Eh, trash. ( )

"I thought to myself how much more welcome a faculty of imagination would be if we could tell when it was at work and when not."

Maurice Allington, is the middle-aged proprietor of a 14th-century English inn called 'The Green Man' who lives on site with his second wife, a daughter from his first marriage and his elderly father. Maurice is a habitual heavy-drinker, hypochondriac and philanderer who is also being haunted by strange visions that no one else is able to see. When Maurice’s elderly father suddenly dies, the ghostly visions increase and Maurice starts investigating the possibilities that a wielder of dark magic is haunting his establishment.

No one in Maurice’s circle believes there is a ghost and they all attribute his sightings to his drinking, the shock of his father dying, and so forth. When he uncovers an account from 1720 in which a housemaid details her encounter with the 'Underhill' ghost, Maurice becomes ever more determined to prove them all wrong.

The novel also has some fun sexcapades, including Maurice’s ridiculous attempt to get his wife Joyce into a threesome with his best friend’s wife, Diana. Amis’s characters always seem to have plenty of attention from women but they always find a way to mess things up. Amis never really bothers to give his women any depth generally painting them merely as sex objects.

At the same time, an unreliable narrator is something Amis excels at. Maurice isn't a particularly likeable character but he is quite comical in a sozzled Basil Faulty sort of way; you are never certain whether or not he actually sees any apparitions or whether they are simply manifestations of a drink-sodden mind. This a modern Gothic short novel where by today's standards the ghost is quite placid and easily dispensed with but its both comical and exhilarating in parts making it an satisfyingly quick read overall. ( )

Imagine writing a novel whose main character mocks novel writers while he arranges funerals, plans orgies, fights off bad intentioned spirits, meets god, and tries to convince everyone his problems aren’t just the DTs.

There's a lot to this slender novel. The main character runs a pub and hotel in the countryside, The Green Man, and is a drinker and a womaniser. But he is also beginning to see ghosts, and when he tells his friends and family nobody believes him - after all, he has a history of not playing straight with the facts, and of drinking rather more than he should.

What starts as a comedy soon becomes something much more serious, and Amis manages this tonal shift adeptly. The writing is always top-notch, as one would expect from the family, and the book, though a relatively short read, leaves a lasting impression. ( )

Okay novel that loses something by being a bit dated and having a ghost story that lacks much suspense. The fact that we never really like the main character doesn't help.

I'm not sure if the things about threesomes, lesbianism, and adultery were still considered edgy in 1969, but they lack any excitement today except to the most prudish.

The entire thing just seemed somewhat tepid to me. ( )