Fear

By Irini Spanidou

Book Overview

Irini Spanidou's highly praised first novel, God's Snake , introduced a writer of rare perception and a character, Anna Karystinou, with whom readers fell in love. In Fear , the author returns to Anna as she comes of age. It is now 1959, and thirteen-year old Anna is a perpetual newcomer, moving from place to place with her family. Her father, a demanding army colonel, has raised her to be invulnerable and proud. But Anna's confident air belies her anxiety as she grapples with her burgeoning sexuality, and begins an uneasy friendship with the smug and challenging Veronica Koroneou. When Anna learns that a serial killer is preying on young women nearby, she is lured toward the sourch of her terror. From a unique and brutally honest angle, Fear is an unflinching protrait of a girl's difficult transition into womanhood.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0679730486
• ISBN13: 9780679730484
• Release Date: June 2000
• Publisher: Vintage
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.6" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

Mesmerizing!

FEAR kept me just as spellbound as her first novel GOD'S SNAKE. I can hardly wait for Irini Spanidou's next book! Being a young Greek woman myself, I slipped hypnotically into Anna's world, devouring each experience with heartfelt recognition- especially her relationship with her father.

Shows promise

I am going to have to leave this book on the shelf and then read it again in about a year, because I am ambivalent about it and don't want to make any absolute judgments yet. The author clearly has a talent, and maybe an important one. Her prose is lean and I like that. She creates atmospheres that seems to live and breathe and grasp the reader. At some moments the fear and dread are palpabe, and so are the almost comically absurd (dinner with Anna's parents) moments. But I have one complaint. The only character that seems to be really developed is the main protagonist. When the others are presented the reader is delighted because he/she thinks they are very interesting characters with wonderful possibilities, but the author just seems to leave them undeveloped, and that is a real disappointment. Shouldn't what happens in the novel grow out of certain features of the characters' personalities? Veronica's father is fascinating when he appears, but then he crawls into the woodwork. The same goes for her brothers the twins, but they too fade out in no time. Anna's father is a stone wall and her mother should get a life, at least an inner life. Anna herself is fleshed out nicely and the characterization of her makes the book worth it. I am not sorry I read this book, but I look forward to future work by this talented author. I know she will end up writing something wonderful.

Have no fear, this novel is a winner

By 1959, thirteen-year old Anna Karystinou has learned that emotions, including FEAR, are worthless. For years she has accompanied her parents across their homeland of Greece due to the constant reassignments of her military father. Anna has no permanent friends. Her parents are cold and aloof as her father wants to make a "man" out of her. This leaves the teenager with no love and a vast void where her emotions should have developed. However, humans cannot remain emotionally bankrupt as some feelings will enter the void. In the case of Anna, she loathes her unfeeling father and quickly realizes that those who profess to mentor her are actually her enemies. She turns to a serial killer, who is terrorizing their current hometown, for some deep emotinal warmth, even if her feelings are grounded in fear. Talk about teen angst. Irini Spanidou provides an insightful look at a troubled teen, learning to contend with difficulties in order to survive. The fast-paced story line moves to an adrenaline rush of a climax without destroying the in-depth character study. Like her previous work, GOD'S SNAKE, Ms. Spanidou provides readers with a passionate look at the past decade in Greece.Harriet Klausner