This is simply one of the greatest reading experiences I’ve had in my life. This is literature of the highest order from a writer unsurprisingly spoken about in Nobel terms; it’s arguably the greatest novel published so far this century (translated from the Romanian by Sean Cotter).
To summarize a plot would not do it any justice but maybe The New York Times came closest with “an endlessly strange study of existence and the longing to escape it.”
If you’re interested in any of the following: Surrealism, Lovecraftian cosmic horror, sublime nature writing, Philosophy, Mystery, bildungsroman, reverence to other great writers: Kafka, Borges, Bruno Schulz… humor, whimsy, depth… then you’re in for the largest of treats; there’s nothing that this book does not have.
At well over 600 pages it skips by, and I cannot wait to go back and read it again.
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF 2022 by the New Yorker, Publishers Weekly, The Financial Times, Words Without Borders
A highly-acclaimed master work of fiction from Mircea Cartarescu, author of Blinding, Solenoid is an existence (and eventually a cosmos) created by forking paths.
Based on Cartarescu's own experience as a high school teacher, Solenoid begins with the mundane details of a diarist's life and quickly spirals into a philosophical account of life, history, philosophy, and mathematics. The novel is grounded in the reality of Romania in the late 1970s and early 1980s, including frightening health care, the absurdities of…
I’m not normally one for biographies but I read two excellent ones this year (the other being Ruth Franklin’s Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life). This one though, the excellent telling of the life of one of Philosophy’s, and indeed Literature’s, greatest practitioners, the titan that was Frederick Nietzsche, I simply have to call attention to.
Meticulously researched, scholarly but never stuffy, it makes the life of Nietzsche an intellectual page-turner, recommended not only for fans of the great thinker, but anyone curious about one of the most remarkable intellectuals we were lucky to have tread our planet.
The Times Biography of the Year Longlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize 2019
'Outstanding.' The Sunday Times
'A revelation.' Guardian
'Wonderful.' The Times
'Riveting.' New Statesman
Friedrich Nietzsche's work rocked the foundation of Western thinking, and continues to permeate our culture, high and low - yet he is one of history's most misunderstood philosophers. Sue Prideaux's myth-shattering book brings readers into the world of a brilliant, eccentric and deeply troubled man, illuminating the events and people that shaped his life and work. I Am Dynamite! is the essential biography for anyone seeking to understand Nietzsche: the philosopher who foresaw -…
I’ll discuss James Lee Burke with anyone who wants to, but I’ll not hear a bad word said about the guy.
In fact, I probably won’t really listen to anyone, because I’ll be too busy gushing over what an amazing writer he is. You’d think after so many (twenty? thirty?) Robichaeux books that the luster would wear off. No siree, Dave Robicheaux could well take the award for my favorite fictional character of all time, and James Lee Burke the trophy for one of the great stylists working in any genre.
Black Cherry Blues (an early Robicheaux outing) is another one of his books that is more than just a detective/crime novel; Burke always gives you so much more. If you want to read one of America’s greatest writers, go back to the beginning and read everything he’s ever done. See if you’re not impressed. He transcends genre. Long may he run.
The third highly acclaimed novel in the Dave Robicheaux series, and winner of the Edgar award.
Personal tragedy has left Dave Robicheaux close to the edge. Battling against his old addiction to alcohol and haunted nightly by vivid dreams and visitations, Dave finds his only tranquillity at home with his young ward Alafair. But even this fragile peace is shattered by the arrival of Dixie Lee Pugh who brings with him a brutal trail of murder and violence.
Robicheaux reluctantly agrees to help out his old friend but becomes more involved than he bargained for when he finds himself suspect…
A woman whose life is upended when her husband and son disappear in a mysterious plane crash is left alone with an unnerving home robot.
In near-future Japan, Susie Sakamoto is mourning the loss of her husband and son to a plane crash. She spends her days drinking heavily and taking her anger out at the only “sentient” thing left in her life: Sunny, the annoying home robot her husband designed. She despises Sunny, and sometimes even gets the feeling that Sunny is out to hurt her.
Her quest is to try to find "The Dark Manual," to shut it down and save her own sanity... but that’s easier said than done and she’s thrust into a world she’d never known.
