Enjoyable, but no match to the Persimmon Tree

Love Bryce Courtenay as an author, however this fell a bit short of the prequel, 'The Persimmon Tree'. I'm not sure if the time period and world events weren't as compelling as the first story, but I found myself wondering a few times how much longer the story could continue. The tale follows the life of main character Nicholas Duncan - Aussie larrikin adventurer turned business magnate has had the fortune of becoming very successful after the war. The whole premise is his life struggle trying to choose between his two great loves 'Anna' and 'Marg' ... but honestly, how is it that hard? I found it a little disingenuous and Nick's character came across as much less heroic in this, able to be bossed around by both formidable women (who of course were chalk and cheese), and never really able to make his own decisions. Nick even allowed Marg to use his relationship with Anna to manipulate situations several times, which was a little pathetic. The most exciting part of the story was set in Japan but again, it was nowhere near as compelling or full of as many interesting and beautiful facts as the first book. Narration was fantastic - the narrator has a great ability to take on many accents, male and female and make them each sound unique. But overall not my favourite read/listen.

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Nice follow up to the persimmon tree.

The persimmon tree did leave me wanting more so it was good to expand on the story. It did drag on at times but I thought the weaving of the main characters into the birth of the green movement was nicely done.

Humphrey Bower’s narration was superb as usual.

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Epic

Yet another action & emotion-filled drama. Some good reminders of Australian historic events. Highly recommended.

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Awesome

Enjoyed both the fiction and the factual aspects of this and the first book. Love the narrator.

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Great listen

Author / reader combo just can’t be beaten. Will always listen to these books, written and read incredibly well

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A Must to Finalise The Persimmon Tree

I loved the Persimmon Tree and Fishing for Stars is the finalization that was needed to close the story. but
Some of the promises of Characters in the Persimmon Tree dwindled and became tangential. Marge offered so much promise in character development in TPT but was lost in FFS as I regret young Bryce's political Dilemma took over. I actually fast forward over the Tasmanian experience as it became tedious. The editor in the rewrite should have cut this dramatically. Kevin's character developed and allowed him to fit and contribute to the book.

A must-read if you read the Persimmon Tree.....

A more minor point is that some of the Japanese references were actually Chinese.
The final chapter makes it worth buying the book.

Well worth the read if you read The Persimmon Tree first.

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Fishing for stars

I very much enjoyed this book, although found some of it overwhelming and main character interactions with Anna & Marg hard for me to believe. I relistened to a few chapters especially the last two which helped a lot. A great story, well worth reading and the ending chapter is dramatic and emotional and promotes deep thought.

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A Great Book!

Really found this book hard to put down at times, but occasionally it was a bit far fetched. The narrator is magnificent!

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amazing book with alot of historical information

loved this book as it filled in alot of the gaps and expanded on the previous book the persimmon tree. highly recommend it.

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Awesome

I loved this book. You need to listen. But it was a great book. I like the story line and had a cry at the end.

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