Any Human Heart, by William Boyd, is the story of Logan Mountstuart as told through the character's journal entries.
The journal format of the novel is intriguing, the reader gets a nearly voyeuristic sneak peak into one man's mind. This format as well as Logan's disarming narrative drives the first half of the book. It's a lyric and yet somehow caustic journey from a school boy to an aging man. Or rather... until Logan's midlife.
Sometimes described as a "roller-coaster ride" or "yo-yo", however, the second half of the book nose dives. Perhaps it's simply that the excitement has gone out of the book and out of Logan's life. Perhaps, this is intentionally, showing that all good things are behind him, that now he's just in the home stretch, hanging on like a distance runner whose shoes have fallen off.
Admittedly, I haven't read to the end of the book. I don't know if I can or want to. The ending is inevitable and trying to finish is more like watching paint dry at this point.
The most vexing aspect of Any Human Heart is the excessive and blatant name dropping. The author continually writes in such literary and artistic luminaries as Virginia Woolfe, Ian Fleming, Picasso, Ernest Hemingway and others. These tiresome inserts aren't written in an organic manner but rather to point out how well cultured the character, and by extension, the author is. "Look, look at how much I know. Aren't I amazing. Go me."
Over all I'm disappointed in Any Human Heart. It starts out grand but suffers a coronary half way through.
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