PSR's Book Blog

And so I move from a book for which there were three reviews (Ivan Klima's 'My First Loves') to this with over 700... Strange how acclaim accumulates in reading circles - rock star status for some, the cabaret circuit for others equally worthy of our praise. In terms of reputation, then, Bolaño puts me in mind of Murakami. In Bolaño's case, the fuss is merited, to some extent at least.

As ever with Bolaño, there is an extravagantly-named protagonist - Father Sebastian Urrutia Lacroix, in this case - and a large cast of extravagantly-named others, some of whom are genuine historical figures and some pure invention. It concerns the sick-bed (and possibly, death-bed) reminiscences of a Chilean priest who is also a literary critic and minor poet. The priest joins the reactionary and secretive Catholic organisation, Opus Dei, becoming its "most liberal member". The crux of the novella explores Urrutia's ambiguous relationship with Augusto Pinochet's appalling neo-Falangist dictatorship (you remember him, the friend of Margaret Thatcher..)

'By Night in Chile' is an example of the one-paragraph, stream-of-consciousness novel. In this, it's nothing new. Garcia Marquez's 'The Autumn of the Patriarch' and Bernhard's 'Old Masters' spring to mind. It does mean, though, it's unlikely to prove a good read for those who like their fiction broken up into readily consumed pieces. I found it thoroughly engaging. The compromised nature of Father Urrutia (think of Greene's 'Whisky Priest' here), the surreal and menacing nature of the episodes and some beautiful imagery compelled me to read it almost in one sitting. Well, in one lying, actually... I write this while propped up on one elbow like Urrutia himself, nursing a lower back injury...

I'm not actually going to write a review, as such. What could I say about this peerless book that hasn't been said before? As a satirical allegory and analysis of human power structures it is the most perfect book I've read. I first did so when I was thirteen or so and didn't really understand the historical/political context but I was still gripped by the power of the storytelling, reading it in a single sitting, and have revisited it numerous times since. You couldn't change a single word to improve it.

So why bother to add words to the 40,000 Goodreads reviews? Because I noticed that it's Goodreads rating is under four-stars. 3.89. What? How is that even possible? A quick comparison - 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows' (4.62), 'A Storm of Swords' (4.54), 'The Hunger Games' (4.33), 'American Gods' and 'Kafka on the Shore' (4.14)... I despair for the future of the book...

I can't disagree with Mr MJ Nicholls that 'House of Leaves' is nothing more than a glorified ghost story - ah, but what a ghost story... The playing around with page layout and fonts, the metafictions and footnotes, all make for good clean fun, adding to the enjoyment of the reading experience. And though ultimately it might have nothing much to tell us about society or the human condition, like The Babadook, it's strength lies in its story and style.

It's been reviewed nearly 9000 times already, so I'll waste no more words (there are enough of them surely in Danielewski's monster of a book). Instead, here's a door in my house which bears a spooky resemblance to something... Fortunately, it doesn't lead to the cellar as I don't possess one.

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I've ranted before about the star system here on Goodreads (all the more appropriate à propos 'Cosmicomics' with its cosmological concerns). Compared to much else out there, this is a five-star read - the sheer inventiveness, the humour, the liveliness of the prose... But how else to indicate that these stories weren't quite in the same league as 'Invisible Cities', say, or the novellas that comprise the trilogy, 'Our Ancestors'?

Anyway, here 'old Qwfwq' informs us about the origins of the universe and of life, events to which he has personally borne witness. The scenarios allow Calvino to indulge in a series of surrealist cosmic jokes. The very best of the stories did show the great man at the peak of his form. I enjoyed particularly 'The Light Years' in which messages are sent across the universe over a million centuries and 'The Aquatic Uncle' where Qwfwq's love interest falls in love with his mother's brother who happens to be a coelacanth-like fish.

No doubt, there's a philosophical point being made here about our smallness in relation to the vastness of time and the universe, but this being Calvino, he delivers it in as flippant a manner as possible. And its lineage is clear to see in Douglas Adams' 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' and his many imitators.

This is the fourth of Klíma's books that I've read and it maintains the standard of work I encountered in the others. It comprises four tales, the second and third of which are effectively novellas. As ever, in this translation, at least, they're beautifully told.

Klíma has personal experience of some of the most extreme events in recent European history and this alone lends his work heft. The first of the tales concerns first love in a Jewish ghetto where the inhabitants are awaiting transportation. Needless to say, it's a moving piece. The second tale, featuring a teenage boy's obsession with a married woman in her twenties is droll but the slightest of the pieces, reminding me of Stefan Zweig...

It is in the third and fourth tales that Klíma hits his stride, for this reader, anyway. 'The Truth Game' is something of a trial run for the novel, 'A Summer Affair', but hugely enjoyable, nonetheless, in its portrayal of romantic cynicism and political intrigue in communist Czechoslovakia. In 'The Tightrope Walkers' the narrator toys with the affections of his best friend's girlfriend who has fallen hopelessly in love with him. It illuminates a previously unseen corner in the old trope of the love triangle.

Highly recommended.

In which the genius of innovative fiction and his great friend amuse themselves through the medium of surreal detective fiction... It wouldn't be everyone's idea of a good read, but then, it's not the sort of book you'd pick up by chance. More than anything, the exercise puts me in mind of the Mortmere stories devised some years before by Christopher Isherwood and his long-term friend Edward Upward. In both cases, you can see the friends sniggering up their sleeves as they create their larger-than-life characters and farcical scenarios, relishing the opportunity to relax away from weightier projects. It's not 'Ficciones' but it's genuinely funny and engaging, saving the best of its problems for the final story.

The fantastic and the mundane combine in 'Blow-Up and Other Stories', often possessing the scorpion's sting in their tales. The best stories here make for a memorable collection. They have the quality of disturbing dreams, often with nightmare endings, the terrible realisation of the narrator in 'The Night Face Up', the grisly fate of the Kid in 'The Bestiary'. It's apparent something special lies ahead from the opening tale, 'Axolotl'.

It earns a five-star rating for the highlights. I was less keen on some of the longer pieces in Part Three. So 'The Pursuer', about the jazz man Johnny and his laconic biographer, strained too hard to be cool for my tastes. Inevitably, the wraith of Borges lurked in the shadows of the collection, but that's no bad thing in this reader's opinion.

Revelatory memoir is more the stuff of salacious serialisation in the Sunday newspapers than of breakthrough in literary approach. Anyone believing the hyperbole of the endorsements is due a disappointment, then. The description of growing up in urban Norway added nothing new to those I've read by Per Petterson or Roy Jacobsen, say, and from my perspective, not as good. It lacks the coherence to achieve the universal relevance that's claimed for it (unsurprising, given that it was apparently written at breakneck speed). And then there's that original title, which means 'Mein Kampf' in Norwegian... what is that about? Nonetheless, in the end, I enjoyed reading Knausgaard's autofiction.

While Knausgaard reveals more about those in his life than they might like, he is also unsparing of himself, which gives this book a different twist. And there are some beautiful descriptions buried among the howling cliches. For me, the final section, describing the aftermath of his father's death was the strongest and the novel accumulated power as we came to see Knausgaard the man (or, at least, the one he chose to present us with). Will I be reading the next in the series? I haven't yet decided.

So this was the fourth recommendation of Murakami that I've read... When will I learn? At this rate, I shall have ended up reading the entire oeuvre of an author for whom I have no great affinity, purely because people whose opinions I respect have recommended him. "Ah, but you haven't read 'The Wind-up Bird Chronicle' yet!" I hear my fellow readers saying. Aaargh!

I liked this more than 'Hard-boiled Wonderland' and 'Kafka on the Shore' and less than 'Norwegian Wood', which is much the strongest of his novels that I've read, from my point of view.

On the plus side, it was brief and easy to read and rather charming at times. Some of the imagery is quite beautiful, but too often, you can hear it applauding itself as it makes its entrance.

On the minus side were all the usual objections. His works are so formulaic, which might prove comforting if you happen to like the niche that he has carved for himself, I suppose. The narrator was absolutely indistinguishable from all the other twenty-something, male, cool/not cool Murakami narrators that I've encountered. Once more, there's some beautiful, unattainable, young female love interest. Inevitably, there's the sexy, older female love interest there too. Next to arrive is the listing of cultural items, which may be unaffected enthusiasm on the author's part but which comes across as showing off. Then the mystical element makes its appearance and it's New Age business as usual.

I remain unconvinced and fearful that before too long, I shall be in the company of another cool/not cool male narrator on the trail of his young and unrequited love interest... Ah, well, there'll always be that older love interest as compensation.

I discovered Klíma by accident. No one I know has ever mentioned his name to me. His books tend not to be in the stores of English retailers. And then I found a couple of his novels in a second hand bookstore. That name piqued my interest. One of the two turned out to be the excellent 'Love and Garbage'. I became a convert. A few years later, I found 'A Summer Affair' in a similar store...

This novel is tautly written and compels the reader ineluctably toward its tragic conclusion. I can imagine some readers disliking the book because they disapprove of/cannot identify with the protagonist. That's to miss the point, I feel. In the grand tradition of 'Lear', it's about folly and obsession and losing everything. We're not meant to admire David as he destroys his family, himself and his lover. The twist at the end would have more impact if Klíma hadn't botched it by signposting it too obviously, but it's still powerful.

Beyond the beautifully spare prose, there are some other nice touches. I found the switching at key moments between omniscient third person narrator and first person narrative highly effective. The characters of the two lovers were believable too. If you enjoy reading about the interplay between human relations and philosophy - the Kundera parallels become unavoidable here - then this book may be for you.

This novel is quite exceptional, a totally involving, emerging experience about life in the shadow of existence-threatening, debilitating disease. Try it, if you're feeling strong and not seeking a feelgood read.

In which we get the rambling thoughts of Reger, an 82-year-old music critic, whose irascibility is only matched by his erudition, as he sits in Vienna's Kunsthistorisches Museum before Tintoretto's 'Portrait of a White Bearded Man'. Reger hates almost everything but reserves great passion for those things he loves. The prose - in a single paragraph, a la Garcia Marquez - is hypnotic.

"...I am basically always unhappy, I am sure you understand, Reger said then. Even though this is nonsense, Reger said then..."

The narrative voice hugely reminded me of one of my favourite writers, Max Sebald. So I looked it up and found that, yes, Bernhard was a great influence on Sebald. I read the novel in the beautifully designed Penguin Central European Classics version - a pleasure in itself. The music critic as hero - this book was bound to appeal to me, then. I shall definitely be seeking out another Bernhard novel to read.

This isn't the sort of thing that I usually read. I'd seen the film, of course, and scant books often make good films. I picked up a copy in a remaindered bookshop for 50 pence and now I'm glad that I did.

An idea that I come back to time and again in my reading is that the perfect novel cannot exist. A book like 'The Stepford Wives', which uses the architecture of a suspense novel, is unlikely also to be strong on description or character. If it were, the suspense would probably be lost. But what it lacks in these aspects, it more than compensates for in the strength of the idea, its general air of creepiness and the skill with which Levin unfolds its plot.

And then there's the prose. It's written in that 1970s, post-Hemingway, pared-down style that became so ubiquitous. It reminded me of Luke Rhinehart. It's not remotely poetic but it moves the story forward in an efficient manner.

Is this a warning about the alienation that feminism might induce? Is it a satire on the infantile nature of modern masculinity? Is it an indictment of suburban existence? Who can say. Whatever else it might be, though, it's also a couple of hours well spent.

All you need to know is... this is one of the funniest books ever written.

I'm going out on a limb here... This is the most useful guide you'll find to reading material in the English-speaking world in the period from the outbreak of WW2 to the year of Orwell's dystopia. He may have had his faults as a novelist but as a critic Burgess was discerning and omniscient. I've even got two copies - one in England and one in Brittany!

What can I say about this deeply odd book?

I'd read a couple of Charles Williams' novels along time ago. They were out of print and it was fun tracking them down, before the internet destroyed the fun of hunting for books in ramshackle stores.

The fantastical story of The Place of the Lion moves along at a fair pace. Some of the strange phenomena are rather beautifully described. Beyond that? Anomalies and contradictions... Unlike his drinking partners, Tolkien and Lewis, Williams makes explicit his Christian message in his battle between Good and Evil. This stretches credence from time to time as his rather stuffy and academic characters are turned into super-heroes. It's like imagining your local vicar transformed into the Incredible Hulk. It's not really clear whether the appalling class prejudice is Williams' own or supposed to be the folly of his characters. Much of the dialogue comes straight out of a Biggles adventure and the obscurantism of the vocabulary deployed suggests the petty elitism of Will Self.

What can I say, then? You won't read anything else like it, that's for sure...