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3.69 AVERAGE
3.69 AVERAGE
Only just spotted one of the jokes. Read across the end of the Chambon book. Felt clumsy at times within its own conceit
A funny, clever, weird, disturbing, and utterly horrifying masterpiece.
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Well, what can be said about this short but intense novel that hasn’t already been said? It’s an obvious statement that it’s a strange reading experience. Already at page 3 the author describes the confusion that grips the narrator (“Wait a minute. Why am I walking backward into the house? What is the – what is the sequence of this journey I’m on? What are its rules? Why are the birds singing so strangely? Where am I heading?”), and that perfectly illustrates the confusion that the reader experiences. When you start reading the book, you know that it tells the story of a life in reverse order, but to experience it sentence by sentence, page by page as a reader is another matter.
I don’t know about you, but I experienced quite a few mood swings: I found Amis’s procedure quite nice and ingenious at first, and enjoyed the constant game of deciphering (by reversing the order) what Amis described. But after a while this continuous effort started to bother me and I even found it banal, edging boring. Until I realized that what was described was anything but banal: the main character is a German Nazi doctor, Odilo Unverdorben, - the name alone – who was active in the Holocaust industry and was able to escape to America afterwards (I am now telling it in the ‘wrong/right’ order). Indeed, anything but banal, which is why you often only realize after a while how horrible what you have just read is, while just before you were smiling at the irony of what Amis describes (Jews walking out healthy and well after ‘treatment’ in the gas chamber, for example). If anything meets the definition of the word ‘mindfuck’ (pardon my French), then this is it.
But is this a successful book? I dare not answer that with an unequivocal yes or no. Ingenious and sometimes downright hilarious, certainly. But also excessively intense, and therefore at times even long-winded. If you are into meta-layers, then you have to give Amis credit for beautifully showing how constructed storytelling in general is, or how treacherous it is to simply describe actions, separated from their meaning. Or: how the eternal ethical-philosophical theme of free will is very much tied to the direction of time, and therefore loses its meaning when that direction is changed (or simply reversed). Well done, Mr. Amis. However, I cannot say that I enjoyed reading this book very much: it was hard work, sometimes got on my nerves, and the existential relevance (which is always important to me) seemed far-fetched. Finally: this is an experimental novel par excellence. But I do wonder whether Amis, following J.L. Borges a bit, would not have been better off limiting himself to a novella?
I don’t know about you, but I experienced quite a few mood swings: I found Amis’s procedure quite nice and ingenious at first, and enjoyed the constant game of deciphering (by reversing the order) what Amis described. But after a while this continuous effort started to bother me and I even found it banal, edging boring. Until I realized that what was described was anything but banal: the main character is a German Nazi doctor, Odilo Unverdorben, - the name alone – who was active in the Holocaust industry and was able to escape to America afterwards (I am now telling it in the ‘wrong/right’ order). Indeed, anything but banal, which is why you often only realize after a while how horrible what you have just read is, while just before you were smiling at the irony of what Amis describes (Jews walking out healthy and well after ‘treatment’ in the gas chamber, for example). If anything meets the definition of the word ‘mindfuck’ (pardon my French), then this is it.
But is this a successful book? I dare not answer that with an unequivocal yes or no. Ingenious and sometimes downright hilarious, certainly. But also excessively intense, and therefore at times even long-winded. If you are into meta-layers, then you have to give Amis credit for beautifully showing how constructed storytelling in general is, or how treacherous it is to simply describe actions, separated from their meaning. Or: how the eternal ethical-philosophical theme of free will is very much tied to the direction of time, and therefore loses its meaning when that direction is changed (or simply reversed). Well done, Mr. Amis. However, I cannot say that I enjoyed reading this book very much: it was hard work, sometimes got on my nerves, and the existential relevance (which is always important to me) seemed far-fetched. Finally: this is an experimental novel par excellence. But I do wonder whether Amis, following J.L. Borges a bit, would not have been better off limiting himself to a novella?
Very nearly a masterpiece, but I'm not sure it holds together as well as I wanted it to. The narrator seems alternatingly clueless and self-aware of his time-reversing point-of-view, as it suits the narrative. The style of relaying events took some getting used to, but one does get there. It does lead to some hilarious moments, as in the Chapter 3 opener. Here, our narrator and his study travel by taxi in NYC. It happens in reverse though, so our narrator describes seeing people gather in the rain "to salute this fine service". Moments such as this abound - some poignant, others humorous - but in the novel's climactic moments I found the device fell a little short. I shall not spoil it, though the publishers do their best in the blurb. The novel's necessarily intricate construction requires some thought to process completely, however, and all of the above could be subject to revision following a re-read. Perhaps, if I can clear away my to-read pile by the summer, I shall make another pass through.
3.5/5
3.5/5
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
funny
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Loved this one a lot more than Money & The Zone of Interest.
challenging
dark
This fucked with my brain in a way you can’t even imagine.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Genocide, Gore, Hate crime, Infidelity, Mental illness, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Excrement, Vomit, Antisemitism, Medical content, Medical trauma, Abortion, Suicide attempt, Murder, Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, War, Injury/Injury detail
challenging
dark
sad
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
challenging
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Second half of this book wasn’t so good. Bit of a slog for me.