Rating: 
Summary: Just Short
Review: The crimson petal and the white in this novel refer to Agnes, the wife of William Rackham (white), and Sugar, William's prostitute/mistress (crimson). But these are merely the main characters in a long, Dickensian, Victorian novel that comes in at something over 800 pages. As a reader who finds the modern trend towards novels of something less that 200 only mildly interesting pages, I was excited and hopeful to see a book like this. It almost lived up to my expectations.Faber is working in the tradition of Dickens and Hardy but he is not quite up to the challenge. Admittedly, he had created some wonderful characters here. Sugar and, in particular, Agnes are well-developed personalities. Additionally, as often happens, some of the secondary characters are more memorable than the main characters. I found William's brother Henry and Henry's friend Mrs. Fox to be extraordinarily interesting. And, at least their story is told to completion. This is my major complaint about this novel. After working our way through 800 pages we are brought to an abrupt ending of the story of our major characters. And I am not a person who necessarily needs closure but I do need some kind of satisfactory completion to at least a piece of the story. To be honest, I felt like Faber just got tired of writing (or his deadline was near) and he had to get the thing done. Boom!--the novel's done. And the paragraph that serves as epilogue to the story is nothing but a confirmation of the cop-out. It is very disappointing to have invested so much time and energy into these characters and to be left so unsatisfied. I also found Faber's technique of speaking directly to the reader to be mildly irritating. Admittedly, this style fades away after a few hundred pages only to rear its ugly head again as the novel nears its end but some readers may enjoy this technique better than me. Still, when push comes to shove, this is a book worth reading. Finally, we have a novel that lasts long enough that the reader can really know something about the characters. And anyone with a bent towards Victorian novels will find this novel to be a good, albeit more explicit, example of the genre. It's worth a few shortfalls to involve yourself in the experience of this world.
Rating: 
Summary: Read the book carefully.
Review: I'm a slow reader. I don't consume 800 pages over a couple of days. It took me a couple of weeks to read this book. I would sometimes re-read paragraphs or pages to make sure I'd understood them and to get a better sense of the writing (as a writer, I'm always analyzing the works of others). I thought the opening was as pretentious as the title, but the author quickly abandoned his imitation "French Lieutenant's Woman" voice and moved onto richly descriptive narrative. I'm a hard sell -- it takes lyrical writing on the level of Mervyn Peake to impress me -- so I was surprised by how much I loved the eloquent, intelligent, witty style of the author. I loved the book for about 700 pages. There were extremely slow patches that I humored because they were worth trudging through to get to the good stuff. There were tedious minor characters who were given far too much page time (Henry and Mrs. Fox come to mind) whom I would have deleted from the book entirely (if the book had started by focusing on them, I never would have read it). There was a surprising amount of repetition and the author showed a willingness to spend time boring his readers with content he himself admitted was dull through the thoughts of his characters (I am referring to Agnes' diaries). Most of these problems could have been cleared up with the help of a strict editor willing to chop the book down to a smooth, crisp, nearly-perfect 300 pages. But as I said, in spite of problems, I loved it for 700 pages. So why did I give it only a single star? Because at the very, very end of a riveting, complex story the author belittles, humiliates, and mercilessly destroys his own characters *pointlessly*. He doesn't do it in a way that makes good tragedy, he doesn't do it in a way that even makes logical sense within the story. Why he does it is something I could not guess without dissecting it for years. Maybe he was just trying to get people to dissect it for years; maybe he's a masochist. **Spoilers beyond this point** I won't give away the whole ending, but I will refer you directly to the two sentences that callously tear down two of the novel's most important, most touching, most fragile characters. My page numbers refer to the hardbound edition. On pg. 809, the author sees fit to humiliate the heroine in a scene that could be the moment of her triumph (or even the moment of her tragedy, if it had been written with more respect). Having actually bothered to emotionally invest myself in this character, it was mind-numbing to see her so coldly mistreated not so much by the characters of the story as by the author who gave her life. Halfway down the page lies one of the worst sentences the author has ever written: "Cheesman laughs and, guiding her against the wheel of his coach, gathers up her skirts in his hands." No more is said; no more needs to be said. The last shred of courage, respect, and potential heroism that Miss Sugar had has been stripped from her in one sentence. The second sentence is crueler than the first, even though it is aimed at a more minor character. But this character is a child in whom Sugar places all her hopes and for whom Sugar ruins her life (apparently, completely in vain). There is no point to all the effort Sugar is putting out for this little girl, no reason for her to try so hard to save her. Why? Because of one sentence the author puts in, apparently intended to drag even innocent children down into the murky depths of hopeless misery that this book has shoved every last one of its characters into by the end. Again, the sentence is on pg. 809. It goes like this: "Although she hasn't the words to express it, she feels she has an instinct for cosmological messages that others fail to divine." If you've read the story, you know that this little girl is showing the first symptom that her mother showed (at her age) indicating that she was descending into madness. You know what happened to Agnes; guess what is going to happen to little Sophie. I'm sure some people will hail such an ending as artistic, or deep, or even powerful. I consider it a waste of 800 pages of development, because it begs the question, "What was the point of any of these characters trying to do anything when they were just going to end up in a hell as bad as the one they began in?"
Rating: 
Summary: EXCELLENT READ
Review: This was, from beginning to end, a completely enthralling book. When I turned the last page, thrilled and delighted with the ending, I was lonely for Sugar and anxious about her future. I loved this book and I am an impatient reader. This book kept me in its spell. What a good way to spend time!
Rating:
Summary: COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN
Review: HISTORICAL, FASCINATING A REAL PAGE TURNER. BOUGHT HIS FIRST BOOK
AFTER READING THIS.
Rating:
Summary: Did the train hit a derailment, or what??
Review: "The Crimson Petal and the White" starts out full of energy and keeps it going at full steam for over 800 pages. Faber brings to life Victorian England in all its prim and starch propriety while showing the ugliness underneath. The protagonist is Sugar, a very young prostitute, who specializes in satisfying her customer's most perverse desires (there is absolutely nothing she won't do), while at the same time ventilating her loathing and contempt of all men in a secret novel she will never publish. She manages to fascinate William Rackham, the second son of a wealthy family who will inherit the perfume business that will make him rich and famous. Rackham is respectably married to a young woman whose tenuous hold on reality diminishes until it slips away to nothingness; he also wants Sugar on the side and installs her first in a private pied-a-terre where she will be at his constant beck and call, and then in his own home as his six year old daughter's governess. But Rackham turns out to be just as contemptible as every other man who used Sugar for his own satisfaction and then discarded her; when he impregnates Sugar, he turns her out into the street. But Sugar isn't about to go empty-handed, and she wreaks a devastating revenge. What that revenge is, is for some reason cut short at the end of the book like a TV show interrupted by a power failure; we're left dangling and infuriated. This alone makes me give the book four stars instead of the five it would have earned if Fagen had given us a sense of what became of his characters. The book doesn't even have an ending, we're left hanging indefinitely over a precipice. A poor termination (I can't say "ending" because it's not one) of an otherwise excellent book.
Rating: 
Summary: Was I reading the same book as the other reviewers?
Review: I just finished this book and while I agree that this book is rich in detail and language of London, it does not adequately capture the class struggle of 1800's London, the demeaning treatment of women and the potential problems with family relationships. I only wonder what personal female relationship problems the author had over the several years it took to write this book. It starts out as a Victorian "Pretty Woman", then moves to a weak imitation of "Upstairs/Downstairs" and finally leaves the reader wondering if there is a subsequent novel in the works. How disappointing, don't bother to spend your money or your time on this novel.
Rating:
Summary: A VICTORIAN ERA "PRETTY WOMAN"
Review: It will not win the National Book Award but it will win you over. This superbly written novel will keep you interested for 800+ pages. It is a simple story about complex people in a confusing era. It is a story about the decisions that people make and the, more often than not, unintended consequences of those decisions.
Faber's writing style will draw you into the story of these very well drawn characters. This book should be read slowly. The reader should savor every sentence. The Catch 22 is that you will be unable to do so - you will want to fly through the pages to see what happens next.
I have a number of reservations about certain plot lines and question some of the character's motivations but I am unable to give less than five stars when an 800 + page book reads as if it is 150 pages.
Read and enjoy.
Rating:
Summary: Intellectually unstimulating and unchallenging
Review: This book was recommended by people who had not read this, but had read other historical novels I enjoyed such as, Versailles, Year of Wonders, Girl with a Pearl Earring, but I found nothing of the informative or educational element in it. I believe the largest and most frequently used word in the book is "orifice."
Rating:
Summary: And soon to be a movie...
Review: Michel Faber has the period dead on! A terrific read. I've heard that Kirsten Dunst is to play Sugar in the film adaptation.
Rating: 
Summary: Faber certainly knows how women think.
Review: What struck me most throughout the book was Michel Faber's insight into the psychology of women, especially in the character Sugar. When she was a common prostitute, she was contemptuous, but in control. She also had passion enough to be creative, albeit poorly. Once she was moved into her own elaborately provisioned house, she was overcome by idleness and loneliness, and hence rationalizes her utter dependence on William Rackham by convincing herself she is in love with him. And then what does she do? Why, of course, she stalks him! Too funny, I've seen this pattern many times in today's women. Add manipulation to the pot (she manages to move into his home, but I won't spoil it for those of you who haven't read the book), and this is downright frightening when you consider a man wrote this book. And I hope women reading this review don't think I'm one-sided on this, because virtually every, if NOT every, man in this book is either a vain, selfish pig or a senseless buffoon. We watch William Rackham transform from the outdated Victorian stereotype of the idle-rich gentleman, into a capable and modern captain of industry. He finds that he likes it, despite his prior distate for productive work. And yet, he hasn't changed, as the last scene in the book has him wondering if he'll be mocked by his friends for having a limp when he injures himself looking for his missing mistress and daughter. What William's boring brother Henry was doing in the book was a mystery to me, unless his female friend's miraculous recovery upon Henry's utimely death was supposed to be some sort of statement on spirituality (which is the only subject Henry is interested in). I suppose both Henry and William represent two conventions that were clearly on their death beds during this time period: the impossibly prudish Victorian interpretation of Christian values, and the concept of the idle and obnoxious rich gleaning esteem off their old-money roots. There is some comedy interwoven into this otherwise bleak story in the form of the ridiculous pair known as Ashley and Bodwell. Two former classmates of William Rackham, and (in the beginning at least) his idols, they prattle and prank their way into the story at different times, making themselves more and more repulsive along the way. I was amused, I must say, to see that Faber made them the founding fathers of what we now call "the vanity press." After their most current social commentary (and that term is used lightly) is turned down by their publisher because their others books lost so much money (a fact they find uproariously funny), they buy their own publishing house. Other than that, I enjoyed the descriptive writing in the narratives. I was especially fascinated by Faber's knowledge of fashion and the insight of how and why it changed during this time period. And suffice it to say, you'll be glad you didn't live in London during these times once you read this book.
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