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| 0356513173
| 9780356513171
| 0356513173
| 3.99
| 115,022
| Oct 1959
| Sep 05, 2019
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really liked it
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I didn't know much about this book going in beyond the fact that it was a post-apocalyptic story. It had quite an impact on me though. Part One is set I didn't know much about this book going in beyond the fact that it was a post-apocalyptic story. It had quite an impact on me though. Part One is set 500 years after a nuclear war and revolves around a 17-year-old monk named Brother Francis who inadvertently comes across a fallout shelter from the old world which may or may not contain relics from the order's founder, Leibowitz (a man who survived the war and later established the abbey). There is much discussion and excitement about these documents and as the years go by many people visit the abbey to investigate what has been found. Later, Brother Francis takes these documents to New Rome where the pope has agreed to make Leibowitz a saint. Part Two jumps ahead another 500 years. City states have developed, agriculture, warring clans, while the abbey continues to protect the relics. A religious scholar, Thon Taddeo, is sent from Texarkana to the abbey to examine the relics. Here he discovers that one of the young monks has already invented an electric light. Thon Taddeo believes he can advance upon this work. Part Three jumps ahead another 500 years and now civilisation is exploring space and using nuclear technology to colonise planets. The two major factions (the Asian Coalition and the Atlantic Confederacy) are experiencing a cold war having both previously engaged in nuclear attacks. War threatens to explode again and so the monk, Zerchi, advises some of his brothers to take the relics and leave earth before the inevitable nuclear war begins. And sure enough, nuclear war follows. It's hard to review this book. I thought it was genuinely quite profound and powerful in its exploration of a human condition which is repetitious by nature, endlessly looping, our inevitable descent into regurgitating old experiences being beyond our control. Not to mention the fact that the book does this over such a vast period of time, reiterating our transient speck-like insignificance. Truth be told, I think it's a waste of time to warn about the dangers of repeating history because, as a species, we need to accept that this is precisely what we are always destined to do. What are the alternatives? Do we really think we're progressing towards something? I personally don't think so. And while Miller isn't clear one way or the other, he nonetheless allowed his cynicism to become almost tangible. The book has such an enormous scope. It's hard not to find it moving, impressive, exquisite. These three time periods demonstrate how unremarkable we are and yet equally how eternal. It's a clever idea, beautiful even, and, for the most part, it is executed very effectively. I was reminded of an episode of Star Trek Voyager (Blink of an Eye) where they encounter a planet where time moves faster than the rest of space. We initially see the planet's inhabitants as primitive people, then return to the ship. Then ten minutes later, we return to the planet to see that they're now more advanced and have developed new technologies. We return to the ship again. Ten minutes later we return to the planet to see that they're now on the verge of space exploration. It's fun to watch this whole world develop before your eyes. This book has the same feature but expanded and with greater depth. That all being said, however, the book isn't perfect and shares similar problems to all books that have disparate sections. Namely the fact that I really enjoyed part one and the simplicity of the post-apocalyptic environment and the character of brother Francis but had to leave all that behind and move on to new characters and environments for part two -- that can be jarring. In this instance, I didn't really care for part two and felt that the book slowed down quite significantly. Likewise, by the time you get to part three, Miller doesn't really have the time to flesh out his world or his characters (enough to make you care about them), and so it feels a little disjointed and hollow. If you read the three pieces as stand alone stories, the second and third would be found a little wanting. But when you put all three together, it does take on a more profound quality. And I acknowledge that. I also disliked the wandering Jew character and felt his (supernatural) presence slightly took away from the piece. Yet despite the fact that there are parts of the book that drag, where the writing is often a little dry, the overall idea of the piece -- its immense timescale and profound themes -- is enormously powerful. It's hard not to be moved by it, to sit back in awe at the magnificent cynicism of Miller's conclusions about mankind and find it all rather... well, beautiful. The book definitely resonated with me. And I will be thinking about its implications for a while. But ultimately, I came to the conclusion that the idea of the book is probably a little more impressive than the book itself. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Apr 05, 2025
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Apr 08, 2025
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Apr 05, 2025
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Paperback
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| 1781255113
| 9781781255117
| 1781255113
| 4.27
| 1,673
| Jan 2008
| May 12, 2016
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it was ok
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I have always struggled with Krasznahorkai. Even when I like him, even when I acknowledge his ability to produce exquisite prose, bleak landscapes, an
I have always struggled with Krasznahorkai. Even when I like him, even when I acknowledge his ability to produce exquisite prose, bleak landscapes, and fascinating characters, I have never really enjoyed reading him. This is generally something that I can put to one side when he gives me the dark, almost post-apocalyptic atmosphere of Satantango or The Melancholy of Resistance, but when he goes on these modern or ancient tangents, I find it rather unbearable. War and War was a real nightmare of uninteresting meandering stream-of-consciousness and this... well, this was probably the least I've ever enjoyed his work. Which is strange because this is essentially a collection of short stories, loosely related vignettes, under the umbrella of a wider theme. And I hated it. Maybe I only noticed it this time around (or maybe he utilised this particular technique more overtly here) but the sentences that never end became very tiresome. For Christ's sake, use a full stop from time to time, Laszlo. And can we dispense with the walls of text for a while? It serves what purpose, illuminates what aspect, elevates which ideas? Then we have the almost fetishisitc use of the em-dash for interrupted thought which is just relentless. It reminded me of that criticism of the German language made by Mark Twain where he points out that in German the word 'de-parted' can be interrupted by swathes of flowery language before the reader even knows what conclusion is coming ("The trunks now being ready he DE... after kissing his mother and sisters, and once pressing to his bosom his adored Gretchen, who, dressed in simple white muslin, with a single tuberose in the ample folds of her rich brown hair had tottered feebly down the stairs....[insert yet more language here]... whom she loved more dearly than life itself... PARTED.") What if it isn't the word departed? What if it's de-stroyed or de-fenestrated? You have to read all the waffle before you get to the verb, to the fundamental part which provides any context. At which point, you've read so much without any clarification that you have to go back and start again. I do not enjoy reading without context and there's a lot of that here. As for the content itself, as I said, it's a variety of stories (each more boring than the last) which really do test your patience. It starts with a bird, then a painting, then a wooden statue of Buddha, then a man wearing tap dancing shoes who's being followed. By this point, I was sincerely struggling to care. I found the writing strangely dull, forced, and inauthentic. There was another story about a guy in Greece. And one about a security guard at the Louvre but I found it almost painful to keep reading any of it. At no point can you say that the writing is bad, it's just overly stylised and designed to be challenging for its own sake. This seems to be deliberate and, dare I say it, performative. I have a theory: The more accessible literature becomes in the modern world (a thousand books published per day), the more we instinctively want to celebrate horrible and unpleasant writing as the most meaningful because it's difficult and challenging. We kid ourselves that this means it's good, at the very least means that it stands out against all that countless drivel and mediocrity which is suspiciously easy to read and overwhelms the bookshops now. Even worse, it results in the genuinely mediocre writing of people like Jon Fosse. We so desperately want literature to be significant, to be more than just...  a story about a thing... that we encourage writers to go down this road, to appeal to the coffee shop hipsters who conflate obscurity with high status, and create a swamp of repetition and dense language which is deliberately unpleasant to read because we think this must demonstrate complexity. Maybe that's true for Fosse but for someone with genuine talent like Krasznahorkai, I think it only serves to make him squander his obvious talent. I wish writers like Krasznahorkai would stop trying so hard. I don't need literature to define my personality or provide me with a new philosophical outlook on existence. I don't need you to be a prophet or a sage. I just want you to write something beautiful. I hated this. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Apr 2025
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Apr 04, 2025
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Apr 01, 2025
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Paperback
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| 009975181X
| 9780099751816
| 009975181X
| 3.94
| 26,424
| 1997
| Aug 2024
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liked it
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I can't remember where I heard about this one but it seemed like a fun historical, murder mystery romp that would distract me with an enjoyable escapi
I can't remember where I heard about this one but it seemed like a fun historical, murder mystery romp that would distract me with an enjoyable escapist yarn. Sadly, I very quickly lost interest in the thing (around the first third). I can't say it's badly written or anything, but it's very formulaic, the kind of book that you might find at an airport masquerading as literary fiction (everything else does so why not this?). Despite being reasonably easy to read, it just didn't hold my attention at all. Again, not badly written for this kind of genre and, for those who enjoy such things, probably a satisfactory and competent example of it. But it wasn't my cup of tea. The book takes place in 1663 and is narrated by several people, all of whom are giving details of the same event from different perspectives (the death of Robert Groves and the arrest of Sarah Blundy as chief suspect). It begins with Marco de Cola, an Italian whose father has business interests in England where he travels. He finds himself in Oxford and, as an amateur physician, is greatly interested in the role of blood within the human body. He theorises that transfusion of a young person's blood to an old person will invigorate the older person. He meets Richard Lower and Robert Boyle (there are real people from history incorporated into the story) and with Lower he explains his theories and together they convince a young woman named Sarah Blundy (whose mother is ill) to give her blood to her mother as treatment. Not long after this a man named Groves dies and foul play is suspected (poison) and the chief suspect appears to be Sarah. I mostly enjoyed this first section of the book but was slightly baffled by the abrupt ending (it concludes with Cola leaving for Italy) only to realise that his section (at least his narration of events) were entirely over. Then comes the next instalment, this time we get the perspective of the disgraced Jack Prescott, son of a civil war traitor, his version of events evidently different from de Cola's in various ways, and this is where I was essentially done with the book (which is a shame because there was still a long way to go... the book is way too long!). After this we get another version of events (this time from John Wallis) which was the least satisfying part because he basically portrays de Cola as a scoundrel and a liar, re-imagining him into an entirely different person. I understand that these manuscripts all offer differing perspectives on purpose (it's part of the mosaic that ends with a twist) but given that de Cola was the only character I actually liked, it was not very enjoyable to see him suddenly turned into a villain, this portrayal jarring with what the opening section had provided. Again, I suppose it's the point, but my interest in the murder mystery aspect was already thin to begin with. After this, we get the events as told by Anthony Wood (probably the most revealing... if you still care at this point), but I was skim reading and ready to call it a day. You get a twist at the end (because of course you do) but the problem is it's entirely dependent upon you caring about the previous interpretations of events rather than the facts provided and the people encountered. The trouble I had is that I didn't care about those aspects. And if the narrator's are all highly unreliable (or at the least very conveniently leaving out vital aspects of the story) then the whole thing feels a little dishonest and requires that you invest in a story that is always changing. By this point, like I said, I simply didn't care who did the murder. It could have been Oliver Cromwell and I wouldn't have cared. Fundamentally, I think you have to enjoy this kind of genre to get the most out of it.  Again, I can't say the book is bad. Of this particular genre, it's probably a pretty good standard, but it's not something I generally like to read (especially when it fails to grab me). I only read it because I occasionally want something light and formulaic, some escapist nonsense that might be fun to read. The murder mystery meant nothing to me so I was left judging it by the characters and writing and I found neither especially compelling. The book is a standard genre piece with concise and rather prosaic prose, a style of writing that does not challenge or elevate, and characters that are purely there in service of pushing the plot along. This one just didn't pull me in (or more precisely didn't keep me pulled in) and I wasn't remotely invested (beyond my enjoyment of de Cola at the start and his ideas regarding blood transfusion). It's fine. Just not for me ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Mar 28, 2025
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Mar 31, 2025
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Mar 28, 2025
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Paperback
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| 0141187921
| 9780141187921
| 0141187921
| 4.18
| 870
| May 01, 1969
| Jul 26, 2005
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liked it
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I picked this up thinking it was a novel (the front cover suggests a quaint story of sleepy English village life). Instead, I found a work of non-fict
I picked this up thinking it was a novel (the front cover suggests a quaint story of sleepy English village life). Instead, I found a work of non-fiction albeit with elements of fiction in some aspects of the presentation. In many ways, it's like a documentary but in book form. Ronald Blythe essentially interviewed Suffolk farming folk in the mid to late sixties and wrote down what they said. For all I know, he may have simply transcribed what they said word for word; but as I say, there is a definite feeling of creative license being employed here (Akenfied itself is a fictitious place and there is drama based on the book which further embellished the piece). I'm not sure what the objective was here for Blythe, to simply record the voices and experiences of a people who were quite noticeably dying out as modernity continued to march on. Maybe nothing more than that. Anyway, we get some facts and statistics along the way, dates, events, historical changes, then we get the thoughts of individual villagers and the various farm workers, people who have jobs that no longer exist (thatcher, bell ringer, malting worker, farrier, wheelwright, saddler, gravedigger etc). Plus a great many people who were directly or indirectly affected by the two world wars (and a few eccentrics thrown in for good measure too). This is a book which records not only a time and a place that is gone but also a place even further back in time which only the very elderly residents can now recall. Blythe seems to recognise that we are losing something, a way of life, a variety of traditions, and before it dies off entirely it ought to be captured, remembered, discussed, before all tangible traces of it (the people) have long vanished. As such the book always feels very sad, romantic, with a theme of hardship and melancholy running through it. England, (Western civilisation itself) has left behind a way of life that has existed for centuries and is being forgotten too easily. Each of the characters give their insights and opinions, some fascinating, some parochial, but it's all in service of a desperately pitiable past, both romanticised or despised, which is leaving us. I found it hard not to sympathise with the general sense of sorrow which comes from the speakers. One of the prominent themes, of course, is religion. Gregory Gladwell 44 blacksmith I have a tendency to be like Charles Bradlaugh, who was a Suffolk man. I am not an atheist but I have strong views about politics and the Church. Bradlaugh wasn't against Church, he was against the set-up. I'm against the set-up. But I think it was an extremely good thing that religion should be accepted as the saviour pf civilisation. So I think it right that it should be carried on, If you forsake religion, it's back to the savages. This is what is happening now. Meanwhile there is a great deal of debate about marriage and children, the need to rush into such matters less urgent than it was in the old days, the responsibilities of so many children a daunting prospect for the young of the day (there is some brief mention of the transformative development of the contraceptive pill but this issue is mostly viewed from an angle of cultural change). Terry Lloyd 21 pig farmer The village girls like to get married very young but the boys don't. Many of the boys don't want to marry until they are about thirty, although plenty of them have to long before then. I have a friend whose girl made all the running before they were wed, now he has to beg for it. Similarly, the book doesn't shy away from the less pleasant aspects of the past either. One of the most fascinating chapters comes towards the end of the book and concerns the law and its relationship with the villagers and farm workers. Here we discover various disturbing stories including one of a group of boys who have been molested by a man with some degree of learning difficulties and they need to get one of the boys to admit to what happened in order to convict him. Despite his reticence (due to the shameful nature of it), they eventually convince him to speak. But it's all rather parochial and tolerated -- as though this is just what life consists of and we should address it accordingly. In this casual vein, we get a rather chilling account from the woman tasked with dealing with the legalities of the people's relationships and how best to deal with them when it comes to children. Mrs Annersley 55 magistrate There was more incest in the past and it was always fathers and daughters, never brothers and sisters. It happened when mother had too many children, or when mother was ill, or when mother was dead. And very often it didn't matter a bit. The daughter usually proved to be very fond of the father and there would be no sign of upset in the family. No, I think it was quite an understood thing that a daughter would take on the father when the mother was ill or dead. Yikes! You will often hear conservatives tell you that we had better morals in the past because of religion but I'm not sure that argument is very convincing when more closely scrutinised. Today things look bad but that's probably because we're actively looking for unacceptable behaviours in a way that wasn't previously done. That being said, I sympathise with the general themes of the book, the lament of a simpler time when life had more certainty, greater boundaries, and a general sense of purpose. It would be silly to ignore the bad aspects of the past entirely but nonetheless I believe we have indeed lost something of value, a greater communal environment certainly, a world that is confined and limited (often for our own benefit). People find it counter-intuitive to acknowledge this, to want less choice, less freedom, less opportunity, but the truth is such things can often provide a greater degree of stability and significantly higher opportunities for contentment. The whole book is a fascinating look at a time that (even when the book was published) was fading away. We now have another additional 60 years to add on to that ever increasing distance. These people are far away from us now, almost caricatures and myths, and I think it's worth occasionally thinking of them with some degree of respect and nostalgia. It's worth remembering the world we had, what we have gained and lost. Reading some of the interviews is enlightening to say the least. Some are more interesting than others and the book certainly doesn't possess any kind of plot or chronological progress. I would not describe it as a page turner but it's certainly a unique perspective into the past and definitely worth a look. An eye opening document of a world that is long gone yet still disturbingly within reach. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Mar 25, 2025
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Mar 27, 2025
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Mar 25, 2025
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Paperback
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| 1917092024
| 9781917092029
| 1917092024
| 3.90
| 1,532
| Jul 25, 2022
| Jan 2025
|
really liked it
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This was strangely romantic, sad, and sorrowful all at the same time. It's also short and sweet. You're in and then you're out. A man returns to his se This was strangely romantic, sad, and sorrowful all at the same time. It's also short and sweet. You're in and then you're out. A man returns to his seaside town to deal with the aftermath of his mother's recent death. He uses this opportunity to reconnect with an old boyfriend and they agree to meet at the boyfriend's house and spend some time together. There's a storm outside and the men very quickly reminisce and re-ignite old feelings, sit by the fire, and change from their wet clothes to dry clothes. From this point on, the chapters switch between their evening together and the narrator's childhood memories of his abusive and neglectful mother. The book is very easy to read and very slight. In fact, it's almost ethereal, wistful, the writing almost feeling like it's floating in and out of your consciousness on a faint breeze. I found it rather lovely and compelling. But there's not much more to the book. The whole thing goes by very softly, almost whimsically and dreamlike, yet always retaining a bitter taste in the memories of his confused childhood and his mother's behaviour. He also explores his nascent sexual encounters in youth (many of which have an element of abuse and coercion to them) as well as the relationship he had with the man he's visiting (more tender and respectful). These flights of fancy are full of nostalgia and deep feeling, and there's always a sense of past trauma defining aspects of his modern life. He wants desperately to connect to this past lover but can't seem to, their comfort with one another also possessing a divide. All the while the book conjures up a solitude in its atmospheric scene, the narrative always beautifully windswept and coastal, full of endless rain, the gentle tapping of it against the windows, and his lover's dog sleeping by the fire as they discuss the past. It was enormously effective and manifested a slow Sunday feeling as I read it, the small town, the sea, the-middle-of-nowhere quality, the northern European landscape. It was very real, tangible, evocative, even sensual. The ending provided yet another reminder that modernity and Western civilisation is becoming increasingly isolated and lonely. We sure done screwed things up on that score. Ultimately, this is a short novel about loneliness and heartache. About regret and sorrow. It takes five minutes to read but is very charming and human. I would definitely recommend it as a pleasant form of escape. The writing has stream-of-consciousness aspects but it's so light and dreamy that you don't notice. Despite being very slight and delicate, I enjoyed it a lot. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Mar 22, 2025
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Mar 23, 2025
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Mar 22, 2025
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Paperback
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| 0575075791
| 9780575075795
| 0575075791
| 3.81
| 1,196
| 1984
| 2005
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it was amazing
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This book has slightly melted my brain and left me wondering who I am. No seriously, I'm looking into a mirror wondering... who is that? I came across This book has slightly melted my brain and left me wondering who I am. No seriously, I'm looking into a mirror wondering... who is that? I came across this book whilst looking at a YouTube Video talking about The Magus by John Fowles (apparently Priest was so impressed by that book he gave up writing for a while). Eventually, he went back to writing and dedicated himself to trying to create something in the same philosophical vein. And he really did achieve it (I will definitely be seeking out more of his work after this). The book begins with a man named Richard Grey, a freelance cameraman, who is in hospital in Devon recovering from a car bomb (implied to be the IRA) which has killed several and injured many (Richard perhaps the most lucky of these survivors). He is undergoing physiotherapy and has regular meetings with two doctors regarding both his physical health but, more importantly, the amnesia which he is experiencing. Richard has lost any recollection of the few weeks, maybe a couple of months, of his life just prior to the bomb. Then, at the request of the tabloid newspaper that is paying for Richard's story, a woman named Sue visits him. He has no idea who she is but it is implied that they were lovers during this lost period. After spending some time with her, and, more specifically, after undergoing hypnotherapy with doctor Hurdis and his assistant (a disturbing yet important piece of the book), Richard feels as though he is regaining some snapshots of his lost life. The book then switches to his first person narration as he pieces together their first meeting in France. He and Sue met on the train and began to spend time together though she had a boyfriend that she was going to see in the south of France named Niall who was abusive and controlling. She can't break it off with him but nonetheless agrees to meet up with Richard again later. Back in the present day (and back to third person narration), Richard and Sue begin seeing each other again. On a visit to his flat they are talking and he tells her that some of his memories have been coming back. He tells her, for instance, about remembering how they met in France on the train, the ordeal with Niall, making love in the hotel. At this point, Sue looks at him in confusion and says:... 'I have never been to France.' Not long after this, we finally get an explanation of what 'The Glamour' is. This is where the book really ramps things up and, to be honest, I'm not sure it's possible to explain anything more without spoiling the book. Suffice it to say, things get very weird and we finally get Sue's version of events (back to first person narration) of how she and Niall first met Richard in a pub in London. The less you know, the more you will enjoy this book and I would definitely recommend going in cold to truly get the most from it. So that's all I can really say without giving away too much. But I would just like to add that this book, unquestionably, contains the most f*cked up and mind-bending sex scene I've ever come across in literature. Just utterly bizarre, f*cked up, and yet mesmerising! This whole thing is a magnificent piece of work. I couldn't believe how well-paced it was. You get third person narration which is gripping. Then it switches to first person and we get a new perspective, new information. Then back to third. Then Sue's first person perspective. All wonderfully unreliable. And all the while Priest writes in a manner that is so beautifully smooth and wonderful to read, the book combining an intriguing story with immensely enticing prose. It's never challenging but effective in moving things along and pulling the reader in all manner of directions, all of which demand answers without ever making them feel too immediate. Priest knows how to tease the audience just enough. And at the end, there are so many instances where the strange little things he included suddenly start to make sense. I absolutely LOVE philosophical books about how we define reality, ourselves, memory, existence, and this book truly lives up to that. It bewilders and bamboozles, plays with the reader, and opens so many doors that will leave you wondering what the hell just happened. It is so cleverly done. Even how we define fiction itself is being toyed with here. And the ending, like all great fiction, allows you to ponder the implications. There are no answers, only more questions. All interpretations are valid (I have my own). If you want the book to be a straight-forward sci-fi story then it can be but that removes a lot of its power if you ask me. If you don't and prefer to see it as an existential novel (and I do), it works even better. I spent the whole book wondering, anticipating, how ambiguous Priest would allow the ending to be, and pleasingly he leaves the door wide open for all these outcomes to be available. I am very much of the opinion that this is an existential novel which entirely takes place in the real world. There is no sci-fi here, no magic. But that's just me. The truth, however, is that I can never know for sure. That's it's beauty. It's a masterpiece! ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Mar 17, 2025
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Mar 20, 2025
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Mar 17, 2025
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Paperback
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| 1781255687
| 9781781255681
| 1781255687
| 3.60
| 14,803
| 1983
| Nov 03, 2016
|
liked it
|
Sooner or later, most men (who date for long enough) will encounter women who want very rough sex. They'll want you to smack them, choke them, and oft
Sooner or later, most men (who date for long enough) will encounter women who want very rough sex. They'll want you to smack them, choke them, and often humiliate them. As a man, you'll find this all very odd and wonder what motivated such a desire but will, ultimately, not care that much. After all, you're getting sex and that's your priority. Sure, it will cross your mind that she has some kind of mental health issue, a childhood trauma, maybe even a severely damaged personality. But (certainly in the modern age) you'll eventually come to the conclusion that it's none of your business. We've been told not to kink shame after all (especially not to kink shame women), told that women are, in fact, enormously empowered and know precisely what they want. I first met one of these women in my thirties and being a good postmodern boy of left-leaning opinion, I never bothered to pursue why she wanted to be treated this way (though a few conversations with her definitely lead me to conclude that it was probably connected to her father). Anyway... the point is I didn't care. Whatever complex psychological turmoil and inner journey she was on, we were not intimate enough for me to take that into account. There's your problem. Erika Kohut (The Piano Teacher), is not of this variety, however; she is VERY overtly this way inclined because of the relationship she has with her overbearing mother. Jelinek makes no bones about this, and the book opens with, and continues to the halfway point, focusing on this co-dependent relationship. Since childhood, Erika's mother has controlled her entire existence and after her father was shipped off to the lunatic asylum, this dominance only exacerbates. Erika was destined to be a great pianist and the pressure of this expectation has taken its toll not only on her talent but also on her personality. She is now reduced to being a teacher, already in her late thirties, the promise of greatness realistically gone but still cherished by her mother so that it can never quite die. As such Erika has become a malformed woman, a disastrous and abnormal soul incapable of developing as a person ought to. She has no meaningful life, no friends, and has acquired a taste for voyeurism in the shape of peep shows and porn. She also deliberately takes large instruments on public transport with her so that she can bump into people without them getting too upset. She stands on their feet so they can blame other people. She's a mess. Then comes the sexual relationship with one of her younger students, Walter Klemmer, and here she finds an opportunity for release. But again, it's a malformed release and not really an expression of love of sexual desire. After their initial sexual encounter (in a toilet like all good first sexual encounters should be) she writes letters to him giving him instructions to beat her, abuse her, and generally humiliate her. At first glance, this is a straight-forward expression of her pent-up sexual need but as I said at the beginning, this doesn't really cover it. What Erika really wants is control but she makes the mistake of trying to attain that control by telling him to be physically violent towards her (therefore implying that he is actually the one in control). This isn't really about sex for Erika, but rather a deformed search for love and connection that she doesn't fully know how to grasp. She isn't one of those women I mentioned at the start who take a genuine sexual pleasure from masochism but instead she feels no sexual pleasure at all. She barely feels anything. In this regard, I don't think the book is that interesting because it spoon feeds her obvious psychological trauma to you. There is very little grey area here, Erika is simply seeking answers, meaning, human experiences, control, but doesn't know how. Even as she watches people having sex, her bodily response is not arousal but a need to urinate. Truth be told, she doesn't really understand sex. The relationship with Klemmer, therefore, is her only means of control but it backfires (quite understandably) because she inadvertently opened a door to an entirely different experience. The book and its characters are interesting. But ultimately, I did not enjoy the book. For me, it was the writing. Jelinek employs a strange third person narration which is far too cold and aloof. A book like this, with such a tormented protagonist, would be far more interesting (and insightful) with a first person narration. I would love to have known what Erika was actually thinking. But we get this flat, rather dull third person instead. Plus the narration itself is just so detached, almost like a robot or a visiting alien is describing the odd behaviours of humans with very metallic and autistic language. I found it almost unbearable to read in truth. It was dense and thick and always remote. This is tricky to pull off without the relief of some highly exquisite prose which Jelinek (and perhaps the translator) don't really have access to. It was so heavy and dull to me, to such an extent that great portions of it were very boring, spoiling what is an otherwise fascinating character study. Worth a read but not a book I can honestly say I enjoyed. ...more |
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Mar 14, 2025
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Mar 16, 2025
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Mar 14, 2025
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| B00IIARKK2
| 3.71
| 5,867
| Dec 13, 2011
| 2013
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liked it
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The story of a young 15-year-old girl called Anais. The book opens with her being taken by the police to a care home called The Panopticon after engag
The story of a young 15-year-old girl called Anais. The book opens with her being taken by the police to a care home called The Panopticon after engaging in a potentially violent act that has resulted in a policewoman being put into a coma. She meets the other residents and staff and what follows is a rather straight-forward YA novel about an angry teen girl who is coming to terms with her circumstances whilst waiting to see if the policewoman recovers and if there's any evidence to convict her. A brief google of Fagan would suggest that this is very strongly autobiographical. I mean, it was fine. I can't say I enjoyed it that much and there were large periods where it felt like something very specifically aimed at teenagers. It just didn't have any meaningful substance to it, any progression, and was very dialogue heavy and prone to drag and repeat itself. The major problem for me was that Anais is just angry all the way through, an angst-ridden girl who is always on the defensive, always with her guard up, always swearing and unwilling to trust anyone. It makes sense given the context of her life but it isn't necessarily fun to read. There's no growth to her character, no sense that she's developing as a human, it's just relentless moodiness and sulking. This is fine for a while but eventually you get bored of it. The book might have been better off had it been narrated by Anais from a later date, as an adult, when she had a more mature outlook. Or if the book covered a larger period of her life. But instead, it's just teensy angst and cocky belligerence to the end. Then we come to a little bugbear of mine. Why are Scottish writers under the impression that they're the only people on earth who possess an accent? No, seriously. Why? There are countless places in England alone where people have a very strong (certainly much stronger than Scottish), almost indecipherable accent, but they rarely fetishise these in literature the way the Scottish do. It's not that bad here, the occasional 'disnae, umnay, arnay, radge,' etc but I just tire of this bizarre, almost nationalistic notion that dialect is somehow unique to them. Give it a f*cking rest! This is clearly designed for the benefit of the English and American reading audience (after all, why would Scottish people even need to read their own accent? Do people actually hear their own accents? No, which is precisely why you know it's performative, deliberately heightened or exaggerated for purely self-indulgent reasons). Anyway, it's a small gripe I've always had but it irritates me. Otherwise, the book is fine. It's mostly an easy to read little story. Give it to your angry teen daughter or something. But I wasn't exactly enamoured and I doubt I'll think about the book much beyond this review. ...more |
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Mar 12, 2025
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Mar 14, 2025
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Mar 12, 2025
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| B011T7IT9G
| 3.69
| 92,028
| 1966
| unknown
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it was ok
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Imagine taking lots of LSD and waking up in an episode of the Monkees. Then imagine how banal this is. A woman named Oedipa (everyone has a wacky name Imagine taking lots of LSD and waking up in an episode of the Monkees. Then imagine how banal this is. A woman named Oedipa (everyone has a wacky name) is informed that she is the executor of the estate of a past lover (Pierce Invararity... see, wacky) and so she travels to L.A and meets a lawyer called Metzger (a former child star) and they watch a movie that happens to be on TV which starred the young Metzger. Then they have sex. I don't know why. She's married but hey, it's the sixties. Oh, and there's a band called The Paranoids who constantly turn up (hey, hey, we're the Paranoids, and people say we Paranoid around). Have I mentioned that it's the sixties? You'd never guess from reading this book that it's the sixties. Wanna smoke some dope and take some LSD and watch a documentary about Timothy Leary? Sadly, after a while, I completely lost interest in all of this cartoonish nonsense. I was suddenly reminded of A Confederacy of Dunces and had that awful feeling that I was supposed to find this book immensely funny (certainly funnier than it actually is). To be fair, I enjoyed the first two chapters and thought the writing was inventive and fluid. But the story is just so dull and gradually becomes more (deliberately) obscure and incoherent. We start to delve into secret societies and perpetual motion devices and insane, screeching therapists. None of this was entertaining to me. It was just zany, psychedelic paranoia... of a very 1960s brand. You'd be better off just listening to Lucy in the sky with Diamonds. Or sniffing glue and staring at a picture of Mickey Dolenz. All the way through, you get the impression that Pynchon himself is deliriously paranoid and drowning in the (heavily dated, my groovy cat) conspiracy theories of the day. Some of this is interesting, the investigation of whether your life is in you hands or influenced, even controlled, by outside forces, this particular anxiety ridden notion very much present in the idea of the secret mail service that works in opposition to the actual mail service. But honestly, no philosophical debate can be adequately explored in such a disposable form of art. Not for me, anyway. And the biggest issue I had, as always, is that it just isn't very fun to read (the story more so than the prose). There's something interesting at the heart of the piece but it feels exaggerated, malformed, and extremely dated. I can imagine hippies and counter culture liberals loving this (oh God, is that why Pynchon is such a hipster's wet dream?). But I found most of it overwrought and contrived, almost like an inadvertent parody of postmodern literature. It's just not that good, kids. I don't care how groovy this cat is. It's well-written gibberish, like that acid infused episode of the Monkees. Reading this has convinced me to put Gravity's Rainbow on the back burner indefinitely. I don't care how groovy you dig on this guy, I ain't no square and this just ain't outta sight ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Mar 09, 2025
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Mar 10, 2025
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Mar 09, 2025
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| 0349141495
| 9780349141497
| 0349141495
| 3.96
| 341
| 1992
| Jul 05, 2017
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liked it
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I've always been a big fan of Patrick Hamilton's work and have enjoyed all of his books. Sadly, this one (actually three novels squeezed into one) was
I've always been a big fan of Patrick Hamilton's work and have enjoyed all of his books. Sadly, this one (actually three novels squeezed into one) was a bit of a letdown. Similar to 20,00 Streets Under The Sky, the three novels have been turned into one because they focus on the same characters. In this instance, just one character, the rather marvellous Ralph Ernest Gorse. He is a cad and a bounder, almost certainly a high functioning psychopath, and the three novels follow his nefarious exploits. The biggest problem with the novels is that they're essentially the same story told three times. Gorse meets a woman, manipulates and seduces her, then swindles her life savings. The West Pier (1952) This is by far the best of the three. This one actually feels more like a novel and provides early chapters about his childhood, his school days, and his early forays into criminality. The book eventually jumps ahead to when Gorse is a young man of 18 and living in Brighton. Here, with two of his friends (Ryan and Bell), they meet Esther and Gertrude. Esther is beautiful and likes Ryan and vice versa. But Gorse is more confident, asking her out while Ryan falters, and she is prone (one of the themes of the book) to be impressed by Gorse being upper middle-class and educated. She is even more impressed by his sexually secure nature, his indifference, his apparent sophistication. And yet she finds Ryan more physically attractive. She begins to date both these young men before Gorse manipulates her into viewing Ryan as a threat. It's a rather lightweight story but does a good job of setting up the character of Gorse. Otherwise, it's a little meandering and quaint, never really going anywhere that interesting (we already know that Gorse is a con-man and is going to fleece her). Hamilton clearly has a certain venom for beautiful girls who place great importance in men who exhibit higher class, status, education. The book is very dated in that sense, everyone obsessed with their rank in the social order. Esther allows herself to be seduced by a man who is less attractive to her than Ryan purely because he combines high status with self-assurance. Had this book been written today, it would probably focus on women and their noted attraction to the bad-boy. Gorse has just enough danger about him to make him more intriguing than Ryan. And she comes across as ultimately naive and even a little complicit in her own downfall. The book is very readable and by far the best of these three. There is an exuberance in the characters, a youthful excitement that permeates, even from the cold and aloof Gorse who openly acknowledges that he's new to the game of confidence trickery. We're essentially seeing him learn his trade. I was enjoying reading this but was a little disappointed by the damp squib ending. It all felt a little inconsequential. Mr. Stimpson and Mr. Gorse (1953) Literally more of the same here. Gorse is now a little older and residing in Reading. He takes on the character of a first world war veteran and focuses his attention on an older woman named Mrs Plumleigh-Bruce. She also has the attention of a man named Stimpson (hence the title) but he is, it seemed to me, somewhat insignificant to events. And so yeah, we get more of the same. This time it's a betting swindle (rather than a car in the first book) and it goes along almost identically, with all the same beats, and all the same outcomes. I really didn't get much from this. Unknown Assailant (1955) Then finally a much shorter novel (a third of the other two) which has yet another identical set-up. Gorse is now over thirty and seduces a barmaid called Ivy. Very much the same story as before though this time Gorse passes himself off as nobility and goes by the name The Honourable Gerald Claridge. I was really struggling with this one and found it quite dull. There is a slight opportunity to touch on Gorse's sexuality (he likes to tie women up) which also had a brief mention in the first book where he does this to a little girl. But it never really goes anywhere and Hamilton only allows himself to hint and nudge. So we basically just get more of the same here. I love Hamilton's writing but these final novels didn't quite live up to what had gone before. The West Pier is the best of the three and worth reading but the others can be skipped (unless you want the full character study). Some of his writing (especially in The West Pier) is lovely, very smooth and accomplished, but there are times when it feels like he could have removed so much. For example, in The West Pier there's a whole section where Ryan gets stood up by Esther so Gertrude arrives to tell him and they spend an evening playing arcade games. This adds almost nothing and despite being fun to read, by the end of the book, you do wonder why he wasted time on this, and many other intricate niceties. I suppose it helps to build the world but It's all for the sake of a rather basic story. Anyway, I enjoyed the first book (a little) but found the second two less interesting. Hamilton's writing is always good but the content is ultimately very slight in my opinion. Never mind. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Mar 05, 2025
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Mar 08, 2025
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Mar 05, 2025
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| 1805331078
| 9781805331070
| 1805331078
| 3.86
| 2,411
| 1958
| Jan 25, 2024
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liked it
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A nameless middle-aged man meets a woman in a bar and proceeds to tell her about a doomed love affair he once experienced. The first and last chapter
A nameless middle-aged man meets a woman in a bar and proceeds to tell her about a doomed love affair he once experienced. The first and last chapter takes place in this bar while the rest of the book is his story. The woman he fell in love with was a young divorcee with a child and while things were going well for a while, she later meets a rich bloke called Howard who offers her money and so things take a turn. After that, it becomes a more adversarial relationship, the power dynamics and transactional nature of love an obvious theme in the book. People are often looking for different things and will manipulate the other in order to get them. This aspect aside, the book is an otherwise very basic story and I would argue the majority of your enjoyment will come from the writing style which Hayes has to offer. Some of it is quite beautiful, a kind of wispish romanticism that was common to the era (or a nostalgic version of this). I also got some flashbacks to the Great Gatsby, a sense of being out of time, lost in jazz music and the rise of burgeoning modernity. Some of the sentences whirl along, slither like snakes that never end, and Hayes clearly has a penchant for the decorous and poetic. 'All I knew, really, was that she had taken away with her when she had gone something which in the past had held me together, some necessary sense of myself, something without which I seemed in danger of collapsing; and whatever it was, an indispensable vanity, an irreplaceable idea of my own invulnerability, it was gone and only she could restore it to me, or so I thought. It's a nice little novella, a little on the lightweight side (too much to be truly great), but it's very well-written. I wish I could say I loved it more than I actually did but the truth is, I was always slightly uninterested in the actual story. If I ever read this again, however, I would almost certainly ignore the story and focus my attention on the writing which is occasionally fluid and lyrical, and something that reaches genuine heights of sumptuous, liquid prose. My first reading is usually focused on the plot and characters, neither of which especially grabbed me here, so I only mildly enjoyed it. But the second reading, whenever I get around to it, ought to be a far more rewarding experience. A nice little gem that's definitely worth your time. ...more |
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Feb 27, 2025
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Mar 2025
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Feb 27, 2025
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| 0099589451
| 9780099589457
| 0099589451
| 3.96
| 2,732
| 1957
| Nov 07, 2019
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liked it
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So the book begins with Tomo being sent by her husband, Yukitomo, to go find a nice young concubine that can be brought home to live with them. With t
So the book begins with Tomo being sent by her husband, Yukitomo, to go find a nice young concubine that can be brought home to live with them. With the help of an old friend, Tomo finds a fifteen-year-old girl called Suga who becomes part of the family. He regularly has ex with Suga (despite the fact that she has not yet begun to menstruate (this will come back later as an explanation for her inability to have children) and Tomo is somewhat sidelined (and growing ever resentful). Meanwhile, another concubine called Yumi is brought into the fold and Tomo has further resentments to deal with. As the years go by the women come to terms with their roles and Tomo even tries to find husbands for them so that they can leave the family. It's all very Japanese (at least late 19th century Japanese). Then comes the part of the book that really takes Yukitomo to new levels of acceptable behaviour. His young (and seemingly low intelligence) son, Michimasa meets and marries a young woman named Miya and, sure enough, Yukitomo begins an affair with her too. Eve Tomo finds this behaviour to be crossing a line. More years go by, the young women Suga and Yumi are now in her forties, and Tomo has grown immensely bitter regarding her husband. You can hardly blame her. I'm not entirely sure what this book is about. Japanese culture? Men being pigs? Dunno. But I've seen some reviews describe the book's title as something that refers to Tomo waiting for death so that she can be released from the humiliating life her husband has inflicted on her. The waiting years, those years when, in that time in Japan, women had little recourse to do anything other than what they were told. Her only escape is death and therefore life is, essentially, nothing more than a waiting room, a thing you have to endure before being released. Sounds about right to me. An intriguing book to say the least, one which explores an interesting world and characters. But I can't say I enjoyed the writing that much. Like a lot of Japanese literature it was very matter of fact, very succinct, and to the point. Not always fun to read. But a book worth reading nonetheless (if you can stomach the patriarch). ...more |
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1
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Feb 25, 2025
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Feb 26, 2025
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Feb 25, 2025
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| 0552995991
| 9780552995993
| 0552995991
| 3.77
| 355
| Aug 31, 1991
| Jan 01, 1995
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liked it
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There's a meme. Several naked men are waiting in line to have sex with a woman. At the back of the queue is a man holding flowers and the caption read
There's a meme. Several naked men are waiting in line to have sex with a woman. At the back of the queue is a man holding flowers and the caption reads: don't be the guy with flowers. Well, this novel is all about that man. And it's some of the most egregious ragebait (in book form) I've ever seen. The story is about a couple with two kids going through a separation. She no longer shows affection for him and he suspects an affair which she denies (her first lie) but then later she admits that she's in love with another man but hasn't slept with him yet. The husband wants to know if she still loves him and she says yes (another lie). He wants to know if she intends to leave him and she says it depends. This is the point in the book where I could no longer tolerate her as a character. It's one thing to cheat, to destroy a marriage, but it's another thing to deliberately torture the man and simply make him wait for her lover to decide if he wants her or not (that's what her decision depends on after all). From this point on, she really is just an awful monster with no redeeming features. Franck clearly doesn't want us to view her this way, doing his best to give her a few sympathetic moments, but it's utterly impossible not to. And that's my primary criticism of the book; this isn't literature, it's melodramatic nonsense designed to provoke the reader. Franck is a screenwriter and it shows. He is dealing with heightened emotions, unrealistic people, incomprehensible decisions, and deliberate provocation, all In the hopes of manipulating the audience into a response. It's effective (oh, how I loved to despise this woman!!!) but again... it's not literature. She is simply acting in a manner that is patently causing her husband (and eldest child) pain and does not seem to care in the slightest; meanwhile, he is a wet blanket, an emasculated coward who lets her walk all over him and tries to rationalise his pathetic weasel-like behaviour by pretending he's a good progressive feminist. Franck very wisely makes a point of letting us know that these people are PAINFULLY left-wing, presumably because he knows we won't buy this garbage any other way. Only that kind of insipid progressive would behave the way his characters do (and even that is a stretch). This whole book is an advert for the limp-wristed worldview of the self-loathing bourgeoisie. It's vomit inducing. This book is manipulative to the extreme. But it works. I got a kick out of hating both of them and their banal wine drinking friends. And the writing is quite compelling (a kind of stream of consciousness style) but ultimately, it isn't great work. It's just a fun way to waste a Sunday afternoon. It's a low-brow soap opera with the added steps of being about progressive middle class French people (and therefore more profound and meaningful). But don't fall for it, what you're reading is utter trash. ...more |
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Feb 23, 2025
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Feb 24, 2025
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Feb 23, 2025
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| 1564784665
| 9781564784667
| 1564784665
| 3.86
| 2,229
| 1979
| Aug 01, 2007
|
liked it
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A 74-year-old man named Geiser lives in a valley that is currently experiencing torrential rains. There is some concern that a landslide might bury th
A 74-year-old man named Geiser lives in a valley that is currently experiencing torrential rains. There is some concern that a landslide might bury the village so he decides to pack some things, leave the house, and follow the path through the woods to safety; it doesn't take long, however, for him to abandon this idea and return home. His memory and physical health are not the best so he removes pages from encyclopedias and the bible and posts them on the walls to remind himself of what he's thinking about (these portions of the encyclopedia appear in the book with pictures). Having just read a book that purports to explore the existential crisis of man (The Evenings) but which, in my opinion, failed, I would have to say that this book (covering the same themes) is an example of a book that actually succeeds. Geiser ruminates on the flood myth in the bible, on the encyclopedia entries about the arrival and demise of dinosaurs, on man's trivial appearance during the Holocene. The erosion of the outside world, falling away and changing shape, represents his own personal erosion as well as that of mankind's. It's a very succinct method of looking at the insignificant ants we are (actual ants are also present in the book) and how quickly life can be formed and destroyed in equal measure. But it's hard for the human mind to grasp the massive time scales involved and so we struggle to see how we don't feature prominently in the life of this planet. Surely, we are the stars of this particular show, its greatest achievement. Frisch barely narrates this thing, he gives a very stark, even aloof third person narration interspersed with Geiser's thoughts, and encyclopedia entries which work as a way of fleshing out Geiser into a person with a full, rich life, this all despite not getting much in the way of details (probably his memories of his brother Klaus gets the most attention). Like I said, it's very effective and does a good job of exploring the existential nightmare of a transient life in a way that other books often struggle to achieve. It's very simple but it gets to the point. Everything erodes, everything changes. That all being said, the book is rather lightweight and you can essentially read it in one sitting so I wouldn't call it a masterpiece or anything. It's a solid entry into the existential canon, a lonely old man coming to terms with his smallness in the grand scheme of things. And the ending is rather brilliant, one last encyclopedia entry which Geiser presumably looked at before we, the readers, got to see it. Definitely worth a look. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Feb 21, 2025
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Feb 22, 2025
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Feb 21, 2025
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Paperback
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| 1805330268
| 1805330268
| 3.49
| 11,818
| 1947
| Oct 01, 2024
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it was ok
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Occasionally, I like to read books about the mundane, the banal, the everyday; books which explore the repetition and ennui of existence. If they're g
Occasionally, I like to read books about the mundane, the banal, the everyday; books which explore the repetition and ennui of existence. If they're good, they will almost certainly become favourites. If they're not, they will infuriate me. In most cases, it's usually the latter because, in my opinion, books about this particular subject matter (the boredom of everyday life) are very difficult to pull off, and very often make the mistake of assuming that a book about boredom should also be boring itself. As such, this book goes nowhere, invites no development, offers no excitement. The author makes the mistake of thinking the book must be a mirror for the subject matter. If it's about life being repetitive then the book must be repetitive. If it's about the tedium of bureaucracy then the book must also demonstrate dry bureaucracy. If it's about nothing then the book must exemplify a certain nothingness. It's an easy trap to fall into. Because, in truth, boredom can actually be very interesting if you explore it with a sense of purpose and creativity. Sadly, that doesn't happen here. Reves has a nice style of writing, or at least the English translation does, and I think it was this style that kept me going longer than I normally would before noticing... it just isn't very fun. The protagonist, Frits, is a slightly charmless individual with a penchant for mockery and pretension. He lives with his parents and they sit and eat potatoes, or they smoke a cigarette, or they listen to the radio. He visits friends, goes to dances, gets drunk, makes fun of his brother's balding hair, or he just takes walks in the cold winter streets by the frozen canal. There are ten chapters representing ten days over Christmas. Oh, and there's a lot of dream sequences too, almost every chapter (at the day's end) concluding with one. I'm tempted to believe that Reves included these because what could better represent boredom than having to listen to another man tell you about his dreams? It is the absolute embodiment of the tedious. But I'm not sure if that wasn't purely coincidental. Otherwise, not much happens (as you'd expect) and the book is nothing more than a brief investigation of a dull, normal life. That this takes place just after the war gives it a strange dimension. I mean, just how bored could people really be after such a dramatic conflict? Then again, maybe the immediate post war years were all the more dull precisely because everyone had just experienced something so visceral. But the book just never grabbed me. It's like someone putting up wallpaper. You understand why it's being done, might even like the pattern they've chosen, but do you really want to watch them doing it? Not me. Again, the themes are interesting but this is a tricky thing to do successfully. I was reminded of Camera by Toussaint, the mundane more curiously presented in that book, perhaps because it was an almost ethereal, heightened version of reality, or, even more so, Skylark by Kosztolanyi, a book which this feels eerily similar to. In fact, these two books could be related, the same book but from different perspectives; in Skylark we get the parents' version of events, here, the adult child's. Ultimately, I think Skylark did a better job of exploring the mundane (and did so much earlier in 1924). To me, this was the less interesting version while Skylark focused on the bored parents, people who had truly known tedium, blandness, and disappointment. Anyway, I struggled with this. It never remotely excited me. I had high hopes but was slightly let down. Its themes have been better dealt with elsewhere. The writing is pretty good, in fact I'm tempted to say it was actually quite contemporary, at least in the sense that it was easy to read with very standard prose. But otherwise, nope. It didn't succeed as a novel about nothing. It wasn't dynamic enough to be about nothing. Nothing is more interesting than this. Nothing is the most profound of all the human experiences. This was just dull. ...more |
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1
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Feb 19, 2025
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Feb 21, 2025
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Feb 19, 2025
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| 1795641495
| 9781795641494
| 1795641495
| 3.84
| 2,064
| Apr 27, 2019
| Apr 27, 2019
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it was ok
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I can't remember where I first heard about this book but I had a feeling it would be some kind of modernist manifesto decrying the progressive decay o
I can't remember where I first heard about this book but I had a feeling it would be some kind of modernist manifesto decrying the progressive decay of western civilisation (which it was). As such, I thought it might appeal to me. Sadly, after some initially enjoyable pages (nearly halfway), it really began to get on my nerves. The problem is format, it's essentially a book where a misanthropic man sporadically gives his opinions on the state of the world. Fun to begin with, full of cynicism and volatile hatred for the banal niceties of the modern world, full of entertaining transgressive thought that would be deemed (by the very dull) as outrageous or shocking content. This is essentially a polemic by a man whose distaste for the blandness of an ever left-leaning civilisation vomits onto the page. Like I said, I was enjoying it for a while. But then it just gets very repetitive and self-indulgent. The male equivalent of Agua Viva by Lispector but more... chronically online. Everything about this book screams... here is my internet assembled philosophy. It's like reading someone's edgy blog about Ted Kacynski. He hates hipsters who go to thrift stores to buy books but then five pages later starts telling you about the books he bought from a thrift store (because his hipster tastes are more valid). It would be tempting to say this is deliberate but I don't think so. Because later, after lamenting the mediocrity of a western existence permeated with ennui and routine, he will whine about some band that he loves (Homeshake -- they're not that good). Or he'll criticise political correctness and the late stage capitalist nightmare of soulless human interactions. Or he'll fantasise about and celebrate mass killings. Then moan about women and blacks. But fundamentally, he will fixate on the lack of beauty in the world, this especially demonstrated by brutalist architecture which (more by design than accident he implies) is purposely meant to crush and defeat us, turn us into self-hating automatons. I don't disagree with a lot of his opining (especially regarding architecture) but it's all presented in a very dull and obvious way. There's no plot or characters to hang any of it on, just relentless teenage angst and whining. To be fair, he does include a warning at the beginning: If you came here expecting coherent plot or structure, you bought or stole the wrong book. Fair enough. But none of this changes the fact that the book drones on. If you're into this kind of incel rebellion, or a book that posits that the left have ruined civilisation (and I am), or you like misanthropic characters of the American Psycho variety, who crave saying the N-word, and find the trappings of modernity to be repugnant, this might have something for you. But I doubt it. The book just doesn't have enough meat on its bones. Occasionally, it can be fun to read, even offer up some intriguing truths about modern life. That we secretly like it when there's a mass shooting or terrorist attack, for example, because we're so bored of our tedious routines, of MacDonald's and Netflix, of Steve from accounts who just had a baby and won't shut up about it, that we crave a disturbance, a crash, a reminder that life can be more than this, more visceral and authentic, more immediate, more akin to the word ALIVE! All true, and yes, sometimes you will stand on a train station and think: "what if I pushed that woman onto the tracks. What would that feel like?" But these little moments are all lost in a rather dense format that, after a while, begs to be more coherent or just significantly more entertaining. You just feel like you need a break, some dialogue, a plot point, an event, anything -- but it's just one blog post after another. Honestly, you'd be better off reading Catcher in the Rye. At least that book has some heart. Alternatively, you might try Houellebecq. Because it felt to me like this guy was just... tying too hard. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Feb 17, 2025
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Feb 18, 2025
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Feb 17, 2025
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Paperback
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| Ma, Ling
*
| 1922330647
| 9781922330642
| 1922330647
| 3.90
| 117,201
| Aug 14, 2018
| Nov 2020
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it was ok
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After a couple of heavyweight books, I retreated back into the safety of an easy-to-read, post-apocalyptic novel. Sadly, it's another one that falls f
After a couple of heavyweight books, I retreated back into the safety of an easy-to-read, post-apocalyptic novel. Sadly, it's another one that falls flat. The book's primary failure is that very little of it actually takes place in the post-apocalyptic environment but rather in the life she, Candace, was living just prior to the end. As such, it just wasn't very interesting to me. Why would I care about her boring life in New York working at a publishing company? Her boring boyfriend? Her boring Mormon parents who came from China to settle in America? It felt like Ling Ma probably wanted to write a story about her own experiences but knew they wouldn't be very appealing so she crowbarred them into a post-apocalypse story. In the end, I'd say only about 20% of the book is about the apocalypse and 80% of the book is a rather dry satire about New York yuppie, office politics. The apocalypse stuff itself is okay, but it doesn't get fleshed out enough to be truly worthwhile, probably due to the fact that she focuses more on the life she was living before the fever arrives (from China as it happens). As far as the fever stuff is concerned, there are some unique elements; namely the fact that people don't die or become murderous zombies, instead they simply become catatonic people, unthinkingly repeating behaviours from their dull, routined lives (walking around the kitchen table, setting the plates, walking around aimlessly etc). But while this is fairly original (unless you view it as 'capitalism made us all zombies' which would be banal), it also sucks all the tension out of events. There's no threat from these docile creatures, there's no sense of needing to escape, survive. So why does she join up with a group of people (lead by Bob) that are heading to Chicago? There's no danger, she could literally go anywhere she wants, safe in the knowledge that there is an abundance of food available in the supermarkets (the real answer is because Ma is obviously making a point about Bob being another cult leader like the ones her parents bought into). But in the real world, it doesn't add up and seems entirely futile. The front copy of my book has the quote: 'a New York Times notable book of the year.' Notable? LOL. That's the best you could do?  It just isn't very good. Dry and unremarkable writing (albeit readable) and a dull story that doesn't dwell on the post-apocalyptic aspect as much as it ought to. The book seems to want to be a satire on modern, middle-class office life rather than a story about the apocalypse. Fine, but that's just not very interesting to me. Sometimes, I get the impression that Millennials thought life was going to be all sunshine and roses and when they discovered otherwise, they somehow came to the conclusion that this was unique to them, and not literally the same for every other generation that came before them. Internet really did convince these people that they were special. Very mediocre stuff if you ask me. Never mind. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Feb 15, 2025
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Feb 16, 2025
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Feb 15, 2025
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Paperback
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| 0571178561
| 9780571178568
| 0571178561
| 4.18
| 15,066
| 1955
| Aug 2003
|
really liked it
|
So, there's this fella, right? And he's called Jesus. And you'll never guess who his dad is. It's obviously difficult to write a review of a story most So, there's this fella, right? And he's called Jesus. And you'll never guess who his dad is. It's obviously difficult to write a review of a story most of you (if not all) are already familiar with. For the most part, Kazantzakis sticks to the basics and merely provides colour to events we already know. But he also takes the opportunity to add his own interpretation and, more specifically, to deepen and flesh out characters who are often two dimensional and almost caricatures at this point. The story starts, for example, by telling us that Jesus is a cross maker. At first, you're like... that seems a bit distasteful. But then you think: he was a carpenter and there were crucifixions every week. Of course he must have built a few crosses in his time. Jesus begins the book as a pious individual but never someone who thinks of himself as the son of God. In fact, it's others who are seemingly looking for new messiahs at every available opportunity (this part of the book did remind me of Life of Brian). Everyone is a new messiah. Everyone has a message from God. Everyone is eager to interpret things so that they can identify the next great prophet. It was during this period where Jesus is seeking God and leaves his home where his relationship with Mary Magdalene is explored. She is presented as a sinful whore but one who is in love with Jesus. He also has feelings for her but must resist temptation and, if possible save her. What follows is his realisation (more precisely others realise it) that he is the son of God. Jesus always comes across as a real person but one who is unequivocally devout. Meanwhile his apostles all slowly emerge and the most interesting, by far, is Judas. The book presents him as an angry hothead, a man who wants Jesus to lead a revolution against the Romans but instead all he gets is talk of love, peace, and brotherhood. Judas, for me at least (given what little I know of him beyond being the baddie) is the most complex of all the characters in this book (save for the ending and the imaginary life Jesus lives - but we'll get to that). Judas is enraged at most things, especially Jesus, but all of his ferocity comes from a profound sense of injustice. In many ways, he is the only character, the only apostle, pushing Jesus forward (sometimes against his will). Then we have the parts of the book where something spiritual is happening. Kazantzakis keeps things on the ground for the most part, allowing the reader to interpret the moments where Jesus heals people as both real or allegorical. Instead of seeing Lazarus come back from the grave, for example, we simply get Melchzedek's retelling of the event. Later, however, there are miracles performed that are impossible to deny, almost (for me) spoiling the narrative a little as it takes away from the book being set in reality among real people. Another part of the book that was interesting was John writing a chronicle of what is happening. Angels (so we are told) are dictating to him and they tell him to say that Jesus was born in Bethlehem rather than Nazareth. Even Jesus is perplexed by these lies but later concedes that the angels must have a purpose for doing so (the narrative of his life being more important than the literal truth of it). The only truly controversial part of the book is the ending. When Jesus is crucified, an angel takes him away and allows him to live a normal life. In this life he marries Mary Magdalene and has children. He grows old and experiences life the way others would experience it. I can understand why Christians might have issues with this (Jesus being an old man is weird -- Jesus having sex is even weirder) but it's clearly Kazantzakis simply highlighting that Jesus had human desires like everyone else but, ultimately, and despite their immense temptation, chose to sacrifice himself for humanity instead. When he realises he's still on the cross, that it was all an illusion, he is, despite all the pain and suffering, relieved that he sacrificed himself, that everything has begun. I must say, the book feels profound and meaningful all the way through, It feels like it is a weighty piece of literature. That being said, it isn't always easy to read. Sometimes it can be very dry and meandering, sometimes there are large swaths of relentless text. But then there are moments of levity and fascination, chapters that utterly pull you in and keep you reading. It's capable of both. And then there are little bits of prose that are either exquisite or comical in their descriptive power: Outside, the male waters poured out of the skies with a roar and the earth opened its thighs and giggled. Nice! So yeah, not an easy read at times, and often prone to large portions that slightly drag, but overall a piece that is in service of a masterful attempt to explore something very difficult to explore; and more so, a book that is clearly written with passion and respect for the subject matter. Kazantzakis is clearly a man who loved and took his faith seriously, but who also recognised the importance of reminding everyone, believers especially, that Jesus was one of us. A man. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Feb 11, 2025
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Feb 14, 2025
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Feb 11, 2025
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Paperback
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| 0099766310
| 9780099766315
| 0099766310
| 4.06
| 632
| 1986
| 1998
|
it was ok
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Bleurghh!! So unbearably dull. Look, I like a meandering novel in the Proustian style as much as the next man. But this was just so painfully awful, te Bleurghh!! So unbearably dull. Look, I like a meandering novel in the Proustian style as much as the next man. But this was just so painfully awful, tediously executed, and appallingly dry. If you're going to write this kind of book, where the narrator reminisces relentlessly and goes on wonderful digressions and tangents (often for many pages) then you need to be a much better writer than this. You need to give the reader some exquisite prose and lyrical beauty, the likes of which it is very difficult to compose (or ignore). Sadly, Nadas simply doesn't have the skill to do that and so you end up with a very slow, boring, and thoroughly dry experience. I mean, Nadas can write, but there's a difference between writing and artistry. And for me, that's what's missing here. The story (not that it matters) concerns a nameless male narrator in Berlin engaged in a highly unconvincing love triangle with a man named Melchior and a woman named Thea. A straight man writing about gay love is a tad inauthentic at the best of times but the narrator also takes us back to his childhood in Hungary where he also fell in love with a boy called Kristian. None of this feels sincere, none of it is entertaining, and none of it is memorable. I struggled to maintain any interest or care about any of these characters; and it goes without saying that there are also large parts of the book that I didn't really follow because my heart wasn't in it (I think the narrator is an author and one of his characters narrates at some point - and i think Kristian narrates at the end too - but honestly, I just wasn't paying attention). It was all I could do to keep reading. I kept waiting for something but it never comes. And aside from the failed Proust impression, there's also a lot of cliched flowery language that feels phoney too. For example: The garden was huge, like a park, shady, mildly fragrant in the warm summer air; pungent smell of pines, their resin dripping from green cones that snap quietly as they grow; firm rosebuds resplendent in red, yellow, white and pink hues; and yes, a single, ruffled, and slightly singed petal that could open no further, now almost ready to fall; and the tall, rearing lilies with their wasp-enticing nectar; violet, maroon, and blue cups of petunias fluttering in the slightest breeze; long-stemmed snapdragons swaying more indolently in the wind; and along the footpaths, great patches of foxgloves luxuriating in the flaming brilliance of their own colours; opalescent shimmer of dewy grass in the morning sun; clusters of.... I could go on (and he does... resplendently, indolently, opalescently) but you get the picture. So even when Nadas isn't aping Proust, his prose is hackneyed and obvious, the kind of thing you'd expect a hipster called Lance on a creative writing course to come up with between Lattes. I'd be willing to forgive it if the story was captivating but it's tiresome in the extreme; or if those flights of fancy where he digresses until you forget where you are were magnificent examples of supreme invention and creativity. But they never are. If you're going to have a character ask: 'what time is it?' then digress for 75 pages about how his nostrils remind you of the housemaid who, when you were ten, often spoke about the works of Kant and made delicious apple pies that sat cooling on the window ledge, before another character finally says: 'it's 7:30pm,' then great, go for it. But it better be utterly wonderful to read. And it just never is. The book is too dry. I mean, I have very little respect for Susan Sontag already (she appears to be a left-winger who never did a day's work in her life) but why I'm supposed to care that she considers this greatest work of the century (says so on the cover) is anyone's guess. She clearly isn't that credible. Perhaps she read the dry Proustian imitation language, saw how long the thing is, and concluded... well, it must be good, books like this (with all those boxes ticked) usually are. And that's true, books like this usually do get enormous amounts of praise by ensuring they meet the criteria required for such an accolade. Thank God those days are dying. Because it's nothing but a bloated mess of self-indulgent cliches and forgettable waffle. Walls of text that mean nothing. Walls of text that take you nowhere. Walls of text that crave applause. I tried coming at this from various angles. It just never took. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Feb 04, 2025
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Feb 09, 2025
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Feb 04, 2025
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Paperback
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| 1804294527
| 9781804294529
| 1804294527
| 3.49
| 24,906
| 2009
| Mar 12, 2024
|
liked it
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This was a curious one. A young Norwegian woman named Jo moves to England (the fictional town of Aybourne) to study Biology at university. The Novel b
This was a curious one. A young Norwegian woman named Jo moves to England (the fictional town of Aybourne) to study Biology at university. The Novel begins with her at a hostel before she goes to several places to see if she can find a more permanent residence. Eventually she meets Carral and moves in with her, into what was an old brewery warehouse that has been turned into modern apartments. The plot never goes beyond their shared living arrangement, a few characters coming and going, but essentially the landscape and the two women being the focus. Jo being a virgin is important but only in the sense that she is exploring these things with a certain innocence. Meanwhile, the home they share becomes an almost gothic mansion, a curious labyrinth of uncertain spaces and mezzanines, prone to rotting (a strong theme in the book) and spurts of vegetation and growth. Everything is described in terms of living organisms, of things being and growing and rotting and dying. The book is very sensual and captivating, perversely drenched in fungi (growing in the bathroom) and spiders (appearing on skin and seeking out mouths) and decaying fruit and sweat and (quite a lot of) urine. Jo and Carral become entwined, as though merging into one being, sharing the same feelings, desires, even memories. It's a wonderfully mesmerising reading experience. And yet... I wasn't entirely enamoured with it. It felt a little dry and slow despite its curious nature. I liked what Hval was doing, I just think I've seen it before. There are so many comparisons to make here. First of all, the Tenant by Topor is an obvious place to start, the slow burn of a mundane existence being gradually twisted into something surreal and slightly unnerving. Then there's the film Persona by Bergman where two women seemingly begin to merge into one another (this was also facilitated by the presence of a man which Paradise Rot also utilises, a man named Pym who becomes a focal point for both women). We've seen this done before often with greater skill. But it's still very effective. The book is visceral and immediate -- the beauty and disgust of the human body being explored in equal measure. Books like this are always interesting, full of weird atmosphere and dark, eerie sentiment, like warm treacle being poured down your back. It very successfully becomes a tangible experience, one that is enormously influenced by the raw sensation of touch, sight, sound, taste. All through the book Jo references the taste and smell of things, the sounds (she has hearing that an eagle would envy) and the perceptible feel of things. The human experience is informed by our five physical senses but then is interpreted by a mind that is more ethereal; like an imaginary hammer trying to hit a corporeal nail.  There are references to Adam and Eve, the snake, the apple, the myriad temptations at the heart of living. I rather liked her description of the apple rolling away between Eve's legs, turning black and transforming into a vulva (the greatest temper there is) and developing labia and scent. That was certainly a defining image to take away from the book. I also notice a lot of reviews fixating on the LGBT angle but I really don't know why. Both women are straight, their sensual connection more existential (even philosophical) than sexual. But hey, everything has to be sold through the queer prism now. The book was extremely thought provoking and easy to read. I liked it but it just never quite pulled me in entirely for some reason. I'm not sure why. Maybe because it always felt a little too gentle and safe, with too many short chapters that often felt trivial and slow. Can't quite put my finger on it. Something was missing. For all its wonderful creepiness and effective slow-burn development, I was never gripped, never turning the pages with mad anticipation or enthusiasm. But it was good, and definitely worth reading. Highly recommended.  ...more |
Notes are private!
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Feb 2025
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Feb 03, 2025
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Feb 01, 2025
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| 3.99
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really liked it
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Apr 08, 2025
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Apr 05, 2025
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| 4.27
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it was ok
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Apr 04, 2025
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Apr 01, 2025
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| 3.94
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liked it
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Mar 31, 2025
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Mar 28, 2025
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| 4.18
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liked it
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Mar 27, 2025
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Mar 25, 2025
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| 3.90
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really liked it
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Mar 23, 2025
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Mar 22, 2025
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| 3.81
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it was amazing
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Mar 20, 2025
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Mar 17, 2025
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| 3.60
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liked it
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Mar 16, 2025
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Mar 14, 2025
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| 3.71
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liked it
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Mar 14, 2025
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Mar 12, 2025
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| 3.69
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it was ok
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Mar 10, 2025
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Mar 09, 2025
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| 3.96
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liked it
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Mar 08, 2025
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Mar 05, 2025
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| 3.86
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liked it
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Mar 2025
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Feb 27, 2025
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| 3.96
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liked it
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Feb 26, 2025
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Feb 25, 2025
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| 3.77
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liked it
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Feb 24, 2025
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Feb 23, 2025
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| 3.86
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liked it
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Feb 22, 2025
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Feb 21, 2025
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| 3.49
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it was ok
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Feb 21, 2025
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Feb 19, 2025
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| 3.84
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it was ok
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Feb 18, 2025
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Feb 17, 2025
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| Ma, Ling
*
| 3.90
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it was ok
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Feb 16, 2025
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Feb 15, 2025
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| 4.18
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really liked it
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Feb 14, 2025
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Feb 11, 2025
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| 4.06
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it was ok
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Feb 09, 2025
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Feb 04, 2025
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| 3.49
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liked it
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Feb 03, 2025
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Feb 01, 2025
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