A review by mahela
Ice: 50th Anniversary Edition by Anna Kavan

challenging dark mysterious slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

This is a strange book. Doris Lessing said "There is nothing like it" and this might be true, but I'm not sure whether it's a positive or negative thing. It was very difficult for me to read. Until the very end I never really felt myself at home in this book, and perhaps that is the intended effect of the novel. The topic this novel deals with is heavy: an approaching global climate disaster (a new ice age), and a man (the narrator) who is possessed by the thought of an unnamed "girl" - possessed, to be more precise, of the thought of possessing her. The plot seems to go in circles, the man perpetually chasing the girl, sometimes there are experimental episodes, which a page later appear to be fantasies of the narrator (?). Very unhinging, hard to grasp what's what, and as I said, probably that's intended. Overall I had to force myself to read this novel to the end. That's never a good sign. The afterword partly helped understand where this style of Kavan's comes from, but it didn't make up for my reading impression. I guess to appreciate "Ice" you have to prepared for and appreciate its experimental style, and I wasn't and I don't.
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