The book attempts to get the reader inside a musician's mind, but it doesn't really succeed - very much a case of standing outside looking in and imagining what it's like to be inside looking out. Or so it seemed.
The main character is not particularly likeable or credible, and one of fiction's most improbable coincidences returns a lost recording of a long-lost quintet to him. His obsession with the woman and his handling of it does him little credit, and is not especially believable. The most attractive thing about him is his love for his borrowed violin, and the most poignant parts of the book are those dealing with musicians looking for, losing or gaining their instruments.
The book was a disappointment after A Suitable Boy. It reads as if Vikram Seth cast around for a non-Indian subject to write about, and chose western classical music as a deliberate contrast. Whereas A Suitable Boy left the reader saddened, almost bereaved, by its ending the end of An Equal Music was really a bit of a relief.
Not a bad book but very far from being a great book.
Seán
Jean wasn't very impressed, and was very disappointed. Saw no point to the
book - it was bitty and scatty - looked like an author getting on in years
who decided to raid his card index and stick everything he found together;
some of the stuff should have stayed in the box.
Jean