story but I found it ultimately not very satisfying as Beard is such a repellent human being. I also wondered about the value of such a character study, since character study this book is--McEwan portrays Beard as a smart fellow with no redeeming qualities, and what's the point of that? There may be such people in the world but this novel did not help me understand them or how I should respond if I encounter someone like Beard.

[phil5james · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This gave me everything I could have asked for from a new Ian McEwan, a topical subject,[ global-warming:] and a totally human, messy character making a mess of his life as we make a mess of the planet.
My criticisms, if any, are very small ones.
If one thinks of a random number to put in a story the usual choice will be 23, and this happens several times.

[sianpr · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The protagonist of Solar, Michael Beard, is an amoral character and a brilliant scientist past his heyday. Beard lurches from one disaster to the next and an event at the start of the story eventually catches up with him at the end. Along the way his womanising, gluttony and dishonesty seemingly know no bounds. Can't say that this was a particular humorous book but then again this depends on your sense of humour. Worth reading but McEwan has written sharper books than this.

[jenmdb · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Worst book I've read for a long time. No character development. Sketchy plot. Wooden writing. Boring as hell because it repeats itself in so many places. I can't believe I read the same book as some of the reviewers here who have gone before me. There is only one funny part: when Beard's penis freezes to his zipper in the Arctic. I failed to find humour elsewhere.Can't believe this is by the same author who wrote Atonement. Mind you, I didn't like Chesil Beach either.

[lexieconyngham · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Extremely well written with characters and situations that will stay with me for a long time. Not sure it was as hilarious as it was said to be, but then it is Ian McEwan. The ending was inevitable but welcome, all the same - the only way out and something of a relief, in a strange way! The author was particularly clever to make his loathsome central character occasionally sympathetic, just enough to keep you going to see what he would do next.

[wassilissa · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Das Buch um den alternden Nobelpreisträger Michael Beard, den eigentlich nichts mehr interessiert, ist interessant und witzig. Es hat einige unerwartete Wendungen (z.B. die ganze Geschichte um seinen Assistenten Aldous) und sehr gut beobachtete und ausgarbeitete Seqeuenzen (z.B. die Szene mit der sozialkonstruktivistischen Wissenschaftlerin, aufgrund derer Beard zum "Nazi-Professor" wird). Insgesamt taugt es wahrscheinlich auch irgendwie als Parabel über den modernen Menschen und die moderne Wissenschaft. Es wirkt zum Teil etwas additiv, aber da sich am Ende alles fügt, passt das dann auch wieder.Das Buch macht Spaß zu lesen, ist meiner Meinung nach aber trotz der aktuellen Thematik, des bekannten Autors und der gelungenen Szenen insgesamt etwas belanglos.