Teaser Tuesdays: The Constant Gardener

I saw the movie version of this book – The Constant Gardener a few years ago, and I found it unbearably heartbreaking (in a very lovely way).

I find the book less so, but that is because Le Carré is not really a sentimental type of writer.

I do love though how righteously angry he gets (something I haven’t seen in previous books I read). This is an angry, angry book, and the main character Tessa really rips into the injustice she sees around her. Not without unfortunate consequences, of course.

Here is an excerpt from the book.

Tessa distinguished absolutely between pain observed and pain shared. Pain observed is journalistic pain. It’s diplomatic pain. It’s television pain, over as soon as you switch off your beastly set. Those who watch suffering and do nothing about it, in her book, were little better than those who inflicted it. They were the bad Samaritans.

The Constant Gardener – John le Carré

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by Ambrosia at The Purple Booker. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!