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aegagrus's reviews
72 reviews
Autobiography of Red by Anne Carson
3.5
In terms of literary craft, Autobiography of Red is a tour de force. Carson writes gorgeous sentences, careful and serpentine or elegant and clipped. The frame device with which she brackets her story is highly inventive. She has a keen eye for vignettes. She treats her classical source material with a reverent unorthodoxy.
As a coming-of-age story, Autobiography of Red dwells on interiority. Geryon muses on the gap between his internal and external worlds; the novel captures this fixation by consistently creating a sense of dreamlike disconnect. Photography, philosophy, and volcanoes are all interesting motifs Carson finds ways of applying to this theme. I enjoyed the subtlety with which Carson treats Geryon's wings, as well. Many queer coming-of-age stories directly center the awkwardness of holding a non-normative identity. Here the wings, always present but rarely the focal point and only occasionally noticed, are an effective way of striking at the quieter ways that we carry identities with us (without neglecting a more direct discussion of queer experiences, which the novel also provides).
I preferred the first half of Autobiography of Red to the second half. As Geryon travels to South America, Carson gets somewhat bogged-down in the trope of foreign-travel-as-self-discovery. The unfamiliar landscapes. The cultural barriers. The final, climactic moment of finding self-knowledge in the traditional beliefs of a far-away people. Carson sometimes does interesting things with these tropes, but none of this is quite up to the standards of her earlier work. Some of the characters, notably Herakles, suffer in being transplanted to a novel environment (the young adult Herakles being far more exaggerated and far less interesting than the adolescent Herakles). None of this is really necessary. While Carson's prose is far from dense, her conceptual work is extremely dense, meaning that there are many compelling directions the story could have gone without getting a bit muddled and losing some urgency by getting into the business of this sort of travel narrative.
Though this change of direction is a drawback, in my opinion, the novel's concluding portions are hardly "bad", and the lasting impressions this book is likely to leave with me are much more likely to reflect its many virtues than its one significant defect.
As a coming-of-age story, Autobiography of Red dwells on interiority. Geryon muses on the gap between his internal and external worlds; the novel captures this fixation by consistently creating a sense of dreamlike disconnect. Photography, philosophy, and volcanoes are all interesting motifs Carson finds ways of applying to this theme. I enjoyed the subtlety with which Carson treats Geryon's wings, as well. Many queer coming-of-age stories directly center the awkwardness of holding a non-normative identity. Here the wings, always present but rarely the focal point and only occasionally noticed, are an effective way of striking at the quieter ways that we carry identities with us (without neglecting a more direct discussion of queer experiences, which the novel also provides).
I preferred the first half of Autobiography of Red to the second half. As Geryon travels to South America, Carson gets somewhat bogged-down in the trope of foreign-travel-as-self-discovery. The unfamiliar landscapes. The cultural barriers. The final, climactic moment of finding self-knowledge in the traditional beliefs of a far-away people. Carson sometimes does interesting things with these tropes, but none of this is quite up to the standards of her earlier work. Some of the characters, notably Herakles, suffer in being transplanted to a novel environment (the young adult Herakles being far more exaggerated and far less interesting than the adolescent Herakles). None of this is really necessary. While Carson's prose is far from dense, her conceptual work is extremely dense, meaning that there are many compelling directions the story could have gone without getting a bit muddled and losing some urgency by getting into the business of this sort of travel narrative.
Though this change of direction is a drawback, in my opinion, the novel's concluding portions are hardly "bad", and the lasting impressions this book is likely to leave with me are much more likely to reflect its many virtues than its one significant defect.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Physical abuse, Sexual assault, and Sexual content
Margery Kempe by Robert Glück
3.0
It wouldn't be hard to dismiss Margery Kempe as "lots of sex, interspersed with bouts of profundity". It wouldn't be an inaccurate description of what reading this book feels like, either. It would, however, be a crude and unfair simplification.
Glück's central device is parallel description of a 20th-century relationship between two men and (an imaginative retelling of) 15th century English mystic Margery Kempe's relationship with an embodied Jesus Christ. Tying the two together, the narrator is a party to the first relationship and also an authorial character, describing the second relationship as he undertakes to write about it.
Margery Kempe succeeds in exploring a number of themes connected to queer love and identity: the particular frustration of wanting a relationship to be something it cannot be (whether metaphysically or socially proscribed), the role of lust in forming interpersonal attitudes, and the impossible but very real need to feel validated in a (sexual, but also spiritual) relationship. Jesus is a particularly interesting character -- elusive, capricious, intermittently cruel -- adding a depth to Margery's feelings in their own right.
Glück also probes the idea of dissolving the distinction between Margery and the narrator, both experiencing frustrated longing. Here, though, he falters. Attempting to blur the lines, he ends up spending disproportionate time on Margery (in ways that can feel quite repetitive) and directly describing the other relationship only elliptically. This is a shame, because L., the object of the narrator's desire, seems to be an interesting character in much the same way Jesus is an interesting character. It's also a shame because Glück hints at dwelling on many contemporary presences in the story -- his narrator's Jewishness, or AIDS -- but is unwilling to commit enough time to the "present" to go very far with these ideas, preferring instead to explore as much as possible by proxy through long descriptions of Margery and her world. Sometimes this approach succeeds, but I can't help feeling that the work as a whole would have more interesting places to go if more effort was devoted to establishing one of the worlds Glück ultimately wants us to feel dissolving into each other. As I've noted, the writing when it comes to Margery's part of the story could easily be tightened up, making room for more narrative time spent in our world.
Glück's central device is parallel description of a 20th-century relationship between two men and (an imaginative retelling of) 15th century English mystic Margery Kempe's relationship with an embodied Jesus Christ. Tying the two together, the narrator is a party to the first relationship and also an authorial character, describing the second relationship as he undertakes to write about it.
Margery Kempe succeeds in exploring a number of themes connected to queer love and identity: the particular frustration of wanting a relationship to be something it cannot be (whether metaphysically or socially proscribed), the role of lust in forming interpersonal attitudes, and the impossible but very real need to feel validated in a (sexual, but also spiritual) relationship. Jesus is a particularly interesting character -- elusive, capricious, intermittently cruel -- adding a depth to Margery's feelings in their own right.
Glück also probes the idea of dissolving the distinction between Margery and the narrator, both experiencing frustrated longing. Here, though, he falters. Attempting to blur the lines, he ends up spending disproportionate time on Margery (in ways that can feel quite repetitive) and directly describing the other relationship only elliptically. This is a shame, because L., the object of the narrator's desire, seems to be an interesting character in much the same way Jesus is an interesting character. It's also a shame because Glück hints at dwelling on many contemporary presences in the story -- his narrator's Jewishness, or AIDS -- but is unwilling to commit enough time to the "present" to go very far with these ideas, preferring instead to explore as much as possible by proxy through long descriptions of Margery and her world. Sometimes this approach succeeds, but I can't help feeling that the work as a whole would have more interesting places to go if more effort was devoted to establishing one of the worlds Glück ultimately wants us to feel dissolving into each other. As I've noted, the writing when it comes to Margery's part of the story could easily be tightened up, making room for more narrative time spent in our world.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual content, Blood, Excrement, and Medical content
Moderate: Sexual assault, Antisemitism, and Alcohol
Minor: Homophobia
Reservation Blues by Sherman Alexie
I was part of the way through this book before I was informed of the Sherman Alexie's history of sexual harrassment. I elected to finish reading, for a few reasons, but I will not assign a star rating and almost certainly won't return to this book.
Detatched from that context, Reservation Blues is pretty good. It's quite funny. As a reader who is not Amerindian, sometimes I laughed because the humor is universal. At other times I laughed because I knew I didn't quite get it, and that experience gap creates its own awkward humor. The book's dominant mood, though, is elegiac. Alexie succeeds at conveying a surreal, wistful sadness weaving through a mileu which blends many forms of remembering: songs, stories, histories, dreams, imagination, and memories are all essential. Some of the dream sequences are particularly interesting, notably those conveying Fr. Arnold's spiritual/ethnic angst and various characters' historical demons.
While the plotting is competent, the novel's overall construction leaves something to be desired. A few too many ideas are explored but never fully developed. Though magical realism always involves unpredictable characters (or entities?), the best magical realism never makes the reader feel that the genre is being used to avoid constructing well-rendered characters; this book sometimes does.
Detatched from that context, Reservation Blues is pretty good. It's quite funny. As a reader who is not Amerindian, sometimes I laughed because the humor is universal. At other times I laughed because I knew I didn't quite get it, and that experience gap creates its own awkward humor. The book's dominant mood, though, is elegiac. Alexie succeeds at conveying a surreal, wistful sadness weaving through a mileu which blends many forms of remembering: songs, stories, histories, dreams, imagination, and memories are all essential. Some of the dream sequences are particularly interesting, notably those conveying Fr. Arnold's spiritual/ethnic angst and various characters' historical demons.
While the plotting is competent, the novel's overall construction leaves something to be desired. A few too many ideas are explored but never fully developed. Though magical realism always involves unpredictable characters (or entities?), the best magical realism never makes the reader feel that the genre is being used to avoid constructing well-rendered characters; this book sometimes does.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Suicide, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Death, Sexual violence, Blood, Police brutality, Grief, Abortion, Cultural appropriation, Colonisation, and War
The Violent Bear It Away by Flannery O'Connor
3.5
Early in The Violent Bear it Away, I thought it was going to be a story about the ulterior motives and personal stakes lying behind ideologies (including but not exclusively religious ones). Certainly this book has a lot to say about the ways human beings use and abuse the vulnerable. But it soon became clear that this is not a story about well-defined motivations. This is a story about madness, irrationality, compulsion, mental disability -- it is difficult to find the right word(s), in part because of the immense gap between the way such phenomena were discussed in Francis Tarwater's milieu and the way they are discussed in our own.
The best I can say is this: this is a story about running away from some interior force perceived as mad or dangerous; about a child's path through resistance, dissociation, trauma, and eventually surrender. This is also a story about the intense and sinister fixation people can have towards those perceived as disabled; a fixation especially present in those who fear for their own psyche in some way. The terrifying but nuanced descriptions of both the schoolteacher Rayber's and Tarwater's feelings towards Rayber's son Bishop represent this theme at its most direct. The religious backdrop adds depth to O'Connor's themes, but I do not think it is in fact their core.
It is difficult to assess this book. Rayber's internal dialogue is sometimes difficult to believe in its mercurial intensity, but this is perhaps less a defect than a thematic element. O'Connor's trademark southern gothic style certainly infuses her writing with a rugged elegance and a palpable sense of danger, but also carries with it episodes which read as seemingly gratuitous, as well as the inescapable questions of racial tropes and racist language. The book is exceptionally well written, but not always well constructed.
At the end of the day, I suspect I will find The Violent Bear it Away as difficult to think about and talk about as I found it to read. This in itself is not a bad thing, but as a warning for those embarking upon this book it seems inescapable.
The best I can say is this: this is a story about running away from some interior force perceived as mad or dangerous; about a child's path through resistance, dissociation, trauma, and eventually surrender. This is also a story about the intense and sinister fixation people can have towards those perceived as disabled; a fixation especially present in those who fear for their own psyche in some way. The terrifying but nuanced descriptions of both the schoolteacher Rayber's and Tarwater's feelings towards Rayber's son Bishop represent this theme at its most direct. The religious backdrop adds depth to O'Connor's themes, but I do not think it is in fact their core.
It is difficult to assess this book. Rayber's internal dialogue is sometimes difficult to believe in its mercurial intensity, but this is perhaps less a defect than a thematic element. O'Connor's trademark southern gothic style certainly infuses her writing with a rugged elegance and a palpable sense of danger, but also carries with it episodes which read as seemingly gratuitous, as well as the inescapable questions of racial tropes and racist language. The book is exceptionally well written, but not always well constructed.
At the end of the day, I suspect I will find The Violent Bear it Away as difficult to think about and talk about as I found it to read. This in itself is not a bad thing, but as a warning for those embarking upon this book it seems inescapable.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Death, Mental illness, Racial slurs, Racism, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Abandonment
Moderate: Child abuse, Gun violence, Pedophilia, Rape, Fire/Fire injury, and Alcohol
The Golden Rhinoceros: Histories of the African Middle Ages by François-Xavier Fauvelle
3.0
François-Xavier Fauvelle's tone is expansive and grand, but in truth his project is a modest one. To his credit, he is deeply conscious of the limitations of his source material, and does not present extrapolations as fact. Fauvelle is able to draw out a few important observations, principally about the complexities of commercial relationships between the medieval Arabian and African worlds: the diversity of religious factions involved (heterodox Muslims such as Ibadis, Jews, and local Christian polities), the importance of certain trade goods (salt, cowries), and the degree to which many of these exchanges linked populations with minimal to no knowledge of one another through sophisticated legal arrangements with intermediaries.
However, almost inherently The Golden Rhinoceros fails to live up to its promise as a work of narrative history, both dealing with a fairly narrow set of sources and venturing fairly limited arguments about those sources. Interestingly enough, the vignettes in archaeological (and paleographical) methodology surrounding the sources were more effective. I came away with a better appreciation for the strange dynamics of archaeology in the colonial world, and some of the physical and cultural barriers to effective excavations (for instance in the section on Ethiopian monoliths and monasteries). Though in some ways peripheral to the book Fauvelle is trying to write, these discussions found the book at its most compelling. If Fauvelle had embraced his opportunity to make interventions here, and made these sections and themes his central focus, I think his book would have come out as a more essential contribution.
However, almost inherently The Golden Rhinoceros fails to live up to its promise as a work of narrative history, both dealing with a fairly narrow set of sources and venturing fairly limited arguments about those sources. Interestingly enough, the vignettes in archaeological (and paleographical) methodology surrounding the sources were more effective. I came away with a better appreciation for the strange dynamics of archaeology in the colonial world, and some of the physical and cultural barriers to effective excavations (for instance in the section on Ethiopian monoliths and monasteries). Though in some ways peripheral to the book Fauvelle is trying to write, these discussions found the book at its most compelling. If Fauvelle had embraced his opportunity to make interventions here, and made these sections and themes his central focus, I think his book would have come out as a more essential contribution.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Slavery, Colonisation, and War
Glossolalia and the Problem of Language by Nicholas Harkness
3.75
Harkness makes several persuasive arguments. His discussion of the "language ideology" giving justification to Korean glossolalic practice is compelling (cleverly asking why glossolalists understand their activities in terms of language). His chapter on the connection between glossolalia and evangelical theology is extremely interesting, focusing on the evangelical emphasis on the Word as an entity which is eternal, but actively moves and travels amongst peoples. Notable here is the distinction he raises between a Presbyterian megachurch, which sees the Word as "inversely related" to earlier forms of divine intervention (i.e., argues that miracles become obsolete once the Gospel is received in its fullness), and a Pentecostal megachurch, which argues that the Word travels via narration and belief, and participating in this travel (e.g. through glossolalia) is necessary to tap into the metaphyiscal power of "nonrational" promises of the bible. Lastly, Harkness sheds light on the group dynamics of glossolalia -- the deep ambivalence and mixed emotions glossolalia brings up among Korean Christians, and the way in which it becomes a tool for navigating large-scale public prayer events, demonstrating public participation while also occluding the content of one's dialogue with the divine from other participants. Occasionally Harkness' conclusions on these themes suffer from being excessively esconsed in academic jargon and conceptual artifice, but his major points are clear.
Some parts of Harkness' work feel somewhat disconnected from his main theme, and certainly from his chosen title. When he discusses the process of translation during a "crusade" held by Billy Graham in Seoul, the issues surrounding heterodox/"heretical" Korean sects and extreme practices like the laying-on of hands, and the particular spiritual and socioeconomic concerns of Korean Christians, his discussion does not always feel essential to the book's putative theme. One almost feels that this book would have been more effective as a contextual discussion of many of the charismatic and evangelical practices which pervade Korean protestantism. Alternately, Harkness could have devoted more ink to explaining the ways in which his (fascinating and very appropriate, but somewhat idiosyncratic) case study relates to the broader practice of glossolalia.
Some parts of Harkness' work feel somewhat disconnected from his main theme, and certainly from his chosen title. When he discusses the process of translation during a "crusade" held by Billy Graham in Seoul, the issues surrounding heterodox/"heretical" Korean sects and extreme practices like the laying-on of hands, and the particular spiritual and socioeconomic concerns of Korean Christians, his discussion does not always feel essential to the book's putative theme. One almost feels that this book would have been more effective as a contextual discussion of many of the charismatic and evangelical practices which pervade Korean protestantism. Alternately, Harkness could have devoted more ink to explaining the ways in which his (fascinating and very appropriate, but somewhat idiosyncratic) case study relates to the broader practice of glossolalia.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Suicidal thoughts and Suicide attempt
Minor: Death and Colonisation
Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino
3.75
Calvino's classic work of speculative fiction is a sojourn in the borderlands between physical and conceptual space. The book serves as a catalogue of ideas, full to bursting with imagined cities. Most of Calvino's conceits are compelling, though not all. Occasionally the through-line feels missing, but most of the time things seem to have been strung together quite elegantly. Interspersed between the fantastical ideas are realistic ones, but these are cast in an equally unfamiliar and strange light -- a trick which is particularly successful at germinating thought. Sometimes Calvino's descriptions employ women's bodies in uncomfortable ways, but the symbolism is still (generally) appreciated.
A reader might find themselves a little underwhelmed when searching for broad takeaways. The metaphor of the constantly iterating chess game captures something of the piece's character. The symbols deployed are ambiguous, and it is difficult to remember every combination of moves. The collection as a whole captures something meaningful, if ephemeral.
The stronger takeaway, for me, is rooted in the frame narrative, a dialogue (or lack thereof) between Marco Polo and Kublai Khan. Here Calvino's work is at its most cohesive and challenging, posing questions about the difference between speculation and experience, the nature of understanding, and the project of communicating that understanding. The communicators experiment with their give and take, touching on both the easy universality of experience and the absurd impossibility of subjective description. The latter in particular is imbued with a real wistfulness which generally engrosses the reader.
A reader might find themselves a little underwhelmed when searching for broad takeaways. The metaphor of the constantly iterating chess game captures something of the piece's character. The symbols deployed are ambiguous, and it is difficult to remember every combination of moves. The collection as a whole captures something meaningful, if ephemeral.
The stronger takeaway, for me, is rooted in the frame narrative, a dialogue (or lack thereof) between Marco Polo and Kublai Khan. Here Calvino's work is at its most cohesive and challenging, posing questions about the difference between speculation and experience, the nature of understanding, and the project of communicating that understanding. The communicators experiment with their give and take, touching on both the easy universality of experience and the absurd impossibility of subjective description. The latter in particular is imbued with a real wistfulness which generally engrosses the reader.
After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory by Alasdair MacIntyre
4.0
Not going to comment here on the argument as such, but I was quite impressed by the book's rhetorical structure.
The Index of Self-Destructive Acts by Christopher Beha
2.5
As a story about lives and careers and relationships, The Index of Self-Destructive Acts mostly succeeds. Beha's writing is sharp and his narrative voice is versatile. He quite capably creates tension and orchestrates drama. His characters are generally interesting.
The Index is also a more ambitious project, however, and here it is less successful. Beha tries to explore empiricism and belief, but when his characters expound on these themes they become caricatures. Their worldviews are a little too strident and a little too simple and a little too predictable. The ways in which their worldviews are challenged by events are, in turn, a little too neat. As social commentary, The Index also stumbles, largely because its depiction of the political and economic atmosphere of 2009 is not always believable. Redemption is handled somewhat better as a theme, but even here the most interesting moments are not those in which the theme is most directly addressed.
While Beha is to be commended for his ambition, his book is at its best in its least ambitious moments. Fortunately, there are many such moments, where the reader can easily enjoy the book without the clunky philosophical baggage. The Index is a reasonably compelling read in such moments, even if taking a step back and thinking about the book as a whole is generally a cause for dissatisfaction, if not frustration.
The Index is also a more ambitious project, however, and here it is less successful. Beha tries to explore empiricism and belief, but when his characters expound on these themes they become caricatures. Their worldviews are a little too strident and a little too simple and a little too predictable. The ways in which their worldviews are challenged by events are, in turn, a little too neat. As social commentary, The Index also stumbles, largely because its depiction of the political and economic atmosphere of 2009 is not always believable. Redemption is handled somewhat better as a theme, but even here the most interesting moments are not those in which the theme is most directly addressed.
While Beha is to be commended for his ambition, his book is at its best in its least ambitious moments. Fortunately, there are many such moments, where the reader can easily enjoy the book without the clunky philosophical baggage. The Index is a reasonably compelling read in such moments, even if taking a step back and thinking about the book as a whole is generally a cause for dissatisfaction, if not frustration.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness and Medical content
Moderate: Alcoholism, Death, Infidelity, Racism, Car accident, and Suicide attempt
HHhH by Laurent Binet
4.75
Almost any review of HHhH will start with a phrase like, "ostensibly a historical novel..." before qualifying that Binet's project is not, in fact, what it appears to be at the outset. Or, not only that. To avoid retreading ground, I'll simply say that this is a story about storytelling. Specifically, a story about telling the story of the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, which took place in Prague, on the 27th of May, 1942.
Binet's subject matter exerts a palpable magnetism. The reader experiences this magnetism, almost physically. We describe an elliptical orbit. At the nearest apsis, our orbit is at its most rapid; the writing is terse and decisive. At the furthest apsis, our orbit elongates; the writing is contemplative, digressive, even hesitant. Circling back and forth between the apsides, we find ourselves drawn back towards recurrent points. When Binet writes about the intense pull his material holds on him, we feel it too.
While hurtling around his story, Binet comments upon his relationship with this object of his obsession. For all of the moments in which he seems to be fully subsumed, there are other moments in which we imagine him snapping back to focus, rubbing his eyes, and remembering the distance at which he stands. We hear him bemused, skeptical, frustrated, and anxious about the story he is telling. Despite pouring his whole being into his task, he can also take a step back. Each of these modes is essential to the book.
Most importantly, the magnetism births a sense of obligation. Not only does he have to tell this story, he has to honor it. He knows he cannot solve every dilemma which comes up in fictionalizing history. He also knows that he cannot do justice to the memory of all those he feels a need to honor; he cannot properly memorialize the countless and forgotten ghosts of those who justly fought and sacrificed. Nor, however, can he in good faith consign them to oblivion. He has to try. Here Binet is at his most provocative and most essential. This is not a manual for how to treat the past. It is a rejoinder to those of us who treat it carelessly.
There are less lofty points on which HHhH also deserves praise. Many episodes are fast-paced and exciting. Political dynamics are described with surprising nuance. And so on. The only real criticism I have is that Binet's artifice occasionally gets the better of him. At times he seems more interested in being witty than he is in deep reflection. Still, most of the time his observations -- even the pithy ones -- are not only substantial but fresh and stimulating. If you are at all interested in historical memory, or in storytelling as a craft, you should read this book.
Binet's subject matter exerts a palpable magnetism. The reader experiences this magnetism, almost physically. We describe an elliptical orbit. At the nearest apsis, our orbit is at its most rapid; the writing is terse and decisive. At the furthest apsis, our orbit elongates; the writing is contemplative, digressive, even hesitant. Circling back and forth between the apsides, we find ourselves drawn back towards recurrent points. When Binet writes about the intense pull his material holds on him, we feel it too.
While hurtling around his story, Binet comments upon his relationship with this object of his obsession. For all of the moments in which he seems to be fully subsumed, there are other moments in which we imagine him snapping back to focus, rubbing his eyes, and remembering the distance at which he stands. We hear him bemused, skeptical, frustrated, and anxious about the story he is telling. Despite pouring his whole being into his task, he can also take a step back. Each of these modes is essential to the book.
Most importantly, the magnetism births a sense of obligation. Not only does he have to tell this story, he has to honor it. He knows he cannot solve every dilemma which comes up in fictionalizing history. He also knows that he cannot do justice to the memory of all those he feels a need to honor; he cannot properly memorialize the countless and forgotten ghosts of those who justly fought and sacrificed. Nor, however, can he in good faith consign them to oblivion. He has to try. Here Binet is at his most provocative and most essential. This is not a manual for how to treat the past. It is a rejoinder to those of us who treat it carelessly.
There are less lofty points on which HHhH also deserves praise. Many episodes are fast-paced and exciting. Political dynamics are described with surprising nuance. And so on. The only real criticism I have is that Binet's artifice occasionally gets the better of him. At times he seems more interested in being witty than he is in deep reflection. Still, most of the time his observations -- even the pithy ones -- are not only substantial but fresh and stimulating. If you are at all interested in historical memory, or in storytelling as a craft, you should read this book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Genocide and Antisemitism
Moderate: Death, Gun violence, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Car accident, and Murder
Minor: Sexual content