Reviews and Comments

logan williams

logan@bookwyrm.social

Joined 4 years, 7 months ago

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Karl Ove Knausgaard: Wolves of Eternity (2023, Penguin Random House)

The future is no more, and eternity has begun.

It's 1986 and a nuclear reactor …

Less melodramatic than The Morning Star

like The Morning Star, there was one character here who felt straight out of My Struggle (Syvert). The novel dwells in his perspective most of the time, which was at first felt revelatory, and then began to drag solipsistically... just like The Morning Star and My Struggle. I think the first Syvert section could have been edited down to 1/2 or 1/3 of its 400 pages without losing much. But Knausgaard has always been a bit Proustian.

The middle half was wonderful, a subplot straight from Richard Power's The Overstory with the thrilling conclusion of an essay on immortality and Russian cosmism. A little too cute with tying the different narratives together, but this is often the case. (Certainly in The Overstory too!)

Kurban Said: Ali and Nino (2000, Anchor Books)

A reprint of a love story of two childhood friends, a Muslim warrior and a …

Hard to read as beautiful

Read while in Georgia recently, fascinating historical backdrop, understandably unrelatable characters. I didn't love the translation, rhythm felt off. I think it could use a new one, maybe would help find the beauty I didn't see.

Elif Batuman: Either/or (Hardcover, 2022, Penguin Publishing Group)

Selin returns to Harvard for her sophomore year, spends lots of time thinking about Ivan, …

collecting pieces, turning them sideways to fit

"Was that what a novel was: a plane where you could finally juxtapose all the different people, mediating between them and weighing their views?"