Hux Book Blog 2024 (Spoilers)

[Madeleine]

No I think Hux has made the point well, the extracts although short don't sound very promising.

[lunababymoonchild]

14 minutes ago, Madeleine said:

No I think Hux has made the point well, the extracts although short don't sound very promising.

Fair enough

[Hux]

4 hours ago, lunababymoonchild said:

I’d just like to point out that just because Hux doesn’t like it doesn’t mean that you won’t. Nor does it mean that it’s a bad book, it simply means that Hux doesn’t like it

 

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That all being said, however, there are some who will probably love this book

 

[Hux]

4 hours ago, lunababymoonchild said:

I’d just like to point out that just because Hux doesn’t like it doesn’t mean that you won’t. Nor does it mean that it’s a bad book, it simply means that Hux doesn’t like it

 

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That all being said, however, there are some who will probably love this book

 

[lunababymoonchild]

4 hours ago, lunababymoonchild said:

Fair enough

 

[Hux]

The Liar (1950) Martin. A Hansen 

 

Well Nathan, we did it. We read this wonderful book about a man living on a small island, trapped by the winter ice, telling his tale to you, Nathan, a fictional creation of his own mind, about the people, the places, the loves, the deaths, and the lost opportunities. Did I enjoy it Nathan? Yes, I thought it was absolutely magnificent. And I really liked the dog Pigro.

Johannes is a school teacher (and deacon) who relates the events of the small community of islanders, specifically Olaf and Annemari who, having recently been his pupils, became an item and had a child. Then there was an accident (a death) that affected Olaf and consequently his relationship with Annemari came to end. Johannes is also in love with Annemari but keep this to himself. It's very subtle but it's there. He can only confess so much to Nathan. And to us. Then there is the young boy Kaj who needs to go to a sanitorium on the mainland for treatment. The family of the deceased young man. Elna, the pregnant barmaid. Olaf's mother who cannot forgive Annemari. Frederick and Rigmor (both unfaithful). Johannes ponders all these people and their stories, the history of the island, the passing of time, the fact that they will all one day be forgotten, that even the words used to describe these things will one day die/change.

Having just read a book that annoyed me, it's always nice to immediately come across one that lifts you back up. So the story is narrated by Johannes Lye (in the original Danish his name is Johannes Vig but since that is similar to svig (meaning 'deceit' or 'guilt') the translator chose to use Lye (lie). And that's important because Johannes is indeed a very unreliable narrator (the title confirms as much). The whole thing is his interpretation of events and it's hard to know just how truthful he is being (personally I got the strong sense that he wasn't being entirely honest about his feelings regarding Annemari and Rigmor) but again, that's the point. We can't really trust Johannes account, we can only listen to it. And he tells it rather beautifully.

The writing is a little different. Short sentences. Often unnecessarily so. Given that they are continuous thoughts. Or pieces of dialogue. And there is a definite stream-of-consciousness element to the prose (a style I have a love hate relationship with). Often it's just a lot of inane gibberish and verbal diarrhoea hiding poor quality writing. But then you get the stuff like this, where it's more like a stream-of-feeling than thought, more fluid and sincere, with a concession for the importance of language and grammar (as opposed to style over substance). Anyway, Hansen is very good at creating an atmosphere of emotion and feeling, his use of Nathan (his fictional sounding board) playing into this. And he knows how to change pace when necessary, slowing down or taking a trip down memory lane. And best of all, he knows when to lie.

It is a wonderful book. Sad, thoughtful, and human.
 

Twenty years of age. That's a magnificent time of life for many. It is our age of deep profundity. For the twenty-year-old demands utter purity. Oh yes of course he tumbles about in this or that and feels himself besmirched. But his life demand is for purity and truth. The mature man is just left bewildered by the twenty-year-old's passionate certainties. The mature man speaks of his life experience, that fool. But this experience simply shows he has forgotten that he is ignorant of life's most important things. The sum of his so-called maturity is a trail of small deceits and minor untruths, in fact a stream of lies, in all opinions and deeds. And yet he is of good conscience because he has become blind to the fact he's a liar.

 

9/10

[Hux]

The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With The Sea (1963) Yukio Mishima

 

Sometimes I wonder if, to be a truly great writer, you have to be slightly dead inside. I wonder this because so many writers avoid giving characters (or first person narrators) any kind of personality or opinions or humour or character. They're always just blanks vessels who remain cold and detached, robotic voices offering only the essentials, the basics, the facts. And yet, despite often finding this annoying, I can't entirely blame them as it often produces some great stuff.

Anyway, Yukio Mishima is as cold as they get. It's all very blunt and matter-of-fact. Here is the setting, here are the characters, here are the consequences. And, for the most part, it's immensely good stuff. Especially when the characters in question possess a coldness that meets with their actions.

The book is about a lonely widow (Fusako) who lives with her with a 13-year-old son (Noboru). She meets a sailor on leave called Ryuji and begins a relationship with him. Noboru has a peephole in his bedroom allowing him to watch them have sex. He has a group of friends who question (as young people always do) the purpose of adult life. They want life to be heroic, have greater meaning beyond the mediocrity of normal life. They want to be above that. As such they kill a cat by bludgeoning it to death and pulling out its innards for examination. This is proof of their higher function, their ability to place themselves outside of the banal morality and expectations of the grown-ups. As the book goes along, Noboru becomes disappointed with Ryuji and no longer sees him as a hero but rather as just another conformist. And I think you can guess where this leads.

I enjoyed it, the writing was very good and Mishima has a beautiful turn of phrase. But it's hard to escape the darkness of the man, that coldness I mentioned earlier. He was clearly not an entirely happy individual and committing seppuka obviously reiterates this but it's more than that. Like I said, there is a coldness to his writing. But that applies to so many. But his particular brand of coldness comes with a thud... a dull, heavy thud.

 

8/10

 

 

Edited May 19, 2024 by Hux

[Hux]

Blood Dark (1935) Louis Guilloux

 

The story of an academic philosopher who, ageing and unstimulated by his current status (both in work and life), spends his days in existential crisis contemplating thoughts of purpose and loss, waste and optimism, set against the backdrop of the last year of the First World war. Francoise Merlin (Cripure to everyone else, a nickname based on Kant's CRItique of PURE reason) is a man coming to terms with his end, in more ways than one, and his faltering crusade against his fellow man. He lives with his maid Maia (also his mistress) and his many yapping dogs. He pointlessly endeavours to educate young men about philosophy (in a mildly buffoonish manner) and loathes his academic nemesis Nabucet. He dabbles in nihilistic thought (especially since his wife left him) but clings to the innocent hope that there might be something behind it all.

This is a magnificent book. The writing is wonderful and the characters (Cripure especially) are larger than life and the perfect axis around which to pivot such lofty considerations. It goes without saying that Guilloux has plenty to say about the futile waste of life consumed by the war as well as the cynicism of the time (while Celine comes to the distinct conclusion in Journey to the End of the Night that it's all for nothing, Guilloux has a remnant of hope still left within him). But they both agree that the war was an unnecessary trauma.

The book reminded me a lot of Auto De Fe (printed the same year in 1935) and obviously Celine's Journey (1932) both in terms of subject matter and writing style. The prose here is superb, lyrical and mature, intelligent and rich, and wonderfully crafted. It is obviously a philosophical book but one which is subtle and focuses on the plot (the events of just one day) as well as the characters to explore those philosophical themes. By the final third, however, I did feel that it was dragging a little and could have been much shorter. There are characters, for example, such as Kaminsky and his friends who felt a little redundant, even somewhat out of sync with the overall story. But Guilloux wants to give a complete picture, a fully realised world, and he does this by emphasising the notion of showing, not telling, though I'm not sure it was entirely necessary. A lot of those threads never really go anywhere interesting (beyond fleshing out the small community and demonstrating the general feeling of people regarding the war and its immediate cultural consequences).

The real star is Cripure and I craved returning to the chapters that involved him. At times, he is oafish and exaggerated (almost to Ignatius J Reilly levels of buffoonery) while at other times he is sombre and romantic, disturbed by his deformed feet, his broken heart, his drinking, and his desire for beauty to exist in a world that appears to have none.

A great piece but probably longer than it needed to be. Highly recommended.

 

8/10

Edited May 27, 2024 by Hux

[Hux]

Out (1997) Natsuo Kirino

 

Once or twice a year, I read some contemporary garbage to keep me up-to-date with what's happening out there (contemporary to me meaning from the 80s onwards) and, in almost all circumstances, these modern books continue to demonstrate that writing ain't what it used to be.

But at the very least, these kinds of contemporary books can still be entertaining even if they're poorly written and very dumb. And boy, is this book dumb as hell! It's the most moronic crap I think I've ever read and I absolutely... LOVED IT. So yeah, let's just get the mediocre, by-the-numbers writing out of the way and acknowledge that this book is of NO LITERARY VALUE WHATSOEVER. The prose is basic, the plot ludicrous, the characters wafer thin, and the themes as subtle as a dishwasher. Now that we've covered that let's enjoy the nonsense...

There are four women who work the nightshift at a warehouse making pre-packaged meals. Masako (married, teenaged son, bored, early forties), Yoshie (single mother to teenage girls, looking after bedbound mother-in-law, early fifties), Kuniko (fat, lazy early thirties), and Yayoi (pretty, married to drunk gambler, two small kids, early thirties). After being beaten by her husband Yayoi snaps and strangles her husband to death. She phones Masako (essentially the protagonist) to help her deal with the situation who, in turn, phones Yoshie, and they agree to take the body away and... cut it up into pieces in Masako's bathroom. As they're doing this, Kuniko pops round and catches them at it so she also gets roped into their shenanigans.

What follows is a book where the women have to deal with the body parts, throw off the police, and cope with each others resentments and money problems. Oh, and the man who last saw the murdered husband alive (Satake, owner of an illegal gambling club) becomes the chief suspect for the police (plus various other subplots regarding a Brazilian worker infatuated with Masako, a loan shark, a sex worker, and a new business opportunity for the ladies). As the book goes along it gets darker and more absurd until it basically has nowhere left to go. It's all very silly but immensely fun. I really enjoyed reading this. I just sat there thinking: 'this is such utter rubbish but I can't stop turning the pages.'

So to recap. Worthless and forgettable as literature but hilarious and gripping as entertainment. Make of that what you will.

 

8/10

[Hux]

Autumn Rounds (1993) Jacques Poulin

 

Possibly one of the most charming and delicate little novels you'll ever come across. The book is written in a style that's so fresh and cool that it feels like a breeze on the skin. It's always straightforward and clear but equally romantic and thoughtful. Pages melt away in your hands, chapters fall away like leaves, and the quiet, romantic story meanders on with such a sweet lightness of touch that you feel like you're in a half-remembered dream. It's just so... well, it's lovely.

The book is about a character known only as 'the driver.' He is a middle aged man who travels around Canada's most beautiful and isolated regions in his bookmobile so that people in remote villages can always have access to books. One morning, he encounters a troupe of singers, acrobats and performers and it turns out they're also going to tour the same places as the driver. The woman who essentially runs the troupe is called Marie and is also middle-aged and grey haired. These two characters develop a bond which, over the course of the novel, is strengthened with each new encounter as they meet up in one village after another. The romance between them is deep, not a sexual craving but a sincere and authentic connection built on shared interests and temperament. They ease their way into each others lives, gently, slowly.

It's such a beautifully written piece, full of optimism and hope, caring and respect. These people are not young but they've found something in each other, a meaningful love. The book exudes maturity and calm, a sense of coming to terms with what truly matters in life, all done with such brisk and honest prose, full of warmth and clarity. It's also a love letter to literature. The driver (being a lender of books) discusses and mentions several writers and novels all the way through the piece and you'll want to take note of them (it's a great list). The book is extremely charming and
explores, in such a simple and pleasant story, the fragile yet beautiful nature of things, of humanity, love, life, ageing, nature, you name it.
 

"She returned every one of his caresses and in small steps, taking very good care of one another, they slipped onto the slope of pleasure with the sweetest of sensual delights and under the protection of all the love stories that surrounded them."

8/10

[France]

What a terrific review!  Autumn Rounds is now on my wish list.

[Hux]

Count Luna (1955) Alexander Lernet-Holenia

 

One of the more disturbing books I've read in recent years. Beautiful but harrowing, entertaining but hideous. In terms of atmosphere, it reminded me of The Tenant, The Green Face, and even a little of Dream Story. Suffice it to say, the book is a nightmare come to life.

Alexander Jessiersky (a name very similar to The Tenant's Trelkovsky) is an Austrian businessman who, during the events of the Nazi regime, has a company that wants to take over the estate of a man named Count Luna. Since Luna rejects this offer, Jessiersky's directors (using their influence) have Luna arrested and sent to a concentration camp in order to get their way. Though not involved in this decision, Jessiersky inevitably comes to feel responsible for what has happened to Count Luna. He regularly visits his family to ensure that they understand it was not his doing, he sends food parcels to the concentration camp, he feels guilty.

When the war ends, nothing is known of Count Luna's fate but his family have concluded that he must have died. Jessiersky finds this hard to believe (even convincing himself that the family are lying to him). His guilt now deforms itself into paranoia, and it spirals ever deeper into his psychological status, overwhelming him entirely. Soon, after an event where a man gave some sweets to his daughter in the park and she falls ill, he becomes convinced that Count Luna is seeking revenge, that he intends to do harm to his family. He hears footsteps in the house and believes they are Count Luna's; he goes to his country estate where he once again feels certain that Count Luna is following him. He abandons his wife, his children, commits terrible acts, loses all perspective, and eventually intends to fake his own death to throw Count Luna (a man he has never actually met) off the scent for good. It's here, at the end of this awful tether, when the very moon itself has become his enemy, that we get a bleak and somewhat terrifying conclusion.

The book is genuinely quite unsettling, this man's obsession, his guilt and paranoia, an all consuming and entirely destructive nightmare. Of course Lernet-Holenia is talking about the guilt of Austria, of everyone who sat back and watched the events of the war and the holocaust unfold. It's extremely effective. I don't think I've read a book that was quite as disturbing as this.

It's also written in a style that I love, where Lernet-Holenia tells the story rather than shows it (show don't tell is for cinema, kids, not literature), narrating the whole thing in a way that allows it to be expressed in beautiful and fluid prose, a sweeping tale of metaphor and simile, of meandering thought and lyrical observation. This means he occasionally includes more than he has to (the details of Jessiersky's ancestors for example) even though that does come back again at the end. And what an ending. Heartbreaking. Sad. Terrifying. Horrific.

 

8/10

[Hux]

City of Night (1963) John Rechy

 

If someone told me they were writing a novel about the seedy underbelly of 1950s American life, the pimps and 'ladies of the night', the drugs and drag queens, the nihilism and cynicism of the post war era, and they asked me to come up with a title for that novel. I'd probably think of something really cliched like: City of Night.

And yet, until very recently, I had never heard of this book, it's title almost too familiar, too obvious to be a real book. Having finally discovered it, I must say I loved it. It tells the story an unnamed narrator from El Paso, Texas who, having abandoned his parents (his relationship with his father especially strained) goes to New York. Here, he very quickly falls into becoming a sex worker and begins to learn about the world he now inhabits (with the help of a fellow rent boy called Pete). Rechy splits the book into sections that are general experiences and then sections where he tells us about a specific person he has met. He then moves to Los Angeles and does the same (detailing his encounters and experiences). Then again in San Francisco, then Chicago, and finally New Orleans. Throughout the book he never seems to have any particular goal or objective, only his confused experiences as a male prostitute and the people he meets along the way. It's fascinating to read (published in 1963 but detailing life in the early 50s) and paints a revealing picture of a time and a scene that hardly seems possible.

The amount of drag queens and transexuals he meets is eye opening. The progressor who likes to take pictures, the guy who likes BDSM, the failed movie stars (for me, the best part of the book was the period in L.A), and the straight, married men exploring (or denying) their sexuality. It's all very interesting and well presented by Rechy, a world which comes alive and feels very real.

Then we have Rechy's writing style. There's no doubt he was influenced by Celine (it felt very reminiscent of Journey) but also the beat writers of the era are noticeable. Rechy doesn't use apostrophes which doesn't matter except for the times he uses the word he'll which obviously become hell. Otherwise, you barely notice. And then there's all the dashes, ellipses and brackets. It all works well and creates a vibrant style that I personally enjoyed a lot. Occasionally, he can overdo it with adjectives but mostly it's very effective and often quite beautiful to read.
 

About him, in the fringes of that world which Lance had ruled unquestionably -- and sometimes mercilessly with the disdain of those who know that beauty rules anarchy -- the extras had existed to carry his legend into the bars -- because that world of bars, extending like an underground from New York to Hollywood with fugitive stops in other cities, is a world of whispers deliciously recording each conquest, each new skirmish of its stars -- but, also... a chorus waiting eagerly in the wings to enter and announce a new downfall.

The only criticism would be that Rechy essentially repeats himself. There are only so many times you can hear about queens, youngmen, hustlers, and scores, before concluding... haven't we already done this? As such, the book slightly outstays its welcome and drags on longer than it needs to. And the cod psychology at the end (like a teenage therapy session) isn't remotely required but I guess it was all the rage at the time (my father didn't love me so I sought out male attention etc). But again, it's a small detail and overall, I loved the book. It was just the kind of seedy exploration of murky nightlife, of the sickly underbelly of traumatised youth and gay sexuality that deserved (and earned) the title: City of Night.

 

8/10

[Hux]

The King in Yellow (1895) Robert W. Chambers

 

A collection of short stories written in 1895 and having a very distinct Poe influence. There is a vague thread throughout the book relating to a drama called The King in Yellow which has been banned and will apparently send its readers insane. The first few stories give some background to this and are connected by a shared universe where this book exists. But other stories are simply stand-alone pieces with a supernatural element.

In truth, it's not very good. The first story is probably the best (madness, jealousy, the king in yellow book as a main feature of the plot) but the others are fairly forgettable. Chambers can certainly write, in a manner that has a literary touch, an educated quality, but he simply doesn't know how to tell a story. He will really drag you through the mill for the sake of a twist ending that feels enormously anticlimactic, providing inane details that offer nothing of value regarding the story or worse, meandering plots that become swamped in uninteresting (and hugely underdeveloped) characters. The book is also dated in the sense that a number of cliches are present. For example, the story 'The Demoiselle d'Ys' is about an American man lost on the Breton moors where he meets a lady falconer who takes him back to her home. They fall in love (very quickly) and in the morning he is bitten by a snake and as he dies he turns around and sees that her home is actually a collection of ruins. Then he falls on a gravestone that reveals her name: DEMOISELLE D'YS WHO DIED FOR THE LOVE OF A STRANGER A.D 1573.

All I could think, as I laughed at this, was about that episode of Friends where Joey thinks he's gonna hit the bigtime because he's been cast as the lead in a movie called 'Shutterspeed' about a man who meets a woman and they fall in love. Then when he goes to her house to find her, the old woman there says: 'Betsy's been dead for ten years.'

Anyway, I found this highly average to say the least. If you're a fan of short (spooky) stories or the writing of Poe, then you might find this worthy of a look. I found it somewhat dull.

 

4/10

[Hux]

The Bridge Over The Drina (1945) Ivo Andric

 

A superb novel which takes the concept of a real bridge in Visegrad Bosnia and adds fictional lives to the centuries that pass over it. The bridge is constructed in the 16th century and so, along with factual aspects of this period, we are given the story of a man who, with others, tried to sabotage its construction leading to his capture and death. They shove a spear up his backside until it pokes out of his shoulder (making sure to avoid vital organs in the process) to ensure that his death is slow and painful. Then more years pass, more people, more lovers, more events. Andric does an excellent job of highlighting the presence of Turks over the centuries, the relationship between Christian and Moslem members of this particular community. The bridge remains a constant while the transient existence of mortal humans comes and goes. Later, the book spends a significant amount of time in the late 1800s, early 1900s, and focuses on the arrival of the Austrian army and, inevitably, the events that lead up to the first world war. In between all this we encounter several characters, some that are more memorable than others, some that age quietly in the background.

The writing is wonderful and always highly engaging. I must say, however, that I did find the earlier chapters more fun to read as they felt natural, fluid, and (presumably because they were predominantly fictional) more entertaining as a whole; they involved (very obviously) characters who were entirely made up and therefore had an element of mystery and intrigue about them. Meanwhile, when Andric is writing the later chapters, set in a period that was presumably more historically documented, you feel as though he is somewhat constrained by having to maintain a good account of the facts regarding that period. Characters became a little less realised, more of a prop to set the scene of the wider activities occurring around them. it was still wonderfully written but I began to feel that drag you feel when your focus is waning.

But even here, Andric gives little moments of insight that are exquisite and human, little touches that are immediately familiar and eternally human. When he talks about the exuberance (and perfomativity) of youth, for example, he could, of course, be talking about any era, any time, such is the cliche of our repetitive lives.
 

they could do with their youth what they liked, and give judgements freely and without restriction; they dared to say what they liked and for many of them those words were the same as deeds, satisfying their atavistic need for heroism and glory, violence and destruction, yet they did not entail any obligation to act nor any visible responsibility for what had been said. The most gifted amongst them despised all that they should have learnt and underestimated all that they were able to do, but they boasted of what they did not know and waxed enthusiastic at what was beyond their powers to achieve.

Every human generation has its own illusions with regard to civilisation; some believe that they are taking part in its upsurge, others that they are witnesses of its extinction.

It really is a magnificent piece, with some exceptional prose, but a little dense on occasion and prone to lose its flow when stifled by real world concerns. The moments that felt the most lyrical and creative were those which possessed a greater sense of storytelling and artistry (almost in a folk tale manner), these (predominantly) occurring during the earlier stages of the book. I became less engage later despite the fact that the Austrian occupation and the upcoming great war ought to have been of interest to me. But that aside, the book is amazing.

 

9/10

[Hux]

The Death of Grass (1956) John Christopher

 

Well, this was just great. An absolute romp of a novel that starts slowly then thunders all the way to the end. The story of a virus that affects crops, grain, grass, etc devastating the Chinese landscape first but then gradually spreading across the globe.

To begin with Western countries send assistance to China and all looks hopeful as scientists promote a new, seemingly effective solution. But then, with what seems like little time to spare, the science fails and the snowball of global famine begins to gain momentum. Roger, a confident, bold and occasionally oafish man, has a job in the government and warns his friend John that terrible times may be around the corner. Sure enough, he hears tales of a government plan to nuke cities to reduce the inevitable chaos and death which the famines will ultimately cause. John and Roger get their wives and children (plus a few other stragglers, including the rather marvellous (and creepy) gun shop owner Pirrie and his young wife Millicent) and head for John's brother's farm in the Lake District. Within days, civilisation collapses and John discovers that he must (and can) murder with ease (especially after an incident involving his daughter). Along the way, they meet other survivors, looters, rapists, families seeking refuge. They lose their vehicles and must traipse across Yorkshire (as a Yorkshireman this was a fun part of the book) all the while embracing this new world, a world of violence and death. John, previously a rather meek and introspective man, becomes a ruthless and effective leader with the excellent Pirrie as his obedient and deadly lieutenant.

The book is so much fun to read. It flies along at a pace. Christopher does a great job showing John's transformation, his Breaking Bad-esque experience of becoming a cold-blooded man strangely suited to this new world. Roger, previously loud and extroverted, quickly submits to his new leader like everyone else and (more than anyone) recognises John's swift adoption of his new role as chief in a world that has, almost over night, become thoroughly unforgiving and bleak. The book is fantastic and throws cold water over you until you can't help but shiver.
 

Olivia said: 'We should like you to come with us, my dear. We are going to a safe place up in the hills. It wouldn't be safe for you to stay here.'

The girl said: 'My mother -- I heard her screaming, and then she stopped.'

'She's dead,' Olivia said. 'Your father, too. There's nothing to stay here for.'

'You killed them,' the girl said. She looked at John. 'He killed them.'

Olivia said: 'Yes. They had food and we didn't. People fight over food now. We won, and they lost.'

 

9/10

Edited June 27, 2024 by Hux

[Hux]

Voss (1957) Patrick White

 

I found it hard to like this one, the very dry subject matter, the somewhat stifled characters, the long-winded approach which Patrick White prefers. Where 10 words will suffice, he will opt for 70 and while the words are often beautifully constructed and the prose is occasionally wonderful (as you'd expect from a Nobel prize winner), it is ultimately very draining. I felt like I'd eaten an entire packet of Jacobs crackers and had no access to water. That being said, there is no denying White's talent nor the fact that the book is definitely worth reading. I just found it a slog.

The story concerns Johann Ulrich Voss, a fictionalised version of the actual German outback explorer Ludwig Leichhardt. It immediately brought to mind Melancholy by Fosse (another fictionalised account of a real life) but felt somehow more fictionalised as Voss never really comes across as anything other than a random bloke (somewhat underwritten in fact) as opposed to the more accomplished scientist Leichhardt. Voss is backed by the Bonner family in his endeavours and Mr Bonner's daughter (Laura Trevelyan) becomes a kind of romantic interest (this relationship also never felt convincing) for Voss. What follows is a switching of chapters between Voss and his motley gang in the northern outback and Laura back in Sydney. The outback chapters brought to mind Blood Meridian but only in so much as they shared a similar environment. At this point, both Voss and Laura (more so Voss) appear to have a fictional versions of each other as company, a ghost companion of one another who remains with them, an idea which is interesting and which, had it been convincing, would have given the piece a greater sense of beauty and meaning. The problem, however, is that their romance simply wasn't something I believed actually existed. They were nothing to each other and while Voss turning Laura into some fantasy of a great love made sense for him (for his sanity perhaps), the fact that it was an apparition made it difficult for me to care.

Overall, the book was just too dry for me, full of unnecessary dialogue and forced profundity. I never got to grips with it and cared little for the characters or the events taking place. Occasionally, the writing was magnificent, full of rich language and beauty but it was in service of a book that was just a little too dense and bloated. I would definitely recommend it, however, because it is unquestionably good writing. But sometimes good writing isn't enough.

 

6/10

[Hux]

Cows (1998) Matthew Stokoe

 

Hmmm, well, this was different. A depraved novel full of transgressive ideas and images, bestiality, excrement eating, cow rape, misery porn, blood, guts, you name it. Oh, and a talking cow. I guess I should start by apologising because... I actually enjoyed it.

The book takes place in some other worldly environment which doesn't really exist, a bleak place full of terrible people and disgusting actions. Steven, the protagonist, lives at home with his awful mother (the hagbeast) who forces him to eat rancid meat that makes him vomit. To punish her, he starts making her eat shhhhhhh, his own shhhhhhh, crapping onto a plate before each meal (if you aren't laughing (as I was) this book probably isn't for you). These scenes made me think of Roald Dahl, grotesque caricatures of human beings engaging in appalling behaviour (but more so). Upstairs is a girl called Lucy with a troubled mind who believes that there is blackness inside her (inside everyone) that she needs to remove. Steven believes that if he and Lucy get married and have kids, they can be normal, like the people on TV. Meanwhile, Steven gets a job at an abattoir where he meets Cripps and Gummy, two workers who love killing the cows (to an extent that it becomes overtly sexual). Slowly but surely, Cripps brings Steven into these experiences and teaches him to enjoy the power and thrill of killing.

But wait, one of the cows starts speaking to Steven. Of course it does. It tries to convince him that he should change sides.

I mean, if that description alone hasn't at least intrigued you already, nothing will. The book slightly surprised me because I actually thought it was rather well written with lots of inventive prose and creative language. I zipped through the whole book very quickly and found it immensely engaging. If the depravity of the piece puts you off then I would suggest skipping this one but otherwise, I thought it was unique, funny, and occasionally even profoundly sad. It taps into the idea of belonging, of craving the life that is beyond our reach, that repeated lie which television sells us. His relationship with Lucy, for example, where both of them are simply playing along with it hoping that by doing so happiness will eventually, begrudgingly manifest. There was a sincere melancholy running through the spine of the story, a defeated acceptance of the excrement that life makes us (literally) eat.

Don't hate me but... I kinda loved it.

 

8/10

[Hux]

Ship of Fools (1961) Katherine Anne Porter

 

Life, you see, is like a ship, you see, and it's travelling towards the future and the passengers are, like, on a journey and, like, the world is moving towards something with people on it, you see, and they're on a ship that's just like life. And that's about it. But with lots of characters (too many in fact) none of which are especially interesting and none of which experience any meaningful conflict or growth.

I really wanted to like this but it never once gripped me. It reminded me a lot of Perec's Life: A User's Manual but where that book uses an apartment to, like, you know, represent life, this uses a ship and both are ultimately a little dull. Set in 1931, the ship sails from Mexico to Germany, stopping off at Cuba, then all the way to Tenerife, before dropping in at Spain and England. As beautifully as Porter writes (and she does), it's all in service of a slightly bloated and almost soap opera-esque narrative that never really accomplishes anything. Occasionally, Porter throws in some discussion of antisemitism (there are dark clouds over Europe, you know) and tries her best to make the piece more substantial than it actually is by such devices but it never really works and always comes across as melodramatic and trivial. Like I said: a soap opera ....

Tune in next week to find out if David and Jenny can put their differences aside, if La Condesa breaks doctor Schumann's heart, if chubby Elsa will find love. In an all new exciting episode of... THE LOVEBOAT!!!

While I normally prefer books without a plot, at the very least you need to give me some kind of intrigue, some degree of conflict or antagonism. But instead it's lots of polite conversations, lots of characters meeting for breakfast, for dinner, drinking with the captain, etc. It just never reaches the heights which Porter clearly intended, never becomes the epic philosophical work that explores the human condition with profound insight and character using the boat as a metaphor for life. It just never gets there. The only exciting moment of the book was when the children Ric and Rac (two little shits) throw the poor dog Bebe overboard. A Basque man dives in to save the dog (successfully) but dies in the process. Don't worry, this isn't a spoiler and that's the point I'm making; because nothing interesting happens to the main characters in this book so when a man dramatically saves the dog and dies in the process, that is the first (and last) time we ever hear anything about him. That was his entire role in proceedings. All the other people on this boat are just extras, filling in scenes as the 20 main characters (you'll forget half of them) continue with their mundane journey and conversations.

This book could have been so much more. It's worth reading (and I would still recommend it) but it all falls a little flat in the end. If you liked Life: A User's Manual then you might like this. I found both to be books that were desperately trying too hard and failed quite badly. Oh well.

 

6/10

 

 

Edited July 10, 2024 by Hux

[Hux]

The Mezzanine (1988) Nicholson Baker

 

A man is travelling up some escalators after finishing his lunch break and contemplates a number of thoughts and ideas before he arrives at the the top. The book takes place between those two points; that's the gimmick, at least at first glance but given that this is how countless books are written, it's actually nothing new at all. The real gimmick is the footnotes. But we'll get to that.

The book has its moments, little ideas that Baker plays around with where he contemplates the minutia of day-to-day living, the little mundane things we all do and experience. Some of them are quite charming and will have you nodding your head saying: 'I do that too.' But others are frankly inane and offer nothing but a somewhat dated observation which is a little tedious. The problem I had with these observations, the myriad little foibles of normal life, is that they felt like the discarded material from a mediocre stand-up comedian. 'Have you ever noticed how they don't deliver milk anymore. What's the deal with vending machines. Have you ever noticed how doctors don't do house calls anymore.'

Like I said, some of it is charming and will have you nodding along (pissing in front of colleagues and not being able to go, for example). I also found it interesting that he laments the switch from paper straws to plastic ones given that we have reversed this decision on environmental grounds in recent years. Though I wholeheartedly disagree with him that men say 'oop' while women say 'oops.' Maybe that's an American thing (or just another observation that's now out of date). But again, it all feels like slightly cliched and uninspired stand-up comedy material. Occasionally, it's fun but more often than not (certainly for me), I just found it a little banal.

I also found the writing to be fairly average. At no point did I gasp, open mouthed, at the beauty of a sentence, or smile at a turn of phrase, it's all rather prosaic and obvious. And then we get to the real gimmick of the book, the footnotes; spread across the pages, they are an eyesore that only marginally offer greater insight or intrigue. It should be stated that I despise footnotes of any kind but especially those that are nothing more than some added novelty value. Baker himself even has a footnote about footnotes and while this is mildly amusing, it doesn't change the fact that I hate them (or that he's wrong). Plus, I've reached an age where I'm already using glasses to read and frankly don't appreciate even smaller writing.

The book is definitely worth a look and is easy to read (and fairly short) but I just didn't find it that interesting or that original. It has its moments (reaching a top step but thinking there's another step there... McCartney more talented than Lennon) but it's all rather straightforward and forgettable stuff in the end. I'm surprised he didn't mention pulling a door when you're supposed to push (and vice versa).

Good, but definitely not great. 

 

6/10

[Hux]

The Hive (1950) Camilo Jose Celo

 

There are certain books that drop you into a city, in a certain time, among a group of certain people, and provide a portrait of life, a fragment of existence, through a variety of vignettes and characters so that you get a general view of life in that place, that society. It's not a genre I generally like as it feels disjointed and vague (unless there's a plot or character acting as a cohesive thread). This book has a very scattergun approach to this kind of birdseye view of life in Madrid in 1943, with so many characters that it's hard to keep track (apparently 300 though it never felt that many to me -- more like 50 but I supposed that's because they all began to merge into one another). They come and go, from one paragraph to the next, in and out, sprinkled into the narrative without ever creating a sense of solid presence. Only really Martin and the cafe owner Dona Rosa had a noticeable role in the narrative. It reminded me a little of Tropisms by Sarraute in the sense that it feels almost ethereal and obscure, ghostly, never giving any firm substance to the world, like you're a bird fluttering into rooms, listening to half-formed, half-understood conversations. It's strangely effective and yet... I can't say I enjoyed it.

It's very easy to read, dialogue heavy with short snippets and paragraphs that focus on one or two characters before moving on to the next. I found it hard to grip onto anyone, onto any particular person or event, only ever having a vague feeling of people or their stories, their role in the bigger picture of life in Madrid. I did enjoy the fact that almost everyone (like Cela himself) was a fascist sympathiser and cared little for the notion of a Europe battling its demons. Life very much is about the here and now, the individual, the next opportunity, the next meal, the next experience. The bigger picture is a luxury for others.

But it was difficult to stay interested in these ghosts or their stories, difficult to maintain any intrigue as the book builds to nothing and only offers sporadic insights and momentary glimpses. Those kinds of birdseye view novels rarely resonate with me and (more often than not) can feel gimmicky and mediocre, never really delving any deeper than the surface (none of the characters ever get fleshed out beyond minimal qualities). Again, it's all very vague. But I guess that's the point of the title, flashing in and out of the hive and making sense of each life as best we can.

Hard to review this one. Clearly worth a look as it's very well written and easy to read but it just never grabbed me.

 

6/10

[Hux]

Dissipatio H. G. (1977) Guido Morselli

 

One of the most wonderful things I think I've ever read.

An unnamed man living in a rural part of (Italy/Austria/unspecified) intends to kill himself in a cave but fails only to discover the next morning that everyone else on earth has disappeared. He wanders the streets looking for answers but finds nothing except his own thoughts and solitude. The animals remain but all human life has been removed, leaving only their cars, their unfinished meals, their watches and clocks (stopped at 2am), and their general detritus. For some reason, on June 2, all human life came to an end but for one man.

The book is less about the circumstances (though Morselli does have his protagonist live in hotels, the airport, the office buildings and explore the area) and more about the conditions of being the last man alive. Our narrator contemplates life, investigates what it meant, what it amounts to, and always with a stoic, philosophical outlook. Often the writing can be obscure, too personal to fully ingest, a private meditation on existence, but even when it is, there is something beautiful in the language, something fluid and authentic. There is always a feeling that something profound is stirring within him as he endeavours to explore humanity and his place in it. And it should be noted that Morselli committed suicide not long after finishing this book (1973 but the book was published posthumously in 1977). As such, it is tempting to see it as a suicide note.
 

I wouldn't be exaggerating if I spoke of myself in the third person: "Mankind said this, did that." Because as of June 2, the third person and any other person, grammatical or existential, has necessarily been my person. There is no longer anything but I, and the I is no one but me. I am the I.

I was utterly intoxicated by this book, its slow, meandering style, the thoughtful method of dissecting his own personal experiences plus those of the planet as a whole. Prior to the event (as he describes it) he was institutionalised and became friends with the psychiatric doctor Karpinsky, a man he now occasionally sees and hears and, more importantly, feels he is destined to find and meet again (despite knowing that he died before the event). There is a pervasive sadness within him, an existential confusion which requires constant rumination and inspection. It is always exquisitely expressed with a calming sense of acceptance. Just after his aborted suicide attempt, he bangs his head and wakes up with blood on his pillow. There is a sense that perhaps he did successfully kill himself and that this is some form of purgatory. But the protagonist explores this notion himself, pondering the possibility that he is in fact dead, but rejecting it as meaningless and offering no solution.

I adored reading this. It is a strange philosophical work which reminded me of 'The Sundays of Jean Dezert', a book which becomes solipsistic and private, the end of the world being somewhat irrelevant to the piece while his own experiences, the personal interpretations and feelings of his unique perspective, are the more significant aspect. It is lightly tinged with sadness throughout, a book that celebrates and smiles upon a lonely introvert.

I thought it was beautiful.

 

10/10

[Hux]

The Maniac (2023) Benjamin Labatut

 

It's ironic that a book about AI should read as though it was written by AI. This isn't necessarily a bad thing as the book (at least the majority of it) is very easy to read and I zipped through it quite quickly, finding it mostly entertaining but a little dry.

The story is based on real events and people, predominantly John Von Neumann, a physicist whose work touched on various fields but especially artificial intelligence. The last part of the book then switches to the creator of an AI computer that plays GO and defeats the world's best player Lee Sedol. The theme of AI is interesting and certainly current, its tentacles reaching into everything right now, so Labatut chose a valid subject matter. But the first few chapters aside, I'm not sure I ever truly enjoyed the writing style nor the fact that it details real people in a fictionalised setting. Truth be told, it made think I might be better off simply reading a biography of Von Neumann (clearly a fascinating character). The book details his early life, his genius, his move to America and is involvement in the Manhatten Project. But you never really get a true sense of the man or his work, only a general outline which paints him (somewhat predictably) as an aloof, occasionally cranky genius (again, a biography might have been more rewarding). That being said, Labatut deserves credit for the research he must have done.

It was fun to read for a while but I began to lose interest slightly and only perked up again when it was time to move on to the story of Sedol playing against the AlphaGo AI computer. But the sudden switch to a significantly less brilliant character slowed things down too much. Plus, I've never really liked the whole concept of a fictionalised account of real people's lives, and a lot of it felt like I was reading a Wikipedia entry, albeit one which is essentially giving me the facts but in an easy to digest and mildly more animated manner. Ultimately, the whole thing felt a little dull and lifeless, lacking in any real human warmth or creative prose (hence, the book itself started to feel a little robotic). Maybe that was the point, maybe Labatut is a genius.

Overall, it was fine, readable, clear, and I mostly enjoyed it. I just never found it to be anything very beautiful, artistic or soulful. Essentially, a very fun Wikipedia entry in book form.

 

7/10

[Hux]

Penpal (2012) Dathan Auerbach

 

A slow build story of creepy uncertainty where the narrator tries to piece together childhood memories in order to reveal a clearer picture. For the most part it works, the book doing a good job of increasing the tension and mystery as it goes along. The downside to this, however, is that you begin to crave a satisfying ending (perhaps with a twist to justify a lot of the teasing we get from Auerbach) but it doesn't come. Instead, we get a vague, almost ambiguous ending which left me profoundly irritated.

The story concerns a young boy who, now as an adult, relates his memories of some strange occurrences experienced in childhood. Waking up in the woods alone one night, for example, feeling that he and his friend Josh are being followed, someone leaving a note to say he had run away from home which wasn't written by him, etc. Then there's a moment in school where the kids release balloons with notes and hope whoever finds them will write back and become penpals. Everyone else gets normal letters but he gets strange, out-of-focus polaroids that he later realises are pictures of him and his friend Josh. And so the book goes on, building suspense, creating an unpleasant atmosphere of paranoia and dread. It's reasonably effective and, for me at least, reasonably entertaining to read. Overall, I enjoyed the book and, the damp squib of the ending aside, found it compelling and fun.

There are two weak points to the book; firstly, I would say that the writing is very basic, plodding, clumsy, offering no real creative prose or interesting language. It's all very flat and functional, something which, given that it's a self-published piece, isn't all that surprising. That being said, I've read self-published work that has a greater quality of writing. The second issue is the convenience of the plot, the strange choices made by characters which don't really add up. If you discovered a man was living under your house, taking pictures of your son, and hoping to kidnap him... you'd probably engage in a significantly greater response than his mother does. You can dismiss these concerns by pointing to the fact that the narrator's memories of events are unclear and untrustworthy but I think that would be generous. And, as I said, I didn't like the ending. It fizzled out. I wanted some kind of greater thread linking all this together but instead it's just a man. A random man. Oh well. I'm sure there are those who will say this makes it even creepier but I disagree - it was a convenient cop out, an ending that gave no real answers after making me invest so much in the story.

So yeah, it was effective, I enjoyed it, but would have liked so much more. If you like creepy stories, I would definitely recommend.

 

7/10

[Hux]

The Notebook Trilogy (1991) Agota Kristof

 

The Notebook (1986)

Two small twin boys are dropped off at their grandmother's house by their mother during the start of the war. They live on the edge of town, near the guarded border of a foreign land. The grandmother is mean spirited and refers to them as sons of bitches. The two boys agree to become self-sufficient, to reject pain, to learn how the world works. They are little psychopaths, emotionless, willing to kill and get their way no matter what. They are slightly terrifying but compelling. The whole book is narrated with the word 'we' throughout. 'We did this, we did that. We walked here, we ate our meal.' As they grow older, they become ruthless young men, powerful, intelligent, ambitious and brilliant. At the end of the book, one of the boys escapes to the foreign land beyond the border, while the other agrees to stay behind. The book is written in a stark, to-the-point style that involves short chapters which draw you in and are utterly engrossing. I read it very quickly, zipped through it with joy.

The Proof (1989)

This is where things get complicated (and challenging). This book switches from 'we' narration to a standard third person narration. And we finally discover the names of the boys (Lucas and Claus). Lucas is the one who stayed behind in the town. What follows is his story of making money, having affairs, and shacking up with a young pregnant woman (Yasmine) who was impregnated (willingly) by her own father. She gives birth to a boy named Mathias who Lucas becomes very attached to. One day Yasmine leaves and Lucas raises Mathias alone. He later buys a shop where he can sell the writing equipment he has always loved. He befriends a Party member called Peter and lives out his life and waits for his brother's return. Towards the end of the book, we jump ahead in time when Lucas has left the town and we discover that Yasmine was probably murdered by him. Then Claus comes to the town and tells Peter that he is looking for his brother Lucas. Peter laughs at this and knows that it is simply Lucas returning. That Lucas never really had a brother. He was always a fiction.

The Third Lie (1991)

Now comes the real head-fudge (in first person narration). What if none of the above is true? What if it was all lies? What if a completely different life was lived by this man, these men, Lucas, Claus, both, neither, none... arghh! Now we have a new story, one about a woman shooting her cheating husband and going into an asylum while her twin boys are separated, one in the other country where he has been disabled by one his mother's stray bullets, the other raised by the husband's mistress. Lucas (or is it Claus) wants to return to his mother, wants to find and reunite with his brother. We see things from both their perspectives, both lives being lived, yet never knowing if there truly are two boys or just one. Maybe there are none at all!! They are old men, they are young boys, back and forth, they are forever connected. I honestly don't know anymore. But I was mesmerised.

All I can say is that this is one of the greatest pieces of work I've ever come across. It deals with memory, truth, fiction, identity in such a profoundly brilliant way. I felt lost. I felt stunned. It's just an exquisite piece of literature that mind-fudgeed me into a catatonic daze. I was bewildered by it. Yes, part one is by far the most compelling and wonderful to read and yes, part two and three (slightly less fun to read), massively undermine it, make it all lies, untrustworthy, even pointless (part of me even resents that). But part two and three also make part one suddenly something new and extraordinary, something terrifying -- something I probably need to read again. Because let's face it, life is nothing more than what we remember, what we recollect. And the truth is, we remember so little of it. And what we do remember, we remember so very incorrectly. Who is to say what really happened? Maybe that's why we're so obsessed with documenting our lives in various ways, because what other method is there for proving that any of it happened? Memory cannot be trusted. It's a shimmering wave of vague colours and feelings, white sunlight on the ocean.

This book horrified me. Amazing.

 

10/10

Edited July 31, 2024 by Hux