DRIVE YOUR PLOW OVER THE BONES OF THE DEAD, by Olga Tokarczuk

 Olga Tokarczuk, a well-known and controversial writer in her native Poland, became better known to an international audience when she was awarded the International Booker Prize for her novel Flights in 2018.  Her 2009 novel Drive your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead caused a sensation in her homeland and more than a little controversy - she was accused of promoting eco-terrorism! The novel is hard to categorize - on the surface, it is a noir crime novel - indeed it is a story of several murders that take place under mysterious circumstances in a rural, mountainous area of western Poland, complete with a creative resolution. But there are other very interesting aspects of the story - particularly, the odd character of the protagonist, Janina Duszejko, who is an elderly women, suffering from an undisclosed illness with strange symptoms, and has a fascination to both astrology and nature (in particular, animals). It would not be an exaggeration to call her a fanatic regarding both of these pursuits. She is also a retired English teacher and passionate admirer of William Blake, and helps a friend work out translations basically as a mental exercise. The novel is narrated by Janina and her personality quirks color the entire story.   Despite the murder plot, the novel is also very meditative - the tone is calm and solemn, philosophical, really, as issues such as free will vs. determinism and species chauvinism surface throughout. It's a wonderful and fascinating read.

For a review of the book by The Guardian, click here:  https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/sep/21/drive-your-plow-over-the-bones-of-the-dead-review 

CLEAR, by Nicola Barker

 Clear, by Nicola Barker, is an entertaining and often funny book set against a unique publicity stunt - magician David Blaine's 44-day public starvation illusion in London in 2003. Given the bizarre context of the story, the novel explores some unexpected and amusing people and events at its fringe. An interesting aspect of the novel is the male narrator, Adair, who hangs around the event basically to pick up girls. He sort of succeeds at this goal in his pursuit of Aphra, a quirky girl with a special gift of a highly sensitive sense of smell, which she uses in her work at a department store. As it turns out, she has some other secrets. His character is irritating but somewhat rings true - although his characterization is sometimes overdone. The book's style matches his character, with lots of sarcastic asides and pseudo self-reflection. The story does take a poignant turn late in the novel.  Overall, the novel is rather light but often entertaining and worth a read for that.

For a review of the book by The Guardian, click here: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2004/sep/18/featuresreviews.guardianreview19 

 

STATION ELEVEN, by Emily St. John Mandel

 I have reviewed a few "COVID" novels, novels written during the pandemic or at least thematically related to the pandemic, for example, Orhan Pamuk's Nights of Plague and Jonathan Lethem's The Arrest. What sets Emily St. John Mandel's novel Station Eleven apart is that it was written in 2014 several years before the actual COVID outbreak. The novel is set in the dystopian aftermath of a pandemic that suddenly arose and wiped out 99% of the world's population in a very short time. Although somewhat familiar now in its depiction of a wasteland of decayed civilization populated by a ragtag set of survivors, the novel is saved from cliche in the way it intertwines the past (pre-pandemic) and present (pandemic aftermath) in an interesting narrative structure. Several characters, in particular, Arthur Leander, a professional actor who died on the eve of the start of the pandemic, and his daughter Kirsten, who was 8 years old at the time. Set in "year 20" of the new "order", the most poignant aspect of the book is the complex role of memory of "how things were" which makes the idealized past so sweet and the present both depressing but in a way bearable. The novel was serialized in a TV mini-series in 2021 in an obviously changed world from that of the book's publication in 2014. 

For a review of the book, click here: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/sep/25/station-eleven-review-emily-st-john-mandel

OH, WILLIAM, by Elizabeth Strout

 Having picked up the novel Oh, William cold, I didn't realize that it is a kind of sequel to two earlier novels by Elizabeth Strout, My Name is Lucy Barton (2016), in which Lucy is the narrator, and also a character in her novel Anything is Possible (2017). Despite reading some reviews that suggested that my lack of context might be a problem reading Oh, William without having read the other two novels, I feel that the book is quite readable without the prior context and if anything, it made for a subtler read in which I had to surmise a lot of context and history from brief allusions. At any rate, Oh, William is a beautifully written book about Lucy's complex emotional landscape and her complicated feelings toward her ex-first husband William Gerhardt.  There's also a lot in the novel about Lucy's own attempts to create a safe identity for herself, overcoming a difficult childhood and various emotional attachments over her life. It's a quiet book, full of contemplation but with moments of intensity and even occasional humor. 

Click here for a review of the book from NY Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/18/books/review/oh-william-elizabeth-strout.html

  

CASE STUDY, by Graeme Macrae Burnet

 Case Study is a novel that is centered on the concept of deceit (definitely including self-deceit) of the main characters. The story is centered on a fictional '60s-era wunderkind spokesman for the anti-psychology movement in Britain, a certain Dr. Braithwaite. The main story line is about a women (with, as we discover)  psychological problems who is the sister of one of his ex-patients who had committed suicide.   This sister initiates a contact with Braithwaite in an attempt to discover whether he is to blame for his sister's tragic end. She does to by pretending to be  "Rebecca Smith", a troubled women who is seeking therapy from Braithwaite. It's basically detective work. She becomes his patient and the book walks us through their "relationship" as patient/ therapist. It's clear that "Rebecca" doesn't have a real plan to discover the truth and finds herself caught up in the roleplay she initiates. Turns out she has her  own share of issues herself and there is some back-and-forth between "Rebecca" and the actual sister. Central to the story is the truly unlikeable character of Braithwaite, who is, basically, an arrogant ass with a despicable moral standard. But the big question is, is he a "fake"? So the theme of authenticity reverberates throughout the novel. It does have very funny and ironic moments and is quite enjoyable.

For a review of the book by Kirkus, click here: CASE STUDY | Kirkus Reviews

A SYSTEM SO MAGNIFICENT IT IS BLINDING, by Amanda Svensson

 Long-listed for the Booker Prize, "A System So Magnificent it is Blinding" is a meandering, sometimes incoherent journey into the family dynamics of triplets who have a major skeleton in the family closet that has skewed their personal and familial identity. The book presents an impossibly complicated, twisted plot as the struggles and personalities of the 3 siblings create odd situations and intra-family conflicts. Ultimately, by means of a big revelation of the truth that comes about in a convoluted and bizarre turn of events, the family reconciles itself to the truth and reconstitutes itself. Although often tiring to make sense of, the writing is clever and even beautiful at times, and worth the effort overall. To be honest, though, I did sometimes find my self pondering, "Is this really Booker Prize material?"

Click here for a review of the book from NY Times: 

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/19/books/review/amanda-svensson-system-so-magnificent-it-is-blinding.html

MY REVOLUTONS, by Hari Kunzru

 My Revolutions, Hari Kunzru's third novel, is the story of a "failed" revolutionary, a member of a radical left-wing group (think, Weather Underground) set in Britain in the late 1960s. The protagonist, Chris Carver, AKA Michael Frame, has gone "underground" for several decades as the story starts - in 1998. "Hiding in plain sight" would be a more accurate description of his situation. He is living a manufactured identity as a middle-class househusband in London. His affiliation with a radical group of revolutionaries decades earlier resulted in his having dropped out of sight as things got too hot, doing a stint in a Buddhist monastery in Thailand to detox from a heroin addiction among other adventures, before taking on a new identity. His new status quo is shaken when, on a holiday in France, he sees a women he thinks is his old companion, lover, fellow revolutionary in the old days who he presumed had been killed in the violent takeover of the West German embassy in Copenhagen years earlier. This incident, along with the unexpected and "unfortunate' meeting of someone tangentially connected with his revolutionary days precipitates a crisis. The narrative jumps back and forward in time and paints a clear picture of Chris/Michael and his current mental state as well as what he has been through. Considering the fact that the writer was actually born in 1969 and certainly had no first-hand experience in the milieu he describes so vividly, it is a believable and compelling story of a turbulent time and the reflection about it in the mind of one of its participants.

For a review of the book from the NY Times, click here: https://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/10/books/review/Blythe-t.html