Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson

Behind the Scenes at the Museum was Yorkshire mother of two, Kate Atkinson's first novel and this wonderful book it is definitely one to be celebrated. Kate Atkinson was born in York and she chose the old walled City as the location for the tale of teenage Ruby Lennox and her family. The book starts from the moment of Ruby's conception in 1951, a moment grudgingly obliged by her mother, Bunty. Ruby starts the tale as a growing foetus, a baby inside ...
...more unhappy…. Atkinson divides Behind the Scenes at the Museum into Chapters and Footnotes: the Chapters focus on Ruby and her direct family life with her mother and father and her sisters. The Footnotes tie up unexplained information mentioned within the chapters, exploring the history of her family over the previous two generations further, starting with Ruby's great-grandmother Alice, who supposedly died giving birth. Although I liked the footnotes ...

nickyturnill 24.01.2006 · Read full review
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Review of Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson

I think you only realise the true power of books when you read one that has such an effect on you that you feel like a part of you is missing when you finally finish it. Not ‘unputdownable’ as such (I hate that word but I’m at a loss for a better one so it will have to do) but a book where the characters really mean something to you and you actually care about what happens to them, where when the narrator stops talking you feel disappointed because ...
...the Scenes at the Museum’ by Kate Atkinson was for me one of those books. (Sorry if you found that intro a bit much – but I am an English student you have to expect it of me occasionally) ‘Behind the Scenes at the Museum’ was on my reading list for last Semester and I have to confess I avoided reading it for two incredibly pathetic reasons – 1. The front cover looked a bit strange and I found it a bit off putting 2. I didn’t like the sound of the ...

lwperkins 28.05.2003 · Read full review
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Review of Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson

“I exist! I am conceived…” thus starts the story of Ruby Lennox in Kate Atkinson’s first novel ‘Behind the Scenes at the Museum’. Kate Atkinson is a York born author who writes about places she knows and interweaves them in this novel. The story of Ruby Lennox is about the life of a young girl from her conception through to adulthood. The start of the story has Ruby in her mother’s womb aware of her mother’s ...
...continues with the life of Ruby and her family as they live above the pet shop run by her family. Some thing happens to Ruby when she is quite young which she can not remember but involved her being shipped off to her aunt’s house for several weeks. This event has a large effect on Ruby’s life. The story is full of relationships in a family. Eventually Ruby has therapy and is able to remember what happened, it is not quite as the family ...

mjbarkley 21.03.2002 · Read full review
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Review of Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson

I read this book for an English Literature course and was left astounded. As well as containing numerous laugh-out-loud moments, the intimate style of Atkinson's writing was so powerful at times that I was moved to tears. The book follows the life of Ruby, beginning at the moment of her conception and tracking her treacherous journey through to adulthood. Through the use of footnotes, we come to learn about her family's past and the many dramas ...
...the past does not stay in the past, but is very much interwoven with the lives of those living in the present day. Atkinson presents some powerful messages throughout the novel, forcing the reader to think about some important issues. Throughout the book, we witness the suffering of women because of their gender, children because of their families, men because of war, and even animals because of their owners. But this is not to say that the novel ...

Icecream123 05.05.2004 · Read full review
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Review of Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson

...social history events that works so well. After all, as the title says, Ruby is describing a world that has gone. If her family lived above the pet shop they owned, then in one sense, the story of her life is like being behind the scenes in a museum. ...

aspebbles 10.11.2005 · Read full review
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Review of Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson

I read this book several years ago when studying for my English degree and was excited by this novel. Kate Atkinson uses York as a backdrop for this novel, and living there now, as I do, adds that extra touch to the scene as I can picture streets and areas written about. I found the book on the whole very serious with the odd injections of humour to lighten the serious mood. Ruby's conception at the beginning of the book is real tickler! I found ...

Emmie 07.01.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson

This is an excellent book. It has a slightly auto biographical, first novel kind of feel to it. It is well written, entertaining and very sad at times. It is not sentimental. Kate Atkinson has a good eye for people and scenery. You sense a warmth for all of her characters. This is a book which left me wanting more and I was genuinely sad to put it down. It is perhaps one of five books written in the last ten years that I have felt that way about. ...

Saturn 10.08.2000 · Read full review
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Review of Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson

This is one of my favourite books of all time, I love it and can identify quite a lot with Ruby. I love the way it alternates between the history of the family and Ruby's perception of current events without being too confusing. This adds an extra dimension and gives you an insight to how the family has developed to where it is today, why people are like they are and why certain things are important. As a psychology student (although I wasn't when ...
...am always being taught that behaviour must be examined in context and within the circumstances it occurs. I liked the way that she found her place in life wven though she took the long way out, risking sensible decisions for ones of the heart (although never in a soppy cliched way). If I ever have a daughter I'll name her Ruby! ...

klingham 27.01.2001 · Read full review
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Review of Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson