SOURCE: Ferraro, Julian. Review of Fear of Mirrors, by Tariq Ali. Times Literary Supplement, no. 4970 (3 July 1998): 20.

In the following review, Ferraro praises Fear of Mirrors for its examination of characters who serve political ideals, but faults the novel for its trite conclusion and “wooden” dialogue.

Fear of Mirrors, Tariq Ali's third work of fiction, is a political novel. The book's narrative spans the twentieth century, from the last years of the Austrian Empire to the collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe and the reunification of Germany. Its central character, Professor Vladimir Meyer, is an East German Communist, a former dissident, who has been dismissed from his university post by the “Westies”. Politically and emotionally estranged from his son, Karl, and abandoned by his wife, Helge, he tries to make sense of his own history and that of his country. The novel unfolds in a series of accounts, from...