A review by pagesofpins
The Confabulist by Steven Galloway

3.0

Galloway did a masterful job of blending the facts of Houdini's incredible life with fiction. We switch from the third person narrative of Houdini's career, affairs, and political intrigues to the first person narrative of the man who killed him (twice) and is now losing his memory in his old age (his memory is being replaced by confabulations, memories that never happened). Martin Strauss' narrative isn't nearly as strong as Houdini's throughout, and though the ending (that Martin has projected all the failures of his life onto Houdini's life, and his confabulated memories are the real ones) provides some food for thought, Martin's telling could have used a lot more depth, much more of why he cares so much about the people he has repressed because he can't handle his own failures. As it is, Strauss' life is conspicuously blank throughout the book, and I predicted the ending before the big reveal.