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3.54 AVERAGE
3.54 AVERAGE
Perhaps this is just a "pearls before swine" situation, but wow! That was a long, mostly annoying, book of nothing.
"I could feel, almost physically, the tide of respect sweeping towards me" (201).
The narrator traipses through a waking nightmare in which time management becomes impossible. His endeavours to solve all problems are doomed to fail.
Alice in Wonderland in a small European town with an elitist penchant for classical music and the main character is a man having marital issues. this is a fever dream and an introvert’s nightmare – SO interesting. But then that ending - not victorious or even tragic, just as if it all were for nothing.
challenging
funny
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
many thoughts & none, most of which i don’t feel fully qualified to explore! it was tedious, it was uneasy, it doubled back on itself, a true study in absurdism! both reminiscent of & unlike ishiguro’s other novels, one i felt unprepared for despite being familiar with his voice. did not enjoying every moment of reading, but i am grateful and happy to have done so! a magnificent dream state, hallucination of two days, akin to twilight zone or maybe uncanny valley, of course kafka & also camus. i will be thinking about this unfamiliar-familiar town & brodsky’s injury / the collected albums / the maneuverings of space time !
Just not in the right place right now to read. Might try again later.
Two of my favorite writers happen to be Japanese. I find their style to be musical, brain-altering, and satisfying on a level I can't really describe. Ishiguro and Murakami both seem to write novel after novel, variations on a theme. The Remains of the Day, The Unconsoled, and When We Were Orphans follow the same subtle narrative thread. He seems to be working on something stuck in his craw. I believe When We Were Orphans to be the artistic culmination of this exercise...but the raw psychological power and eerie surrealism in The Unconsoled makes this version my favorite.
This is by far the most enjoyable/unique /sophisticated fiction that I have read through and keep my curiosity constantly high enough to engage with the dream like narrative, which were portrayed in this book. The genius Kazuo Ishiguro escaped his go to narrative style, and used a bit unorthodox dream like narrative style to take me a vivid journey of a renowned pianist intense yet confusing experience on his visit to a family yet not familiar town.
First person narrative style generously offered the rich context and deliberate details of emotion to perceive what ever happened with the other person, memories and situations that the Pianist encounter. From the point he entered the hotel, to the point of having a buffet breakfast on the circled trams with the utterly confused and climactic outcome, we are filled with unimaginable of details revolutionaries.
From my point of view, the author buried various puzzles for reader to speculate the missing dots or confusion parts of the storylines, like the Mr. Ryder’s relationship between Sophia and Gustave, Ryder’s childhood memories with Fiona, the quite miscalculated expectations of his parents visit, and jolly circle trams that comforted him to fade out his outmost the recent devastated lost of family bond/connections with Sophia and Boris, and many other plots. Maybe they portrayed the dream-like imagination from the Ryder’s mind, or even exposing his hidden amnesia condition, or even reality with intentional hided plots, whichever we can follow, gave the reader the final judgment to come to term with their confusions with their own perceptions and speculations to form a peaceful consumption. I loved it, I am glad to journey this book brought me into.
First person narrative style generously offered the rich context and deliberate details of emotion to perceive what ever happened with the other person, memories and situations that the Pianist encounter. From the point he entered the hotel, to the point of having a buffet breakfast on the circled trams with the utterly confused and climactic outcome, we are filled with unimaginable of details revolutionaries.
From my point of view, the author buried various puzzles for reader to speculate the missing dots or confusion parts of the storylines, like the Mr. Ryder’s relationship between Sophia and Gustave, Ryder’s childhood memories with Fiona, the quite miscalculated expectations of his parents visit, and jolly circle trams that comforted him to fade out his outmost the recent devastated lost of family bond/connections with Sophia and Boris, and many other plots. Maybe they portrayed the dream-like imagination from the Ryder’s mind, or even exposing his hidden amnesia condition, or even reality with intentional hided plots, whichever we can follow, gave the reader the final judgment to come to term with their confusions with their own perceptions and speculations to form a peaceful consumption. I loved it, I am glad to journey this book brought me into.
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Loveable characters:
No