A review by eveningreverie
Parasol Against the Axe by Helen Oyeyemi

challenging mysterious slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I’m reeling from Parasol Against the Axe. The city of Prague, the various versions of the meta-textual novel multiple characters read and talk about (Paradoxical Undressing), and the various characters and their backstories themselves are all equally as perplexing. Oyeyemi's use of language is dense and simultaneously light. Paradox upon paradox, mazes and more mazes. The plot at the heart of the novel is thematically strong and interesting at its core, but the ways Oyeyemi spins these characters in circles and have the thing they were just looking at suddenly be different is mirrored in at least four different textual layers. This is remarkably dense, and doesn't feel like it until you look back and wonder "what the hell is going on?"

Ripe for thematic picking-apart but decidedly not for the faint of literary heart. At times I felt reminded of du Maurier and McEwan and they way they write about Venice. Upon rereading, I guarantee my rating would change, though I honestly don't know if it would go up or down. This is a confounding novel. The ending made me cry, even though I wasn't fully sure why. 
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