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junko's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
nini23's review against another edition
2.0
The Society of Reluctant Dreamers, is about people who dream and are dreamed of, in unusual ways in Angola, South Africa, Cuba and Brazil. Translated from Portuguese, I found the phrases and imagery chosen to be rather cliche at times e.g. Her image continued to float, a sailboat among the tall waves, on the stormy sea that my life had become. This is José Eduardo Agualasa's seventeenth novel, I read an old interview of his where he states that English Anglo readers have little access and exposure to works in Portuguese and French. Hopefully with the increasing popularity of translated works, this has changed.
Embedded in this is the political history of Angola, colonialism under Portuguese rule, specific events like the Cuban military intervention in 1975, revolutionary resistance. Mr Agualusa does not spoonfeed the reader with relevant background information, which I like; it was up to me to read up on Sevimba and UNITA and untangle statements like "No comrade, you on one side, the puppets of imperialism, supported by South African racists; and the socialist comrades on the other, along with the proletariatan internationalists."
Some of the story is in epistolary form; both our narrator Daniel Benchimol and Rainbow hotel owner Hossi Apolónio Kaley in Cabo Ledo, Angola keep journals and the journal entries are how we readers follow happenings. Of the dreamers, I was most interested in Hossi Kaley's story. He was a UNITA Secret Services agent but defected after the killing of his family. Struck by lightning, he lost parts of his memory but started appearing in the dreams of others in his vicinity wearing a purple coat. When sent to Cuba to recuperate, the Cuban intelligentsia tried to coerce him into using his unique ability for their purposes - communicating messages via dreams. Daniel Benchimol dreams of people and events that eventually occur, such as the lady artist Moira Fernandez whose photos are in the camera he found. Moira Fernandez lives in Cape Town, South Africa and exhibits staged photos of her dreams. It's hinted she's an 'alpha' dreamer who can broadcast her dreams and she jokes about setting up a "republic of dreamers." A neuroscientist enlists her help in sleep studies to render into images the dreams of study participants. The last 'dreamer' Karinguiri I found the least interesting, the teen daughter of Daniel, full of idealistic dreams, gets thrown in prison for throwing bloody Monopoly money on the Angolan president.
Unfortunately, in my opinion, this novel suffered from the male gaze. It seemed overly fixated on breasts ("I'd marry a dark skinned woman with small breasts and wide hips....", "Dona Filó had her enormous breasts leaning against the steering wheel", "She had breasts in full bloom, full and hard, ...", "The dark stage, the naked woman, with her shriveled breasts hanging down over her belly.") At least two instances of blatant fat-shaming ("...unpleasant, enormously fat woman,...", "One of the police officers, an obese young woman, who barely fit into her uniform, ...."). The females Ava and Moira in the plot seem to exist to serve the sexual and emotional needs of the male protagonists while the menfolk are doing their heroic resistance and mystery solving; none of the women exhibit any depth or dimension. Moira, the artist, for example likes to wander around naked in her photos. Why? What's her motivation? Daniel Benchimol dreams of having sex with her and even superimposes her face on a pair of Jamaican contortionist twins to have sex with in his dreams. He's also an absentee father who has no clue who his daughter's friends are and has time to fly to chase skirt while daughter is locked up in prison.
Speaking of said daughter, contrary to the author's intention of making her and her group inspiring and sympathetic, I found them young, foolish and playing at being revolutionaries. It started to read like a YA fantasy where a group of seven young greenhorn idealists manage to accomplish with their amateur tactics what experienced hardened guerrillas have not managed for decades despite massive loss of lives to their cause. I don't buy the sequence of events that led to the President's resignation and downfall; if he could be cowed by international pressure and the people's wishes, the country wouldn't be where it was for decades. As well, the quick wrapping up of 'All's well ends well" belies the shallow treatment of the issues at hand. I was reading a current non-fiction article on Tunisia, birthplace of the Arab Spring. The dictator is no longer in power but unemployment, inflation and poverty rates are higher than ever. It was obvious too that the author favoured Karinguiri, I never had any trepidation that she was in any real danger from the authorities with plot armor to protect her. Heck these 'kind' authorities even offer her a scholarship to study in Lisbon. **mild spoilers ahead*** Sure enough, she continues her charmed life at a beach idyllic locale after that brief foray into activist protest adventuring.
The section on identity was interesting with a character asserting " You can change your passport. You can't change your identity." Daniel Benchimol is conspicuously referred to as "my Angolan friend" by his love rival as a put-down. A discussion of some of our greatest writers follows which I loved: is Clarice Lispector Ukrainian (left Ukraine as an infant) or Brazilian, does Nabokov write from a Russian perspective even when he writes in English, is Coetzee South African or Australian. I think the relevant dissection is which mantle of cultural/racial/nationalist identity with which authors wield their almighty pens and voices, invariably permeating into their works. Which brings it back full circle when Mr Agualasa is hailed as an Angolan author yet his parents are "white Portuguese settlers" (his own words). He is writing about the brutal years of Portuguese colonialism, the independence civil war in Angola between different paramilitary groups backed by foreign intervention and the lingering aftermath of colonialism.
https://sites.tufts.edu/atrocityendings/2015/08/07/angola-war-of-independence-post-war-consolidation/
https://www.theroot.com/a-white-journalist-discovers-the-lie-of-portugal-s-colo-1790854283
Embedded in this is the political history of Angola, colonialism under Portuguese rule, specific events like the Cuban military intervention in 1975, revolutionary resistance. Mr Agualusa does not spoonfeed the reader with relevant background information, which I like; it was up to me to read up on Sevimba and UNITA and untangle statements like "No comrade, you on one side, the puppets of imperialism, supported by South African racists; and the socialist comrades on the other, along with the proletariatan internationalists."
Some of the story is in epistolary form; both our narrator Daniel Benchimol and Rainbow hotel owner Hossi Apolónio Kaley in Cabo Ledo, Angola keep journals and the journal entries are how we readers follow happenings. Of the dreamers, I was most interested in Hossi Kaley's story. He was a UNITA Secret Services agent but defected after the killing of his family. Struck by lightning, he lost parts of his memory but started appearing in the dreams of others in his vicinity wearing a purple coat. When sent to Cuba to recuperate, the Cuban intelligentsia tried to coerce him into using his unique ability for their purposes - communicating messages via dreams. Daniel Benchimol dreams of people and events that eventually occur, such as the lady artist Moira Fernandez whose photos are in the camera he found. Moira Fernandez lives in Cape Town, South Africa and exhibits staged photos of her dreams. It's hinted she's an 'alpha' dreamer who can broadcast her dreams and she jokes about setting up a "republic of dreamers." A neuroscientist enlists her help in sleep studies to render into images the dreams of study participants. The last 'dreamer' Karinguiri I found the least interesting, the teen daughter of Daniel, full of idealistic dreams, gets thrown in prison for throwing bloody Monopoly money on the Angolan president.
Unfortunately, in my opinion, this novel suffered from the male gaze. It seemed overly fixated on breasts ("I'd marry a dark skinned woman with small breasts and wide hips....", "Dona Filó had her enormous breasts leaning against the steering wheel", "She had breasts in full bloom, full and hard, ...", "The dark stage, the naked woman, with her shriveled breasts hanging down over her belly.") At least two instances of blatant fat-shaming ("...unpleasant, enormously fat woman,...", "One of the police officers, an obese young woman, who barely fit into her uniform, ...."). The females Ava and Moira in the plot seem to exist to serve the sexual and emotional needs of the male protagonists while the menfolk are doing their heroic resistance and mystery solving; none of the women exhibit any depth or dimension. Moira, the artist, for example likes to wander around naked in her photos. Why? What's her motivation? Daniel Benchimol dreams of having sex with her and even superimposes her face on a pair of Jamaican contortionist twins to have sex with in his dreams. He's also an absentee father who has no clue who his daughter's friends are and has time to fly to chase skirt while daughter is locked up in prison.
Speaking of said daughter, contrary to the author's intention of making her and her group inspiring and sympathetic, I found them young, foolish and playing at being revolutionaries. It started to read like a YA fantasy where a group of seven young greenhorn idealists manage to accomplish with their amateur tactics what experienced hardened guerrillas have not managed for decades despite massive loss of lives to their cause. I don't buy the sequence of events that led to the President's resignation and downfall; if he could be cowed by international pressure and the people's wishes, the country wouldn't be where it was for decades. As well, the quick wrapping up of 'All's well ends well" belies the shallow treatment of the issues at hand. I was reading a current non-fiction article on Tunisia, birthplace of the Arab Spring. The dictator is no longer in power but unemployment, inflation and poverty rates are higher than ever. It was obvious too that the author favoured Karinguiri, I never had any trepidation that she was in any real danger from the authorities with plot armor to protect her. Heck these 'kind' authorities even offer her a scholarship to study in Lisbon. **mild spoilers ahead*** Sure enough, she continues her charmed life at a beach idyllic locale after that brief foray into activist protest adventuring.
The section on identity was interesting with a character asserting " You can change your passport. You can't change your identity." Daniel Benchimol is conspicuously referred to as "my Angolan friend" by his love rival as a put-down. A discussion of some of our greatest writers follows which I loved: is Clarice Lispector Ukrainian (left Ukraine as an infant) or Brazilian, does Nabokov write from a Russian perspective even when he writes in English, is Coetzee South African or Australian. I think the relevant dissection is which mantle of cultural/racial/nationalist identity with which authors wield their almighty pens and voices, invariably permeating into their works. Which brings it back full circle when Mr Agualasa is hailed as an Angolan author yet his parents are "white Portuguese settlers" (his own words). He is writing about the brutal years of Portuguese colonialism, the independence civil war in Angola between different paramilitary groups backed by foreign intervention and the lingering aftermath of colonialism.
https://sites.tufts.edu/atrocityendings/2015/08/07/angola-war-of-independence-post-war-consolidation/
https://www.theroot.com/a-white-journalist-discovers-the-lie-of-portugal-s-colo-1790854283
sandral's review against another edition
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
franciscalmr's review against another edition
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
antonioctcg's review against another edition
5.0
Não são raras as vezes em que as coisas bonitas nascem do acaso. Por acaso este livro foi-me oferecido este Natal por ser "a minha cara" mas não achei nada dele a não ser o título giro e a capa gira. Por acaso, por trás do título giro e da capa gira está uma reflexão bordada a ouro da política, da vida e da morte. Senhor Agualusa irei ler mais, por acaso!!!
creativeinminds's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
mysterious
fast-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
amandar9fa2f's review against another edition
4.0
Surreal political fable.
Angolan journalist, Daniel Benchimol, comes across a mango-yellow camera floating in the sea. The camera belongs to Moira, the Cotton-Candy-Hair-Woman. Daniel hasn’t met Moira yet, but he has been dreaming about her. They meet and become involved with a Brazilian neuroscientist creating a machine to photograph people’s dreams.
While Daniel’s dreams are visions of the future, his student daughter dreams of a better future for Angola.
Written in a fabulist style, The Society of Reluctant Dreamers blurs the boundaries between dreams and reality. Agualusa’s inventiveness is compelling, but his characters’ reliance on aphorisms appears lazy.
For me, a bonus with reading the novel is that it has considerably enhanced my appreciation of the political environment of Angola.
Be warned: substantial chunks of the text are in italics.
My thanks to NetGalley and publisher, Steerforth Press, for the ARC.
Angolan journalist, Daniel Benchimol, comes across a mango-yellow camera floating in the sea. The camera belongs to Moira, the Cotton-Candy-Hair-Woman. Daniel hasn’t met Moira yet, but he has been dreaming about her. They meet and become involved with a Brazilian neuroscientist creating a machine to photograph people’s dreams.
While Daniel’s dreams are visions of the future, his student daughter dreams of a better future for Angola.
Written in a fabulist style, The Society of Reluctant Dreamers blurs the boundaries between dreams and reality. Agualusa’s inventiveness is compelling, but his characters’ reliance on aphorisms appears lazy.
For me, a bonus with reading the novel is that it has considerably enhanced my appreciation of the political environment of Angola.
Be warned: substantial chunks of the text are in italics.
My thanks to NetGalley and publisher, Steerforth Press, for the ARC.
mylogicisfuzzy's review against another edition
4.0
As the title suggests, this is a book about dreams and dreamers. Set in present day Angola, it deals with the country’s difficult past while being hopeful about the younger generations bringing in a better future. Although I found its surrealism a little bit messy at times, it was also compelling, unique and a very good read.
After a difficult day in court divorcing his wife, fifty-something journalist Daniel Benchimol goes to a beach hotel for a long swim. While in the water, he finds a waterproof camera and dreamlike photographs featuring Cotton-Candy-Haired-Woman who has appeared in his own dreams. She turns out to be a Mozambican artist Moira who stages her own dreams in her art and after the two meet, Moira goes to Brazil to work with Helio, a neuroscientist who records people’s dreams. Moira helps him turn these recordings into films.
Back in Angola, Daniel befriends Hossi, owner of the beach hotel who was once an interrogator for revolutionary guerrillas. After a near death experience, Hossi no longer dreams but has appeared in other people’s dreams as the man in a purple coat. Daniel, like many Angolans who have lived through the many political upheavals is apathetic about politics and current affairs. This changes after his daughter Karanguiri, a student activist, stages a protest with a group of friends that ignites the country, as if waking it up after a long sleep.
This is my first book by Jose Edoardo Agualusa, only after I finished reading it did I learn that he also wrote The General Theory of Oblivion, which sounded very intriguing but I never got around to reading. I will correct this soon. I also learned that Agualusa based the novel on real events – Karanguiri’s protest was inspired by a real group of protesters, for example and reading the book, I couldn’t help thinking that there were elements of auto-fiction here too.
I liked a lot of Agualusa’s ideas about the power of dreams and dreaming; being afraid of dreams because they expose our most intimate thoughts; inability to delineate dreams from reality; dreams turning into reality, which can be taken as a metaphor of dreaming about a better future for Angola, expressed by Karanguiri’s activisim. And despite the ending perhaps being too idealistic and some of the ideas above not being fully explored, I still think The Society of Reluctant Dreamers a really good book, one that I would recommend.
My thanks to Archipelago and Netgalley for the opportunity to read and review The Society of Reluctant Dreamers.
After a difficult day in court divorcing his wife, fifty-something journalist Daniel Benchimol goes to a beach hotel for a long swim. While in the water, he finds a waterproof camera and dreamlike photographs featuring Cotton-Candy-Haired-Woman who has appeared in his own dreams. She turns out to be a Mozambican artist Moira who stages her own dreams in her art and after the two meet, Moira goes to Brazil to work with Helio, a neuroscientist who records people’s dreams. Moira helps him turn these recordings into films.
Back in Angola, Daniel befriends Hossi, owner of the beach hotel who was once an interrogator for revolutionary guerrillas. After a near death experience, Hossi no longer dreams but has appeared in other people’s dreams as the man in a purple coat. Daniel, like many Angolans who have lived through the many political upheavals is apathetic about politics and current affairs. This changes after his daughter Karanguiri, a student activist, stages a protest with a group of friends that ignites the country, as if waking it up after a long sleep.
This is my first book by Jose Edoardo Agualusa, only after I finished reading it did I learn that he also wrote The General Theory of Oblivion, which sounded very intriguing but I never got around to reading. I will correct this soon. I also learned that Agualusa based the novel on real events – Karanguiri’s protest was inspired by a real group of protesters, for example and reading the book, I couldn’t help thinking that there were elements of auto-fiction here too.
I liked a lot of Agualusa’s ideas about the power of dreams and dreaming; being afraid of dreams because they expose our most intimate thoughts; inability to delineate dreams from reality; dreams turning into reality, which can be taken as a metaphor of dreaming about a better future for Angola, expressed by Karanguiri’s activisim. And despite the ending perhaps being too idealistic and some of the ideas above not being fully explored, I still think The Society of Reluctant Dreamers a really good book, one that I would recommend.
My thanks to Archipelago and Netgalley for the opportunity to read and review The Society of Reluctant Dreamers.