Unlike my last review, this one seems to be a book that finds a way to be admirable at any time. A couple decades ago, I imagine it was read as an emotive recollection of times changed, love lost, and emotions suppressed. Today, readers will focus on the lament of complicit inaction. It‘s a layered book with pinpointedly ornate style—a rich read in many ways.

This is difficult to assess earnestly. In recent decades, suburban ennui has sprawled beyond a genre to a cliché. The storyline, then, is easy to anticipate. Even still, it has enough particulars to make it readable, if not surprising. As this is more of a recommendation than an evaluation, it‘s ultimately more of a question of the reader‘s feeling about this realm. Lacking linguistic brilliance but having competence, it did not dazzle or dull me.

This book combines two of Nabokov‘s challenges: linguistic brilliance and sexual transgression. It adds a third: narrative meandering. Nonetheless, I found this so constantly full of clever wordplay—in English, French, and Russian—that I enjoyed the whole reading even if I wasn‘t gripped by the story. Caveat: it helps to have some level of Russian fluency.

An academic reading would uncover layers of Japanese literary connections. An ingenue would find a tantalizingly coy narrative. The rest of us, who are somewhere in between, will see echoes of the typically spare Japanese style overlaid with more ornate descriptions, all wrapped with the flashes forward and backward in time, delivering a nuanced yet welcoming tale.

Unintentionally apt pick, with the conflict between those in power and those in unease. But what really is great about this novel is its locally specific inventiveness. From the folk story references to the plethora of common sayings, this is a work that immerses the reader into its place. The narrative itself is not the most compelling, but that‘s a credit to the richness of the book‘s tropes and allegories.

Like so many, I read this in high school and thought I got it. I did not. From the elegantly baroque, and also conversationally apt, interruptions in sentence syntax to the slowly stoked question of whose mind is truly moored, this is a delight to read, and to read again, for the language and for the tale.

This charming love story is full of wonder, but, despite its tree-leaping protagonist, does not climb to the heights that Calvino can summit. A picaresque tale of a boy who rebels against his family by vowing (and succeeding) never to set foot on ground again, it‘s quick and enjoyable but lacks the thematic coherence of Cosmicomics or Invisible Cities. Thus, unlike Cosimo, you might be able to drop from the trees and pick another leaf.

As always, Calvino picks a concept and (pardon the pun) cleaves to it. What‘s delightful about this book is the perfect pace at which he explores the natural consequences of this concept (a man split in half becomes two living halves of one man) in a way that allows him to arrive at an unsurprising end in an unexpected way. Plus, so many quickly drawn characters to give luscious foliage to the journey.

“Read this in an afternoon.” Sometimes, that‘s the best summary of a book. Easy to read, intriguing to pull you through, but not something to inspire a lot of additional thinking. That said, he did a great job inventing a world, playing by its rules, and keeping forward momentum even through an intentionally repetitive structure.

These stories are enchantingly breezy. They often start simply yet build imperceptibly to a moment of irreversible change. Might not last a quarantine, but would be good for a day or so.

I really liked reading this book. It was enjoyable from the start and through to the end. Rich characters, sharp setting, good dramas.

What I can‘t quite discern is how the mystery should be understood. The “surprising” revelation at the end seemed quite obvious. So obvious that I assumed it was intended as such. But if so, why did we not hear more about Gina‘s change after she saw what we‘d anticipated all along?

This book, you can judge by its cover. It is phantasmagoric, inscrutable, and ever and ever weirder—yet it retains coherence and never feels arbitrary in its oddities. It also has the best meta-fictional sequence I‘ve ever read.

Continuing my Tour de Nobel...

This phrase sums up the impossibility that Handke scales and summits, but from the back route. Instead of trying to explain or tell about his mother, he carefully, cautiously, and stringently offers snippets of who she was. In so doing, he builds a monumental mountain for her. We climb it with him. We don‘t have to talk about it. We know.

This book is wrought from masterful quality. The episodic nature is inviting and intriguing, and the inventive quality of so many stories and personages makes it fresh on every page. I enjoyed it throughout.

And yet I felt somewhat held at arm‘s length. Maybe the lack of a singular narrative? Maybe how it felt too perfectly themed, a touch overly crafted? Let‘s blame that on my fondness for the roughly hewn. She‘s the one who won the Nobel.

This is a delightful romp through the Argentine pampas, full of misfortunes, dry wit, hopeless schemes, and a narrator who seems impressively dedicated to not seizing success. It avoids following typical narrative twists yet never drags or feels uncertain in its story.

But most importantly, my newborn daughter let me read it while holding her.

The structural conceit (read the chapters in whatever order you deal the tarot deck) is more fascinating than illuminating, but the pace is crisp and enjoyable. The characters tend to speak in a(n appropriately Eastern European and mystical) register of parable and metaphor, but it works for the narrative and milieu. As you can tell from my sentences, I‘m not enthralled, but I liked reading it. A mediocre fortune is better than foretold doom.

Unintentionally apt bedtime reading for Labor Day.

Does it have a plot? Nope. Nuanced character development? Nah. But the raw force of its inventiveness—in images, in concepts, and in language—is a sheer delight. No wonder Roussel is lauded as a (grand)father of so many experimental writers.

This magnificent book haunts without haunting description or spooky setting. At a rough guess, it‘s 75% dialogue, and yet it still evokes a ghostly atmosphere. (Okay, so there are actual ghosts. Still.) Most impressive is how it relays multiple complete narratives and interwoven complex characters in under 125 pages. I envy this book.

The innocent audacity of the narrator‘s attitude makes me want to equate it to rightness. This is the genius of Walser.

This scene is riveting because of its specific language and dialogue. Would you guess one of the two was a priest? Which one?

I love the specific outrage here. I don‘t know what exactly syntheses mean, but this earnest outburst makes me loathe them.

“A new old chapter” well captures the early feel of this book, a beguiling yet trenchant mélange of factual history and fictional family narrative.

I enjoy teaching, or attempting to. Often, my teaching comes from a place I think is wise. This reminded me that I shouldn‘t always try to instill wisdom.