Take a photo of a barcode or cover
thebobsphere 's review for:
Batlava Lake
by Adam Mars-Jones
I’ve always vowed to never have expectations when reading a book but I let my guard down. As I have just read the excellent My Cat Yugoslavia and it sparked off a hankering to read books based in Kosovo, I was excited to read Batlava Lake as that is situated in Kosovo. Let’s say I didn’t get what I wanted.
Barry is an engineer and he, and a group of men are located to Kosovo. With the exception of little discussions about the wa, Mar-Jones goes deeper and Batlava Lake is more a stream of consciousness dialogue about weighty topic.
The narrative voice, is one of a working class man. He’s very masculine in his outlook. At the point of the book he is divorced from is wife and has a shaky relationship with his children. Saying that, throughout the book there are glimpses about his past loves, his current situation and his semi racist views.
What I saw here is that Mars-Jones is giving the reader a portrait of a certain type of mentality, complete with attitudes. To be honest I felt that the book was a bit weak, mainly due to it’s narrator. Barry is quite blokey and after a while it grates. I don’t mind stream of consciousness writing but here it got a bit on my nerves. Batlava Lake is not a bad book but it is lacking. I have heard that Adam Mars-Jones has better books so if this is one misfire, then it’s an ok one. I’ve read much worse.
Barry is an engineer and he, and a group of men are located to Kosovo. With the exception of little discussions about the wa, Mar-Jones goes deeper and Batlava Lake is more a stream of consciousness dialogue about weighty topic.
The narrative voice, is one of a working class man. He’s very masculine in his outlook. At the point of the book he is divorced from is wife and has a shaky relationship with his children. Saying that, throughout the book there are glimpses about his past loves, his current situation and his semi racist views.
What I saw here is that Mars-Jones is giving the reader a portrait of a certain type of mentality, complete with attitudes. To be honest I felt that the book was a bit weak, mainly due to it’s narrator. Barry is quite blokey and after a while it grates. I don’t mind stream of consciousness writing but here it got a bit on my nerves. Batlava Lake is not a bad book but it is lacking. I have heard that Adam Mars-Jones has better books so if this is one misfire, then it’s an ok one. I’ve read much worse.