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mariah13's review against another edition
dark
emotional
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
chillcox15's review against another edition
4.0
Kilalea is really bursting onto the scene with this one; she has an idiosyncratic idea that she pursues here about writing, which I would describe as a layering of sense details (often sound, appropriately for a novel about a concert pianist) rather than an adherence to plot or narration. While I didn't personally love this, I really respect Kilalea's stand for something unique over a safely narrated debut novel, and I'm excited to see what's next.
linesuponapage's review against another edition
4.0
OK, Mr. Field reminded me of a Woody Allen movie. Mr. Field, a concert pianist's career ends when he is involved in a train accident. His loss of purpose made me sad. The book was emotionally deep and telling by how depressed Mr. Field was while missing his wife. The writing was superb. Katharine Kilalea creates a world that no one in their right mind would want to live in by choice if not fighting a mental health issue. The social contact that Mr. Field avoids, on the whole, is painful and I understand how he ends up in that hole that he can't dig out of until he chooses too. The joy we read when he has visitors is a fleeting moment and again, such a sad reality hits you when he walks back into his dream home. If this is dreaming, I call it more a nightmare. His Journey is like the house he lives in - dwindling and uncontrollably shifting.
If you love books like Sinclair's Rabbit Run or Don Delillo's White Noise, you will enjoy this book. It definitely takes a certain high-level reader to make it through the whole book. I loved the emotional journey you take with Mr. Field. It's my book.
If you love books like Sinclair's Rabbit Run or Don Delillo's White Noise, you will enjoy this book. It definitely takes a certain high-level reader to make it through the whole book. I loved the emotional journey you take with Mr. Field. It's my book.
abiggail's review against another edition
As hard as I tried I could not enjoy this book. I found myself just reading words and sentences but not a story. While there is no real plot to the book it’s not quite introspective either. None of his thoughts carry any weight or significance, which makes it impossible to invest any emotional attachment or much less any empathy for him. No real or remotely interesting thoughts are thought, no important dialog said, nothing heavy to make you think, no drama that needs resolved, and the few people in the story have no real significance. Everything just is… but nothing is given a valid reason
bookapotamus's review against another edition
3.0
I'm not really sure how to describe this book. It's very odd, a bit sad, somewhat quirky, extremely claustrophobic, and very unnerving. It made me feel uncomfortable, and I do believe that may have been it's intention.
Mr. Field is losing his mind. He's a trained concert pianist in London until horrible train accident shatters his wrist and he can no longer play as he did. He becomes a recluse, his partner leaves him, and the entire story told from inside a mind that is slowly losing it's grip on reality. There aren't really many other characters aside from Mim, who left, and an odd obsession he has with his new home's former owner, but again, it's all in his head. Any interactions, conversations, are stemmed from a mind gone mad.
There's a big deal about the house he purchases, a character in itself, one that is designed like LeCorbusier's Villa Savoye (if you google it, you'll probably recognize it if you know art and architecture at all). I found this part interesting though, being an artist, but I didn't really connect with the house as I believe intended. The house is sort of the beginning of the end, as he's first introduced to it's architectural uniqueness staring at a photo in a newspaper, just minutes before the train accident.
I thought the writing was exquisite, but the musings of a mad man were rambling and obsessive (understandably - the point I suppose) and I didn't like feeling uncomfortable, and thought it was a bit uninteresting and somewhat boring at a times.
Mr. Field is losing his mind. He's a trained concert pianist in London until horrible train accident shatters his wrist and he can no longer play as he did. He becomes a recluse, his partner leaves him, and the entire story told from inside a mind that is slowly losing it's grip on reality. There aren't really many other characters aside from Mim, who left, and an odd obsession he has with his new home's former owner, but again, it's all in his head. Any interactions, conversations, are stemmed from a mind gone mad.
There's a big deal about the house he purchases, a character in itself, one that is designed like LeCorbusier's Villa Savoye (if you google it, you'll probably recognize it if you know art and architecture at all). I found this part interesting though, being an artist, but I didn't really connect with the house as I believe intended. The house is sort of the beginning of the end, as he's first introduced to it's architectural uniqueness staring at a photo in a newspaper, just minutes before the train accident.
I thought the writing was exquisite, but the musings of a mad man were rambling and obsessive (understandably - the point I suppose) and I didn't like feeling uncomfortable, and thought it was a bit uninteresting and somewhat boring at a times.
mads_reads20's review against another edition
4.0
Very odd book,
A tale of a man losing his mind as the house seems to crumble around him. Exploring the idea of loneliness and a grasp for anything to cure the hole left by that perpetual feeling of loneliness.
It contained beautiful language and metaphors and all round seemed in my opinion to be a metaphor for a man losing himself to depression.
Despite enjoying it i felt as though it was a book that lacked a beginning ending or even a middle, like a clip from someones life and gone as quickly as it came.
I do recommend reading though, the odd sad aura and confusing fever dream like writing was enjoyable as well as perplexing
A tale of a man losing his mind as the house seems to crumble around him. Exploring the idea of loneliness and a grasp for anything to cure the hole left by that perpetual feeling of loneliness.
It contained beautiful language and metaphors and all round seemed in my opinion to be a metaphor for a man losing himself to depression.
Despite enjoying it i felt as though it was a book that lacked a beginning ending or even a middle, like a clip from someones life and gone as quickly as it came.
I do recommend reading though, the odd sad aura and confusing fever dream like writing was enjoyable as well as perplexing
baram's review
emotional
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
tense
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
3.25
frankies_bookshelf's review
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
1.0
ronanmcd's review
emotional
relaxing
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
I am reminded of Camus' l'Étranger.
There's a mechanical nature to the character and, by association, the plot. He just does things or lets them happen, as though the universe and fate are just pulling him along, as though he has no agency.
This is made explicit early on when his automaton-like piano playing ruins a recital. He is said to be unfeeling in his playing.
The house is an echo of his mechanical nature - it's a "machine for living". But the house is not the real thing, it is itself an echo or homage in the way the book feels like it is to l'Étranger. Both even feature beaches at either end of teh African continent.
Everything just occurs. Like clockwork. One thing after another. It makes for a strange reading experience. I found myself skipping sentences, knowing they would be inconsequential as the book moves along with its on momentum.
There's a mechanical nature to the character and, by association, the plot. He just does things or lets them happen, as though the universe and fate are just pulling him along, as though he has no agency.
This is made explicit early on when his automaton-like piano playing ruins a recital. He is said to be unfeeling in his playing.
The house is an echo of his mechanical nature - it's a "machine for living". But the house is not the real thing, it is itself an echo or homage in the way the book feels like it is to l'Étranger. Both even feature beaches at either end of teh African continent.
Everything just occurs. Like clockwork. One thing after another. It makes for a strange reading experience. I found myself skipping sentences, knowing they would be inconsequential as the book moves along with its on momentum.
nini23's review against another edition
reflective
4.0
OK, Mr Field is an astonishingly accomplished experimental debut by Katharine Kilalea. I alighted on this short novel from another (Is Mother Dead) that was bleeding emotion from out the pages and it was cool relief. As this Guardian review (https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/jul/19/ok-mr-field-katharine-kilalea-review) points out, it's rare for a debut female writer not to include some autofiction or self-identifying elements into the fictional characters. As it was, I spent part of the time feeling a little quizzical about the author's intention. For example, there is a bizarre section where the male protagonist is at the beach with his wife who has taken off her top and he imagines the areola to be eyes. Suddenly everywhere he looks, the women's breasts are winking at him. Is Kilalea toying with the idea of male gaze or is this a surreal hallucination betraying his mental state? The same goes for even the title. Depending on the inflection and tone, is it meant to be read as exasperation or condescension in the vein of 'Ok, boomer' or in a concerned manner as the protagonist keeps being asked by a hallucinatory voice of his landlady whether he is ok.
Mr Field is decidedly not ok. He is a concert pianist who after a somewhat disastrous performance in London, England gets into a train accident requiring surgery on his hand due to fractures. With the compensation money, he decides to rent a villa in Durban, South Africa with his wife Mim. At some point in the narrative, Mim leaves him.
Without looking at the author's bio, it is evident that she is a poet. The choice of words and sentence structure is very deliberate with wordplay and recurrent motifs. As the protagonist is a classical musician, he is sensitive to the rhythm of his surroundings such as the sounds of nearby construction and raindrops. Certain scenes such as that of the room of the landlady he stalks are presented as if beholding a still life painting. Architecture, classical music with particular emphasis on Chopin's works, art and the plumbing of loneliness blend to present an intriguing intellectual puzzle for the reader.
One of the more memorable passages was the one where he is attempting to play Chopin's Raindrop Prelude after his surgery. Due to the particular requirements of the piece requiring the striking of the same note with varying degrees of strength, his post-surgery hand is unable to accomplish the effect. The non-injured hand becomes independent, decouples from the other hand and seemingly Mr Field's control, and proceeds to musically concernedly seduce the injured hand. Another surreal scene includes a rider on a horse with the author prepping us beforehand about the similarity in sound between writer and rider. Whole swaths of time appear to pass by even with important events cloaking the novel in a dreamlike state.
In some ways, OK, Mr Field is opaque in contrast to contemporary novels which are quite upfront about their themes and foci. After reading some reviews like https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/katharine-kilalea-ok-mr-field-review-brilliantly-funny-debut-novel-1.3550957 and https://www.thisissplice.co.uk/2018/06/04/a-room-for-fantasy-katharine-kilaleas-ok-mr-field/, I went back to reread the first section, in particular paying more attention to the architectural description of the house he rented and noting the motif of doppelgänger, not only with buildings but later on with another character. I also asked myself why I wasn't reacting more strongly to some elements of the story that I would normally find objectionable. Being a piano player myself (though not at concert performance level), I enjoyed the descriptions of classical music and digressions such as speculation of the emotion that Chopin had waiting for George Sand in the piece. Are there Bernhardian influences with repetition and an obsessed male character displaying little self-insight? Two books that come to my mind which may be comparables are Saint Sebastian's Abyss and Peaces: A Novel.
All in all, this is a thought-provoking cleverly constructed novel that has gone under the radar.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Stalking
Moderate: Injury/Injury detail and Mental illness
Minor: Animal death