emleemay 's review for:

A Horse Walks into a Bar by David Grossman

3.0

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Here it is now – a shared flicker that no one but the two of us, I hope, can detect. You came, his look says. Look what time has done to us, here I am before you, show me no mercy.

I'm not 100% sure how I feel about this book, to be honest. Like most Booker Prize winners, it is undoubtedly very clever, but can I say I actually enjoyed reading it? Not really.

There have been a number of reviews and comments saying "I don't really like stand-up comedy, but..." or "I do like stand-up comedy so..." but I really think liking or not liking stand-up comedy has nothing to do with whether you will like this book. A stand-up routine in a comedy club in Israel works as a framing device for this story to be unveiled, but it is not funny, nor does it seem like it's supposed to be.

A comedian called Dovaleh G begins his routine to laughter and applause, but it very soon begins to fall apart as his jokes become ever less funny, ever more personal. Many themes are covered in this short book about a man falling apart on stage - friendship, betrayal, revenge, Israel, the Holocaust, to name a few.

The rambling style of narrative, punctuated by unfunny jokes, made for a difficult and tiring read. Dovaleh was sometimes too annoying to be interesting, though I will say that perseverance pays off when we finally discover the truth behind his personal angst. I think the most interesting aspect throughout - and what probably enabled me to read to the end - was the inclusion of the first person narrator in the audience. We know almost immediately that Dovaleh knows this person and that there is going to be some story behind their shared glances.

I finished the book feeling satisfied at having read it. Some books don't feel worth the effort put in to make it to the end, but I appreciated this one more when I looked back over it. It just seems wrong to give a book more than three stars when it was so difficult to push through.

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