Julian Barnes has his character, a doctor called Geoffrey Braithwaite, consider various literary ideas. One, which only really applies to writing prose fiction, is the relation between form and content. Most novels, certainly most pulp fiction, never address this, since the authors usually present apparently literal material merely literally or, perhaps even more commonly, fantastical material literally. Generally within some recognisable genre, these offerings tend to preoccupy themselves with simple narration. In effect, most novels are presented in pictorial form, like a comic strip running a frame at a time through the authorâ??s mind, with only minimally extended commentary. Their presentation is invariably linear, with the writerâ??s aim to spoon-feed the reader with bite-sized chinks of easily digestible plot in a context aimed at simplifying the experience.

Flaubertâ??s Parrot is the polar opposite of this. The only plot is Flaubertâ??s life, both physical and intellectual, alongside that of his enthusiastic intended biographer, the doctor, Geoffrey. Geoffreyâ??s research, notes, speculations and musings provide the bookâ??s utterly original form. Since the adultery of Flaubertâ??s fictional Madam Bovary provided the scandal that created his fame, evidence of his attitudes towards women and sex in his own life provides a fascinating backdrop against which we can assess the authorâ??s motives and desires. The death and revealed adultery of the narratorâ??s own wife provides motive for his obsession with Flaubert and his femme fatale, and, quite unexpectedly, this culminates in a truly moving moment of emotional empathy that the author, Barnes, not Flaubert, not the narrator, evokes in his reader.

This emotional intensity developed as a real surprise towards the end of the book. Through it, Julian Barnes achieves a perfect marriage of form and content, the finest I have ever encountered. No matter how much we analyse the creative process, it is our emotional lives that provide the stuff of art. The writer moulds it, contextualises it, formalises it, but eventually the rawness of the experience, the chasm of bereavement, the hollow of betrayal, the consonance of love that makes us laugh or weep as we read, and Julian Barnes provokes both responses in this beautiful book.

There are some stunning moments of virtuosity. There are, for instance, three concatenated chronologies of Flaubertâ??s life â?? an encyclopedia of success, a record of failure and a personal diary. This is a masterstroke, effectively answering the rhetorical question of why we remain interested in the author, even when we consider a work as iconic as Madame Bovary. The narratorâ??s dissection of â??correctnessâ? in fiction is utterly poignant, especially so when we cannot even agree on the detail of reality. And so what if the writer decides to change things around? Isnâ??t it supposed to be fiction?

But the enduring memory of Flaubertâ??s Parrot is that masterstroke of marrying motives via Falubertâ??s real life, whatever that was, the imagined world of his femme fatale and the apparently real life of Geoffrey Braithwaite, with its own experience of adultery and bereavement. And then, of course, we have Geoffreyâ??s obsession with Flaubert, through which we reflect on the ideas of the self and its selfishness. Stunningly beautiful.

And the parrot? Probably a fake. Or perhaps just faked. Or then againâ?¦.

This caught my attention because I had just been considering putting the Kindle on my Christmas list this year. You know how it is when you log into Amazon, you always see the advertisements for their electronic reader right in your face, and eventually you become brainwashed where you suddenly decide you MUST have one of those (insert name of new gadget here). That’s what happened to me with Kindle I think. And I’ll be honest with you, I really didn’t know a whole lot about it.

So when I heard about the nook reader that B&N is about to unveil, I asked the check-out lady a few questions and then when I got home I decided to check it out on the website. I was pleasantly surprised to see that it actually appears to have more features than Kindle.

So here’s the lowdown. They both have 6-inch screen displays so they are easy to read, you can adjust the text size with both devices, and both of them feature 2 GB memory, ability to browse and shop for ebooks, speakers, headphone jack, rechargeable battery, comparable weight, software updates, quick page turn by hard key, synchronized last page read between devices, and ability to read your books on multiple devices.

But, here’s what you get on the nook reader that is not available on the “other reader.” Color touch screen, touch control and navigation ability, library view by book cover, Wi-Fi, free Wi-Fi in Barnes & Noble stores, expandable memory, more than a million titles, more than half a million free ebooks, exclusive content at B&N, directly load and read PDF’s (very helpful), synchronized notes between devices, “LendMe technology” which is where you can share books between nook, iPhone, iPod touch, Blackberry, PC, and Mac, and a replaceable battery.

Sounds good, right? I was impressed. In addition, and this is really key, you can go into Barnes and Noble and try out the nook in person. You can hold it in your hands. Studies have shown that this is key in allowing buyers to make a decision on a purchase. You can sell a lot more when the person can touch as well as see.

I have to say I’m really interested in the nook reader and to be honest, I think it really wins in the head-to-head battle with Kindle by a landslide. Of course, I have not tried out the actual device yet but it will be in stores at the end of November (so I was told). So if you are considering an E-reader you should check out the nook when it becomes available, either for yourself or maybe as a gift.

This caught my attention because I had just been considering putting the Kindle on my Christmas list this year. You know how it is when you log into Amazon, you always see the advertisements for their electronic reader right in your face, and eventually you become brainwashed where you suddenly decide you MUST have one of those (insert name of new gadget here). That’s what happened to me with Kindle I think. And I’ll be honest with you, I really didn’t know a whole lot about it.

So when I heard about the nook reader that B&N is about to unveil, I asked the check-out lady a few questions and then when I got home I decided to check it out on the website. I was pleasantly surprised to see that it actually appears to have more features than Kindle.

So here’s the lowdown. They both have 6-inch screen displays so they are easy to read, you can adjust the text size with both devices, and both of them feature 2 GB memory, ability to browse and shop for ebooks, speakers, headphone jack, rechargeable battery, comparable weight, software updates, quick page turn by hard key, synchronized last page read between devices, and ability to read your books on multiple devices.

But, here’s what you get on the nook reader that is not available on the “other reader.” Color touch screen, touch control and navigation ability, library view by book cover, Wi-Fi, free Wi-Fi in Barnes & Noble stores, expandable memory, more than a million titles, more than half a million free ebooks, exclusive content at B&N, directly load and read PDF’s (very helpful), synchronized notes between devices, “LendMe technology” which is where you can share books between nook, iPhone, iPod touch, Blackberry, PC, and Mac, and a replaceable battery.

Sounds good, right? I was impressed. In addition, and this is really key, you can go into Barnes and Noble and try out the nook in person. You can hold it in your hands. Studies have shown that this is key in allowing buyers to make a decision on a purchase. You can sell a lot more when the person can touch as well as see.

I have to say I’m really interested in the nook reader and to be honest, I think it really wins in the head-to-head battle with Kindle by a landslide. Of course, I have not tried out the actual device yet but it will be in stores at the end of November (so I was told). So if you are considering an E-reader you should check out the nook when it becomes available, either for yourself or maybe as a gift.