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Armadillo | 
| Author: William Boyd
Publisher: Knopf
Category: Book
List Price: $24.00
Buy Used: $0.98
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Avg. Customer Rating:  21 reviews
Sales Rank: 1280972
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1st
Pages: 337
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 9 x 6 x 1.3
ISBN: 0375402233
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.914
EAN: 9780375402234
ASIN: 0375402233
Publication Date: October 6, 1998
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Condition: Former Library book. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. 100% Money Back Guarantee. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy!
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Amazon.com Review
Lorimer Black may suffer from a serious sleep disorder and an obsession with the labyrinths of the British class system, but IArmadillo/I's peculiar protagonist Iis/I the star insurance adjuster of London's Fortress Sure PLC, unaffectionately known as the Fort. At the very start of William Boyd's inoir/i-ish seventh novel, however, things take a decided swerve for the worse. On a bleak January morning one of his cases has apparently chosen to kill himself rather than talk: "Mr. Dupree was simultaneously the first dead person he had encountered in his life, his first suicide and his first hanged man and Lorimer found this congruence of firsts deceptively troubling."p Soon our hero, who himself has a lot to hide, finds himself threatened by a dodgy type whose loss he has adjusted way down and embroiled with the beautiful married actress Flavia Malinverno. "People who've lost something, they call on you to adjust it, make the loss less hard to bear? As if their lives are broken in some way and they call on you to fix it," Flavia dippily wonders. Lorimer also has his car torched and instantly goes from an object of affection to one of deep suspicion at the Fort. Then there is another case, the small matter of the rock star who may or may not be faking the Devil he says is sitting on his left shoulder. p Needless to say, Lorimer is "becoming fed up with this role of fall guy for other people's woes." Boyd adds a deep layer of psychological heft and a lighter level of humor to this thinking-person's thriller by exploring Lorimer's manifold personal and social fears. This is a man who desperately collects ancient helmets even though he knows they offer only "the illusion of protection." Another of IArmadillo/I's many pleasures: its dose of delicious argot. Should Lorimer "oil" the apparent perpetrator of the Fedora Palace arson before he's oiled himself? Or perhaps he just needs to "put the frighteners" on him. Boyd definitely puts the frighteners on his readers more than once in this cinematically seedy and dazzling literary display. I--Kerry Fried/I
Product Description
On a cold winter's morning, Lorimer Black, an insurance adjustor -- young, good-looking, on the rise -- goes to keep a perfectly ordinary appointment only to find a hanged man.brbrHis life is about to be turned upside down and in directions he never imagined. The elements at play: A beautiful actress with whom he finds himself falling in love after a quick glimpse of her in a passing taxi ... an odd, new, business associate whose hiring, firing and rehiring make little sense ... a rock musician whose loss -- in this case of his mind -- may be "adjusted" by the insurance company. What ties it all together: a web of fraud in which virtually everyone he knows is somewhat involved, a web in which he finds himself being increasingly entangled.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 16 more reviews...
London calling March 27, 2003
0 out of 3 found this review helpful
Armadillo is also a great book for all London-minded readers. It is fun to be able to recognise places and routes mentioned in the book. But I would not recommend the TV adaptation of the book: a lot got lost in it, even though it was adapted by the author himself. The humourous bits and all things about London had gone.
 Not what I had hoped for. November 27, 2002
2 out of 6 found this review helpful
Whilst I can see and appreciate the main themes within this book - being afraid to be yourself and the absurdity of the British class system. I didn't really feel like I got to know any of the characters that well. The twist and turns of the plot seemed pretty far fetched to me. I found it more sad than amusing. Perhaps it speaks more to men than to women, I wouldn't recommend this book to a friend.
 boyd's best April 11, 2002
1 out of 4 found this review helpful
I spent a year of my life working the 2AM shift flipping burgers, and Boyd brought that world back to me. I don't know anyone who has ever written so well about sleep, nosleep, and the inner world of the solitary working stiff
MY OUTSTANDING READ FOR THE YEAR 2001 December 28, 2001
12 out of 12 found this review helpful
Lorimer Black is a loss adjuster working in the City of London. Unwittingly he becomes a pawn in a darker world and a side of business life, where corruption, greed and snobbery prevail.pFrom the outset this book had a hold on me. It was fascinating immediately, and very funny. I recognised the characters in people I know and laughed outloud so many times that I became a real pain to those within earshot. I very rarely find literature funny, only Spike Milligan in fact.pThe writing is crisp and flows beautifully. pThe bad type of British male: slobby, uncouth, aggressive and misogynist was supremely portrayed in Torquil Helvoir - Jayne. I have seen these guys so many times in real life. William Boyd makes the point that despite his name and connections Torquil is no different to other pig ignorant individuals who happen to be below him in the class order.pWilliam Boyd has a fine reporter's eye and can build characters that are believable and a wonder to behold.pThere are a number of important themes in this book but the main one is the struggle to be someone other than ourselves. A British trait I am afraid, a response to the class bias where we are judged as soon as we open our mouths, in our accents, the way we speak and dress.pLike so many others in Britain poor Lorimer fell for it hook, line and sinker.pThere is a great play in names: Milo Blocj becomes Lorimer Black, David Watts the clapped out rock star had also changed his name. Pretence and more pretence. pThe book says that underneath it all we are all the same insecure and fragile individuals. Eventually the unreality catches up and drags us down. We wear armour that eventually proves to be too heavy, to be discarded so that real life can enter. Hence the armadillo - the little armed man. The layers are slowly stripped away. And the final piece - the helmet is cut away. pDespite Lorimer's adherence to style and clambering up the English greasy pole of class snobbery, in the end he reverts back to himself - Milo the European ethnic. That's when he starts to live life and find true happiness.pIt is a great book and one of my best reads for the year 2001. I can't wait to read some more William Boyd.
 Not his best June 1, 2001
3 out of 6 found this review helpful
Armadillo is an entertaining well written novel, that's clear. However, I think it's little more than that. It lacks the streght of other novels by Boyd like Braazeville Beach for example. Lorimer Black, the main character, is not consistent: sometimes he is brilliant and then he seems stupid. The explanation of why he is so insecure is found in his past by the reading his diary, but I think it is not convincig.The other characters, like Flavia Malinverno are steal weaker. When I read the novel my conclusion was somethig like: ok I had good fun reading it but what else?
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