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jake_evan_'s review
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
This book was fine. There were parts of this that I found very poetic and interesting but I think the main point of it is flying over my head. I think that the fear of radiation and world war as an ever present factor in the lives of people during the cold war, and war in general, was very interesting and a really nice backdrop to this parable. I will sit and think about the metaphorical meaning of Yerzhan not growing at all but as of now, it still is haunting in the sense of not knowing what weapons of war could do to our bodies and the world. Short and sweet, i liked the writing but wasn't super engaged with the story.
patchworkbunny's review
4.0
Yerzhan is a young boy, growing up on the remote steppe of Soviet Kazakhstan where nuclear weapons are tested on his doorstep. He intends to marry the girl next door, the only girl next door for miles and he has a talent for music. But when he dives into a polluted lake, the water changes him. Yerzhan will never grow into a man.
The writing is beautifully evocative, creating a vivid picture of the wildness of the steppe and the culture of Yerzhan’s family. Their life in isolation is simple and timeless, the period only set by the Cold War and its atomic legacy.
The explosions are both a horror and something in the background. Something that just is and the families get on with their everyday lives against a backdrop of dread. Uncle Shaken argues that the nuclear experiments are their communist duty; they must not be left behind the Americans, but mostly, the explosions don’t impact their simple lives as much as you would think. Not until Yerzhan goes for his swim in polluted waters. It’s interesting to think that something we would be terrified of, nuclear bombs, is just part of normal life.
Of course, it is also a story about a boy and a girl. A boy who doesn’t grow up whilst she becomes taller than her father. A boy who is left behind; a common fear of adolescence. Yerzhan also becomes obsessed with the stories of Gesar, relating them to his life.
Review copy provided by publisher.
The writing is beautifully evocative, creating a vivid picture of the wildness of the steppe and the culture of Yerzhan’s family. Their life in isolation is simple and timeless, the period only set by the Cold War and its atomic legacy.
The explosions are both a horror and something in the background. Something that just is and the families get on with their everyday lives against a backdrop of dread. Uncle Shaken argues that the nuclear experiments are their communist duty; they must not be left behind the Americans, but mostly, the explosions don’t impact their simple lives as much as you would think. Not until Yerzhan goes for his swim in polluted waters. It’s interesting to think that something we would be terrified of, nuclear bombs, is just part of normal life.
Of course, it is also a story about a boy and a girl. A boy who doesn’t grow up whilst she becomes taller than her father. A boy who is left behind; a common fear of adolescence. Yerzhan also becomes obsessed with the stories of Gesar, relating them to his life.
Review copy provided by publisher.
scottishben's review
4.0
This is one of the most unique and memorable fantastical novellas to have been published in English in recent years and it is one of the strongest novellas Pereine Press has released.
Plenty happens in this but there is probably not enough action and too much eerie darkness and reality in this for many mainstream Fantasy fans but for those who are interested in a modern fable set in a part of the world (Kazakhstan) not many westerners know much about they are in for a treat.
Its a wonderful translation and the prose is poetic and yet also efficient and looks at the damaging consequences of nuclear testing and the arms race with USA on a remote part of the former USSR.
Plenty happens in this but there is probably not enough action and too much eerie darkness and reality in this for many mainstream Fantasy fans but for those who are interested in a modern fable set in a part of the world (Kazakhstan) not many westerners know much about they are in for a treat.
Its a wonderful translation and the prose is poetic and yet also efficient and looks at the damaging consequences of nuclear testing and the arms race with USA on a remote part of the former USSR.
remigves's review
emotional
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
siria's review
3.0
Via the framing device of a tale told on a long train journey across Kazakhstan, The Dead Lake tells the story of Yerzhan, a virtuoso violinist raised on the steppes whose body has been perpetually stunted thanks to the repeated nuclear testing carried out by the U.S.S.R. near his childhood home. Hamid Ismailov's novella reads like a folk tale, and his conjuring up of the rhythm of life in the vast grasslands of central Asia, with its continuities stretching across centuries, was for me one of the most pleasurable parts of The Dead Lake. The other was his framing of the nuclear testing as a nameless, mythical horror—inexplicable events whose full ramifications are clearly not understood by Yerzhan and his family at the time.
I never found myself warming to any of the characters, though, and particularly not the central character, Yerzhan. His fits of angry, jealous possessiveness towards his childhood sweetheart, Aisulu, were offputting, especially in a work which otherwise concentrates more on allegory than emotion.
I never found myself warming to any of the characters, though, and particularly not the central character, Yerzhan. His fits of angry, jealous possessiveness towards his childhood sweetheart, Aisulu, were offputting, especially in a work which otherwise concentrates more on allegory than emotion.
andrew61's review
5.0
This is an astonishing novella which at 122 pages is full of lyricism and poetry, traditional tales, music and the modern day horror of nuclear testing. An intro tells the reader that from 1949 to 1989 468 nuclear explosions were tested in a test site in the Kazakh steppes. This story tells of Yerzhan a 27 year old man who looks like a 12 year old boy whom the narrator meets on a train selling yoghurt and playing his violin. He then tells the story of his and his families exposure to nuclear radiation. Part folk tale with magical elements it has a love story within it and a picture of the traditions of the Steppes. An excellent read giving a snapshot of a region the size of Europe devastated by nuclear testing. Yerzhan is a interesting hero who like Oscar in The Tin Drum is a man in the body of a child who in a chilling scene has bathed in the Dead Lake of the title, his love interest Aisulu who lives with the family next to his in two isolated huts on the side of the remote railway is also affected. I would recommend this book and given its length I am tempted to read it again before it goes back to the library.
la_karina1818's review
emotional
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
A fantastical take on a novel based on Semipalatinsk, a nuclear weapons testing site and the effects of radiation on civilians around the site. Told like a biography of sorts by an unknown narrator, he meets Yerzhan, a man who remains with the body of a 12 year old boy after going into a radioactive lake to impress his childhood love. It has a fast flow to the story, realistic yet fantastical in a setting from either a sci-fi or a dystopia (reminds me of a book like the Kite runner, a mix of the imaginations of children, told in a dangerous setting). It was charming to read at the beginning, but towards the ending the telling of the story got dislluded, as the narrator travelling with Yerzhan begins telling his story instead of Yerzhan continuing. The ending was left a bit abrupt, with the narrator getting emotional over the depth of Yerzhan's story and how he physically remains stuck in time but mentally living through decades of his life, losing loved ones in the process. Maybe at the end there wasn't much to tell after, as he remains alone in the world, where he has come to learn to deal with his condition. It was a quick and impactful read for sure.
anywiebs's review
4.0
This was an impressive tale of a young boy and his family living next to the railway station and a nuclear bomb testing area.
I was drawn in by the narration, trying to solve the mystery of the young man's history and the style of the narration.
I was drawn in by the narration, trying to solve the mystery of the young man's history and the style of the narration.
s0laris's review
challenging
emotional
informative
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
3.5