Despite being nominated for the Booker, His Bloody Project didn’t make it onto my radar back in 2015. But after reading Graeme Macrae Burnet’s latest,Despite being nominated for the Booker, His Bloody Project didn’t make it onto my radar back in 2015. But after reading Graeme Macrae Burnet’s latest, the excellent Case Study, I was inspired to pick it up. There are some similarities between the two books: both are framed as a sort of investigation, both touch on themes that involve contemporaneous schools of thought in psychology, and both position the main character as an unreliable narrator. Here, that’s Roderick Macrae, a young crofter accused of multiple murders in a remote community in 1869. The two main narratives are Roderick’s own confession and an assessment of him written by a pompous criminal anthropologist; they’re surrounded by other material, including witness statements and an account of the controversial trial. On balance, I think I liked Case Study a little more – Project doesn’t seem to make the most of some of its most intriguing details. But its depiction of life in the village of Culduie is convincing, Roderick’s tale engrossing, and the various voices well-realised. It seems like it could easily be a true story, with the result that it feels something like a 19th-century serial filtered through the lens of modern true crime.
I almost feel I must have missed something in my reading of this book – whatever it was trying to say or show seemed terribly muddled, verging on offeI almost feel I must have missed something in my reading of this book – whatever it was trying to say or show seemed terribly muddled, verging on offensive. I only finished it because I was holding on to a sliver of hope for a satisfying ending, ideally involving (view spoiler)[the protracted and very painful death of the odious David, but no such luck, infuriatingly (hide spoiler)]. I loved Greensmith and think about it often; I perhaps should have chosen a more recent novel by Whiteley (I had no idea this was a republished earlier work until reading other reviews after finishing it). I will still read more from her....more
(3.5) A good potted history of the ghost, tracking the development of belief in ghosts around the world, scientific attempts to prove their existence (3.5) A good potted history of the ghost, tracking the development of belief in ghosts around the world, scientific attempts to prove their existence (or otherwise), and their representation in literature, film and TV. A bit general on some points – you'll want to look elsewhere if you're after an in-depth analysis of ghosts in pop culture. But it's a really solid place to start, and particularly useful as a concise summary of ghost traditions in Western, Asian and Latin American societies.
I first dipped into Aickman’s Heirs a couple of years ago, when I was eagerly trying to consume every last word by Nina Allan that I could get my handI first dipped into Aickman’s Heirs a couple of years ago, when I was eagerly trying to consume every last word by Nina Allan that I could get my hands on, in order to read her brilliant contribution, ‘A Change of Scene’. I always meant to come back and read the rest; reading the collection Dark Entries, and subsequently wanting to revisit ‘A Change of Scene’, gave me the perfect excuse to do so.
The editor’s introduction cautions against expecting fiction that feels ‘the same’ as Aickman’s, suggesting that such a thing is impossible, that his style was truly inimitable. However, the strongest stories – Allan’s among them – do indeed achieve that (the introduction seems, therefore, more like it’s pre-empting criticism of the stories that don’t). ‘A Change of Scene’ is by far the best in the book, but there are plenty of other highlights: ‘The Book That Finds You’ by Lisa Tuttle, ‘Underground Economy’ by John Langan and ‘The Vault of Heaven’ by Helen Marshall are all fantastic stories, Aickmanesque or not, while ‘The Dying Season’ by Lynda E. Rucker nails the brief, doing the best job of updating Aickman’s knack for the deeply uncomfortable to a present-day setting.
--- ‘A Change of Scene’ by Nina Allan: I cannot emphasise how much I love this story. It is PERFECT. Hands down one of the best short stories I have ever read, to rank alongside Elizabeth Hand’s ‘Near Zennor’ (also Aickman-inspired and set on the English coast – that must be my thing) and also one of Allan’s best, to rank alongside ‘Four Abstracts’, ‘Maggots’, ‘The Silver Wind’, ‘Vivian Guppy and the Brighton Belle’, ‘Bellony’, ‘The Muse of Copenhagen’, etc. (I really need to do a top 10 at some point.)
It’s based on – effectively a sequel to – Robert Aickman’s story ‘Ringing the Changes’. Some years after the events of the original, Phrynne and her best friend Iris are both widows. Shortly after Gerald’s death, Phrynne insists they should take a holiday together, and Iris – from whose perspective the story is told – reluctantly agrees. Phrynne refuses to reveal their destination and, naturally, it turns out to be Holyhaven. She’s also booked rooms at the same ‘hotel’ she and Gerald stayed in, a pub called The Bell. The bells are not actually ringing this time, but the custom is immortalised in a series of lurid murals; Phrynne and Iris visit a church to see them, and both women have equally strong, though very different, responses to these disturbing images.
While Aickman’s original story is suffused with strangeness, Allan’s betters it because she gives the characters such strong psychological foundations. The friendship between Iris and Phrynne is somewhat uneven, with Phrynne both prettier and bolder (reminding me of the characters in another Aickman tale, ‘The Trains’). Iris worries that grief has made Phrynne dangerously erratic: her mood alters rapidly, her memories of Holyhaven seem to shift from moment to moment. Yet Iris herself is nursing a secret, something she feels great guilt about, and briefly becomes convinced the holiday is all part of an elaborate plot to humiliate her. Later, Phrynne has a vitriolic outburst towards Iris and, once again mirroring the original story, this creates an irreparable rift between the two main characters.
Another stroke of genius comes right at the end of the story. A two-pronged approach leaves the characters’ fates in doubt, and the very last line is brilliant and horrifying at the same time as it is inscrutable. (It made me think of the ending of Inception.) The ambiguity makes for a perfect tribute to Aickman.
--- ‘Seaside Town’ by Brian Evenson: On holiday with his partner, the docile protagonist finds himself alone in a rather terrifying, seemingly hostile hotel. I didn’t exactly like this, but it certainly creates a feeling of dread – and in that, it’s very similar to many Aickman stories.
‘Neithernor’ by Richard Gavin: A man discovers his cousin has become an artist, creating odd sculptures from copper and human hair. Maybe the purple prose is a deliberate attempt to mock the narrator’s pretentions, but I still found it torturous to read. (Actually, purple isn’t strong enough, it’s more like puce.)
‘Least Light, Most Night’ by John Howard: Mr Thomas receives an invitation to visit his colleague Mr Bentley at home, and approaches the event with some trepidation. While I wish this had been longer, it does a great job of communicating Thomas’s sense of fearful apprehension.
‘Camp’ by David Nickle: Taking a detour from their planned honeymoon, James and Paul find themselves in trouble when they attempt to kayak across a lake. A solid story in its own right, if not quite what I expected from this anthology.
‘A Delicate Craft’ by D.P. Watt: Bogdan, an out-of-work plumber, forms an unlikely friendship with an elderly lady who teaches him the art of lace-making. An original idea; I didn’t see where it was going, and found the ending beautifully enigmatic.
‘Seven Minutes in Heaven’ by Nadia Bulkin: A girl grows up near a ghost town and is fascinated by it. Again, this wasn’t the type of thing I was expecting (I tended to feel this most often with the American stories). I really enjoyed it all the same. Weird and vivid.
‘Infestations’ by Michael Cisco: A woman returns to New York after the death of her parents’ close friend, after whom she is named. I don’t have anything good to say about this.
‘The Dying Season’ by Lynda E. Rucker: Sylvia is trying to get through an off-season leisure park holiday with her horrible partner John, a task that becomes harder when a peculiar couple befriend them. A triumph of Aickmanesque discomfort filled with squirming unease.
‘A Discreet Music’ by Michael Wehunt: Hiram mourns his wife, Sandra, and struggles to cope on the day of her funeral. While this is a better story than ‘Neithernor’, the writing is similarly florid in a way that undercuts the emotion of the premise. Thematically it’s oddly similar to ‘Camp’ – presumably coincidentally, as neither seem to be referencing a particular Aickman tale.
‘Underground Economy’ by John Langan: A woman working at a strip club watches with alarm as her coworker is drawn into a dangerous game. Sexist depictions and descriptions of women are rife in horror, and Langan writes about strippers without that coming into play at all; I know this is real ‘the bar is on the floor’ stuff but I’m impressed nonetheless (and I still want to know the story of Nikki’s tattoo!).
‘The Vault of Heaven’ by Helen Marshall: A naive archaeologist inherits a post at a small Greek museum, his predecessor having ‘dropped out’ for reasons unknown. A strange, evocative story about art and beauty, and the terror in both.
‘Two Brothers’ by Malcolm Devlin: A story I had already read in Devlin’s collection You Will Grow Into Them, but was happy to revisit. A boy eagerly awaits the return of his brother from boarding school, only to find him unpleasantly changed. Inscrutable, absorbing.
‘The Lake’ by Daniel Mills: A group of boys swim together at a local lake; years later, one of them remains haunted. Not my cup of tea, and not the strongest.
‘The Book That Finds You’ by Lisa Tuttle: A young woman becomes obsessed with the work of a horror writer (clearly intended as an analogue of Aickman himself) and falls in love with a bookseller who shares her passion. This is a fantastic contribution, combining unsettling horror with the sort of ‘literary treasure hunt’ plot I find hard to resist.
In the aftermath of the Great War, Dennis Beaumont returns to London a haunted man. He finds himself unable to successfully return to his previous exiIn the aftermath of the Great War, Dennis Beaumont returns to London a haunted man. He finds himself unable to successfully return to his previous existence. Carelessly unfaithful, capricious and misanthropic, Beaumont could easily be a loathsome protagonist, but somehow he's sympathetic – relatable, even. Perhaps it's the strong sense of his postwar disenchantment and trauma; perhaps it's simply that he's so very, horribly human.
Beaumont's London is luridly realised, a soup of misery peopled by the damaged and defeated. In my head, it looks like a Francis Bacon painting come to life.
I am still in hell, Beaumont thought. Only now it is worse, because everyone pretends that the life we are living is the life we want.
Something I keep noticing about Nina Allan's fiction: it's so multilayered. The introduction of The Harlequin gives the reader a great deal to chew on. The suggestion of a traumatic wartime incident that continues to trouble Beaumont. Numerous observations he makes of people around him – observations that tell us a lot about the man he is. References to Alain-Fournier's Le Grand Meaulnes, prompting an assertion (spoken by a friend, remembered by Beaumont) that 'memory is not fantasy. It is the bridge between the real and the imagined'. Allusions to Beaumont's relationship with his fiancée Lucy, about whom he seems to feel distinctly unenthusiastic. Alongside that, a contrasting portrait of Beaumont's sister Doris that underlines how much he cares for her. All this in the opening pages of a short book, all of it done effortlessly and with the lightest of touches.
For the same reason, it's difficult to get a handle on what this story is actually about. At the halfway point, I was uncertain whether so much plot could be gathered together and resolved in the space allowed by what remained of the book. If there is a problem with The Harlequin, it's that the story doesn't have enough room to properly unfold; it could easily have been turned into a book two or even three times the length of this novella.
As it happens, The Harlequin turns out to be 'about' quite a few things, and it's not easy to pinpoint exactly where its deep sense of unease stems from. Beaumont's outburst of violence? The death of fellow soldier Stephen Lovell, a memory he continually returns to? The sinister figure of Vladek in his patchwork coat? Does the latter spring from Beaumont's imagination – or somewhere darker still?
This weird tale is both subtle and confounding. It leaves an impression, a mark, a stain. Allan brings her setting and period to life so vividly that I feel it's a place I've visited, that I could physically return to – though I wouldn't want to.
Enjoyed this graphic novel, but I'm downgrading the rating (which was originally 4 stars) because, although I liked the plot and the art well enough, Enjoyed this graphic novel, but I'm downgrading the rating (which was originally 4 stars) because, although I liked the plot and the art well enough, I realise now I've been left with zero desire to read volume 2. Set in the titular, evocatively named county, it follows a young woman who, as she approaches her eighteenth birthday, finds her home and town (and she) are not quite what they seem. It's a 'Southern Gothic fairy tale' with witches, ghosts, and woodland monsters; backdrops full of creeping shadows and twisted branches. I was hoping for an 'Over the Garden Wall for grown-ups' vibe from this and I guess I got it, to a degree, though it wasn't anywhere near as charming or memorable. Certainly entertaining, but didn't leave much of an impression.
**spoiler alert** Some dick who spends his life objectifying women ends up saddled with a demonic kid. His existence becomes a living nightmare until **spoiler alert** Some dick who spends his life objectifying women ends up saddled with a demonic kid. His existence becomes a living nightmare until he thinks he's found a way out, but surprise surprise, he's just engineered his own demise and passed the burden of the kid on to an even bigger twat who beats his daughter.
I guess the presence of the evil child represents these guys' comeuppance, but I'd just prefer not to read about sexist pricks in the first place, to be honest. Also I can't get over the fact that there's a scene in which Phil opens a door with 'teeth bared' when we were told about 2 pages earlier that all his teeth have just finished falling out. How did an editor not catch that?!...more
Experimental Film is a sprawling novel of weird, cosmic horror, but it kicks off as an intriguing historical mystery. Lois Cairns is a journalist and Experimental Film is a sprawling novel of weird, cosmic horror, but it kicks off as an intriguing historical mystery. Lois Cairns is a journalist and former film professor who believes she's stumbled on a discovery that will change history: Iris Whitcomb, a wealthy spiritualist who disappeared under mysterious circumstances in the late 19th century, may have been Canada's first female filmmaker, her experiments in special effects predating even Georges Méliès. The initial revelation comes by way of a short film 'made' (plagiarised) by antagonistic dilettante Wrob Barney; a particular fragment sparks obsession in Lois. The more research she does, the clearer (and more terrible) Whitcomb's motifs become. She frequently told versions of the same story through films and art: a story in which a terrifying female figure, clad in white and holding a scythe, tempts her victims to look up into the merciless midday sun.
Something that makes this book different: Lois's troubles aren't confined to ghostly apparitions and weird folk tales, and even once the supernatural stuff really kicks in, she faces many other obstacles. Wrob Barney is determined to have full credit for the discovery, at whatever cost. Meanwhile, Lois's mother thinks she shouldn't be working at all and should devote all her time to caring for her autistic son. And then there's Lois's increasingly debilitating migraines and insomnia, and the difficulty of getting funding for such a project in Canada to begin with... etc, etc.
Experimental Film is unusually told. It's not exactly non-linear but seems determined to diffuse tension and go in unexpected directions every time the action threatens to reach a climax. I actually really enjoyed this (though can imagine it being frustrating for some). There is just so much packed into this book; it might not always do what you expect or want it to, but one way or another, there's never a dull moment. While I thought the horror element was brilliantly executed, my favourite part might have been the first third – all the dense exposition, only occasionally interspersed with the slightest hint of something off-kilter. I love this kind of rich, textured and believable backstory, especially in horror fiction, which can so easily tip over into silliness.
Inevitably, there are times when it feels a bit overstuffed, when the details of Lois's family life threaten to overwhelm the main plot, or when her encyclopaedic knowledge – not just of cinema and filmmaking but of things like esoteric ancient religions – seems too good to be true. I also got a bit irritated with her voice: she uses certain unusual words way too much; by the end I'd had enough of the term 'overtop', for example, to last me a lifetime. (The fact that there are spelling mistakes in the book made me wonder whether this sort of thing was an editing oversight, rather than a deliberate feature of Lois's character.)
But a few flaws don't take away from what an innovative and surprising horror novel this is. I have no idea why on earth it took me so long to get round to Experimental Film, and I recommend it to anyone and everyone who loves ghost stories, intelligent horror, and/or engrossing mysteries with lots of background detail.
An unhappily childless couple take a holiday in Verona, hoping to distract themselves from the heartbreak of the many failed fertility treatments theyAn unhappily childless couple take a holiday in Verona, hoping to distract themselves from the heartbreak of the many failed fertility treatments they have endured. They are, however, beset by peculiar occurrences from the moment they arrive, as well as finding themselves strangely drawn to a particular church and its distinctive stained glass window... Verona seems to riff on both Daphne du Maurier's 'Don't Look Now' and the ancient religious horrors found in many of M.R. James's stories. It is subtler and, in my opinion, more effective than Abbot's Keep, the other ghost story I've read by Ashforth, and apparently his most widely read. It doesn't induce electrifying terror, but there were definitely more than a few moments that gave me chills. If you like this sort of thing then I'd certainly recommend it, and I'll be investigating the rest of Ashforth's stories at some point too.
Ex-journalist Sam is writing a book about Robert Wardner, frontman of Manchester post-punk act The National Grid, who has been missing for 25 years. TEx-journalist Sam is writing a book about Robert Wardner, frontman of Manchester post-punk act The National Grid, who has been missing for 25 years. The band became famous overnight following a notorious appearance on Top of the Pops, during which Wardner acted out a fake suicide attempt; for years, rumours have persisted that he went into hiding because he murdered a fan. The tale of Sam digging into Wardner's life is juxtaposed with Wardner's story in his own words, plus occasional articles about the band that give a sense of their cultural impact.
At first, I found the plot thrilling, and Mankowski's writing about music and creativity is often excellent. But a great deal of the dialogue is stilted, there are some truly heinous descriptions of women, and overall there's just a bit of an amateurish feel that pervades the whole text. (I also just didn't understand what the purpose of Sam's relationships with Elsa and Camille was. Maybe just to provide a (weak) parallel to Wardner's with Frankie and Nataly? Even so, pretty much all of that material could have been cut to make way for the far more interesting story of Wardner, the band and the music.) A compelling but flawed novel, How I Left the National Grid has a fantastic concept but bumpy execution.
I made up stuff I was wearing that I don't even own, and then I typed yes baby yes for five minutes in one window and watched a video about a dog traiI made up stuff I was wearing that I don't even own, and then I typed yes baby yes for five minutes in one window and watched a video about a dog trainer in another window.
That sentence encapsulates the detached tone of this novella about real and online lives. 'Valletta78' is the internet alias adopted by the narrator – after the featureless housing development in which she lives, not the Maltese capital. She's bored, unemployed, indifferently married, and lonely. She met her husband Brandon on a cruise, after both won their trips in different contests. Now, he goes to work while she sits at home and numbly chats to men online, occasionally going out for a shopping trip or an appointment with her therapist.
Cybersex is one thing, but the story takes a darker turn when Valletta78 starts frequenting support forums for victims of conditions and tragedies she's never suffered. On an insomnia forum, she invents a brother with cancer, soliciting sympathy and gifts from strangers. She also strikes up a friendship with a guy she calls Win, short for Winfield; in keeping with her own moniker, she names her chat partners for the towns they come from.
Valletta78 is about the space between online identities and reality; the different ways in which loneliness can manifest; making connections, and which parts of those connections can be said to be real when one or both parties are telling lies about themselves. It doesn't really say much about these themes, though, it just presents them. Despite an unexpectedly sad denouement (unexpected because the plot appears to be building to a moment of catharsis), the ending seems to prove the protagonist hasn't learned anything. The story seems designed for a 'so what?' reaction, a shrug and a half-hearted shake of the head. I mean, I liked it! I think it's worth reading. But it's about someone who is empty, and so it can't help but feel rather blank itself.
Anyone who's read even the briefest synopsis of Martin John will not be expecting pleasant subject matter, but I wasn't expecting the style to be equaAnyone who's read even the briefest synopsis of Martin John will not be expecting pleasant subject matter, but I wasn't expecting the style to be equally offputting. Probing the obsessive, repetitive, yet disjointed thoughts of Martin John – whose main interests include Eurovision, walking circuits around Euston station, and exposing himself to women in public – it is arrhythmic, feeling designed to disrupt and frustrate. It is itself circuitous and, at the same time, fractured (as Martin John's circuits and routines are continually interrupted by 'Meddlers'). It's often unclear who the narrative is referring to in using 'he', 'she', 'they', or even 'I'; there is also an occasional, disturbing 'we' that drags the reader into an unwilling alliance with Martin John.
The story is as choppy as the manner of its telling. There's a sense of escalation as it goes on: partly due to Martin John's increasing paranoia about 'Baldy Conscience', his lodger and nemesis, who he believes to be responsible for anything that upsets the balance of his life; partly because of the heightening audacity of his infractions. Yet the sequence of events is withheld – another method of frustration – so we learn about Martin John's return to his Mam in Ireland, and her abusive method of dealing with him, before we learn what causes this.
I'm sure I was supposed to feel uncomfortable reading Martin John. I just didn't feel the discomfort was worth it – that it led anywhere worth going. It's excellent in its own way, but never something I could love.
A couple of months ago I came upon a piece at Public Books – Chick Lit Meets the Avant-Garde, by Tess McNulty – that seemed to perfectly encapsulate aA couple of months ago I came upon a piece at Public Books – Chick Lit Meets the Avant-Garde, by Tess McNulty – that seemed to perfectly encapsulate a phenomenon I hadn't exactly noticed but had been absorbing, and enjoying, for a while. In reviewing five recently-published novels by female authors, McNulty identifies an emerging trend: fiction that combines accounts of the 'female experience' (in fact, as she puts it, 'the most insistently girly features of that experience') with aspects more commonly found in experimental postmodern novels and, less prominently, sci-fi and fantasy. Two of those reviewed, You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine and The Ghost Network, are among the best books I've read in the past year, and although McNulty also mentions one I tried and couldn't get along with – The Beautiful Bureaucrat – this naturally made me interested in the one I'd never heard of before: Andrea Phillips' Revision.
In terms of style, Revision falls much more firmly into the chick-lit bracket than do any of the other books mentioned in McNulty's essay. Mira is a breezy Fifth Avenue heiress whose first lines are sheer cliche: she unironically enthuses about how the best way to deal with a breakup is by bingeing on ice cream, watching tear-jerking movies, and burning all photographs of you and your now-ex-partner. Her vocabulary includes terms like 'carbolicious'; she uses 'crazy' as a noun far more than is necessary (which is not at all); the forced ditsiness of her voice can be very grating. But the themes veer closer to science fiction. Mira's boyfriend, Benji, is co-founder of tech startup Verity, a kind of Wikipedia for breaking news. When he abruptly ends their relationship, she spitefully alters his Verity profile to say they've just got engaged, only for him to reappear with a proposal straight out of a cheesy rom-com... and that's how she realises Verity doesn't just report on what's happening in people's lives; it's capable of altering them. Chick lit meets the avant-garde, indeed.
What follows is a mild conspiracy thriller: Mira's contacted by former Verity executive Chandra, who faked her own death to escape the company's manipulation, and the two do some amateur sleuthing to get to the bottom of Verity's true purpose. It's fun, but the stakes never feel very high. In a post on her own website, Phillips says 'the emotional arc of Revision is very much about how someone who has advantages in life has the power to ruin everything for the vulnerable people around her, while remaining personally more or less unscathed'. It's interesting to consider that, especially as it's an interpretation that didn't really occur to me – partly because I assumed the reader wasn't supposed to feel too much negativity towards Mira, and partly because I was more interested in the world-altering-tech conspiracy arc than the emotional one.
As much as Revision has some outlandish twists, it doesn't fuse its light tone with anything like the weird fiction of You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine or the academic framework of The Ghost Network. This isn't to say that it should, obviously – Phillips wasn't writing it to fit into a micro-trend that hadn't been identified at the time – but I wouldn't have bought or read it if not for the McNulty essay, and the implication that it belonged to the same literary universe as those other books. It's entertaining, but doesn't break any new ground....more
A ‘failed artist’, Miles, settles temporarily in a small town in Germany, ostensibly to write a book about a forgotten surrealist painter named Emil BA ‘failed artist’, Miles, settles temporarily in a small town in Germany, ostensibly to write a book about a forgotten surrealist painter named Emil Bafdescu. He gets little work done, though: instead he thinks/writes about the death of his father, his complicated feelings about his ex-girlfriend, and something that happened on a holiday in Venice that marked the beginning of the end of their relationship. The resulting novel is strongly reminiscent of Ben Lerner’s Leaving the Atocha Station, and its detached, dreamy style also reminded me of Sarah Bernstein’s The Coming Bad Days. I found the narrative’s treatment of Alice, the ex-girlfriend, somewhat troubling – perhaps even more troubling when you consider that, minus the fictional artist, this seems to be autofiction. But perhaps that was the author’s intention after all, perhaps it’s a deliberate part of the book’s meta tangle. Regardless, I think it’d have been stronger if Alice was something more than a pawn to be moved in and out of the story as and when she proved useful to the protagonist. If you can ignore that, almost everything else about Fever of Animals is excellent. I particularly loved reading about the invented life of Bafdescu, and found there to be something consistently hypnotic about the entire narrative despite the fact that it frequently switches focus/perspective.
Rare, these days, for me to bother reading a reasonably long book only to give it such a low rating. I kept trying to like this, but by the end it actRare, these days, for me to bother reading a reasonably long book only to give it such a low rating. I kept trying to like this, but by the end it actually made me angry, partly because it could have been so good. A brilliantly original and intelligent concept wasted on a dreadful protagonist, terrible humour, and constant, pointless, infuriating, exhausting, BORING sexism.
Koons Crooks is a fanatical devotee of the anodyne advice doled out on Twitter by Silicon Valley venture capitalists; he retreats from society to spenKoons Crooks is a fanatical devotee of the anodyne advice doled out on Twitter by Silicon Valley venture capitalists; he retreats from society to spend his days transcribing banally 'inspirational' aphorisms in calligraphic lettering (because he heard Steve Jobs was into that). Later, rumours of Crooks' strange behaviour and bizarre demise are passed around San Francisco and make their way to an anonymous editor, who pieces together the tale. In a half-hearted stab at pretending it's a true story, the whole thing is labelled as the work of 'Koons Crooks and Anonymous'.
This wasn't awful or anything, just kind of pointless outside its original context. I know the backstory, but having read the 'book' (very short story), I assume there must be something more I'm not seeing, maybe references that would only make sense to the original recipients. There are a few gently satirical details, but it's just so slight; I certainly wouldn't call it 'vicious' or 'scathing' as the article that first brought it to my attention did. I really should have taken heed of the fact that people suspected Robin Sloan of being the author.
A deceptive book - at the beginning, as it opens with a woman boarding a flight to Casblanca, Morocco, you'd never imagine it could be as breathlesslyA deceptive book - at the beginning, as it opens with a woman boarding a flight to Casblanca, Morocco, you'd never imagine it could be as breathlessly unputdownable as it is. Imagine a cross between Rachel Cusk's Outline and The Talented Mr. Ripley; the chameleonic protagonist jumps from identity to identity, latching on to acquaintance after acquaintance, and performs increasingly elaborate deceptions, moving through scenes from a shabby hotel to a movie set to a desert tour. Suspension of disbelief is essential, as the protagonist (who remains unnamed, unless you count about six fake names...) makes some ludicrously terrible decisions - accepting someone else's possessions and passport from the police as though they are her own, lying to the American Embassy and so on. And then, of course, there's the fact that in the space of just a few days, she goes from losing everything to being the stand-in for a Hollywood star. The whole story is told in second person, so it takes longer than it perhaps should to realise that the protagonist is probably an unreliable narrator - or whatever it is you call an unreliable narrator when they are not, in fact, narrating. That constant 'you' works cleverly by implicating the reader in the protagonist's every decision, carrying the story along in gripping fashion despite the often outlandish turns taken by the plot.
Summed up in a sentence, The Diver's Clothes Lie Empty is an intriguing, taut novella that's infuriating in the best possible way. The first thing I've read by Vendela Vida, and unlikely to be the last....more
Two former lovers end up sat next to one another on a train - the 6:41 to Paris. Twenty years earlier, their affair ended badly, but they are now bothTwo former lovers end up sat next to one another on a train - the 6:41 to Paris. Twenty years earlier, their affair ended badly, but they are now both much changed. The narrative switches between their points of view as, without speaking to one another, both relive their short relationship and the disastrous events of the night they broke up. The publisher's blurb for this describes it in an odd way - 'a psychological thriller about past romance' - which isn't, in my opinion, accurate; it's more like a smart, subtle romantic comedy, though it's just as compelling as a thriller. It's also rather too short, and I would've liked to read more about these two fascinating characters, but the book's brevity would, admittedly, make it absolutely perfect for a train journey....more
