The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa, translated by Stephen Snyder

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? A dear friend passed along this copy. Her review? “It was okay.”

Why not 3 or more stars? On an unnamed island, the titular authorities regularly disappear items from existence, making them impossible to remember or recognize. When the Memory Police begin targeting people who can still recall disappeared things, a novelist intervenes to save her editor. Red herrings abound: smuggled sculptures, a tsunami (that narrowly drowns our leads but we aren’t privy to their escape?), and strangers begging for refuge. A great story that would have been better served by a faster pace and less sterile writing (“So it was that evening came to the island.”). It was okay.

A Line in the World by Dorthe Nors, translated by Caroline Waight

3/5 stars

What's it about? Dorthe Nors explores the forces and landscape of Denmark’s northernmost coast in this contemplative collection of essays.

How’d I find it? I learned about this book through a review in Harper’s then found a copy at Normals Books & Records, which has notably good nature writing on offer.

Who will enjoy this book? Fans of Roger Deakin’s Waterlog and Mary Oliver’s Upstream should try this one.

What stood out? A Line in the World captures the Jutland Peninsula and the surrounding islands in all their diversity, cultural quirks, and violent expressions of nature. You can almost feel the windslap on your cheeks in every paragraph. The book is beautifully illustrated by Signe Parkins, who appears in the essay “The Timeless.”

Which line made me feel something? From “The Tracks around Bulbjerg:” “The eternal, fertile and dread-laden stream inside us. This fundamental question: do you want to remember or forget? Either way, something will grow. A path, a scar in the mind, a sorrow that you cannot grasp, because it belongs to someone else. All that must be carried alone. All that cannot be told.”

Tender Is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica, translated by Sarah Moses

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? Oh, the buzz! Folks have been talking about this one for some time, so I picked up a copy at Enoch Pratt Free Library.

Why not 3 or more stars? Humans are being bred for meat, and all is not what it seems. In the opening pages, slaughterhouse employee Marcos may not want to remember how this new reality came to be, but he sure does, in blunt prose that explains the world of Tender Is the Flesh. After being spoon-fed all this backstory, I figured Bazterrica had a fast-paced adventure in store. Alas, rubbing readers’ noses in the horror appears to be the ultimate goal, and the myriad ways in which characters debase and mutilate each other quickly turn gratuitous. In one particularly gross scene, the penis of a rock star is served to a game reserve proprietor who strongly channels Hannibal Lecter. Most disappointing is Jasmine, the “First Generation Pure” female gifted to Marcos. She gets no agency, no chapter, no voice, or any real opportunity to challenge the morality of this depraved system.

In a book so dark that it contains puppy murders, the yuck has to be justified. Is the turn to human meat (called “special meat”) a ploy by the government to curb population growth? What should we make of the Scavengers, the people who lurk outside the slaughterhouse hoping for scraps? Does anyone buck against the new order? What is the difference between human and food?

Do you need to read this? You don’t need to read this.

When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamín Labatut, translated by Adrian Nathan West

5/5 STARS

What’s it about? Though When We Cease to Understand the World defies easy description, think of it as a treatise about the responsibility of discovery and the cost of our species’ relentless pursuit of knowledge. Labatut takes on this theme through accounts of Fritz Haber, Karl Schwarzschild, Werner Heisenberg, Erwin Schrödinger, and other luminaries as they redefined their disciplines, be it quantum physics or mathematics. Running through the book is an undercurrent of dread as scientific breakthroughs inevitably become tools of war.

How’d I find it? Shout out to Enoch Pratt Free Library for always having the hot titles available. I strolled in to pick up a hold and there this was, waiting.

Who will enjoy this book? When We Cease to Understand the World felt like a book by Milan Kundera, one of my all-time most beloved authors. Labatut’s blend of fiction and history, use of humor, and the slipperiness of madness and obsession hearken back to the Czech master. Fans of Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer will also enjoy.

What stood out? Hot damn, this is a good one. Labatut picks apart the insularity of academic research by visiting great minds at work in the battlefields of World War I or at a sanatorium among convalescing patients, settings that highlight the loneliness and mania of genius. The blurry line between fact and fiction keeps the reader unsettled, uncertain — thoroughly effective in a book that feels like a warning.

Which line made me feel something? From the section “Prussian Blue:” “An ingredient in Dippel’s elixir would eventually produce the blue that shines not only in Van Gogh’s Starry Night and in the waters of Hokusai’s Great Wave, but also on the uniforms of the infantryman of the Prussian army, as though something in the colour’s chemical structure invoked violence: a fault, a shadow, an existential stain passed down from those experiments in which the alchemist dismembered living animals to create it”

The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches by Matsuo Basho, translated by Nobuyuki Yuasa

4/5 stars

What's it about? This trim volume unites five travel sketches by Basho: The Records of a Weather-Exposed Skeleton, A Visit to the Kashima Shrine, The Records of a Travel-Worn Satchel, A Visit to Sarashina Village, and The Narrow Road to the Deep North. Through haiku and reflections on sights encountered, Basho revels in time on the road. Nobuyuki Yuasa’s introduction enriches the reading experience with context about the development of poetics in Japan. A vivid snapshot of the poet’s life.

How’d I find it? My spouse has been imploring me to read this book for years, especially since we spent our honeymoon in Japan. I finally acquiesced.

Who will enjoy this book? This strangely reminded me of the book by Patti Smith I just read. Thich Nhat Hanh is another readalike in tone.

What stood out? The mix of prose and poetry provides a textured account of 17th century Japan and invites you to read outside. I also appreciated the maps in the back of the book for details about Basho’s journeys throughout the country. Bursts of wit surprise throughout the sketches and make for light chuckles.

Which line made me feel something? From The Narrow Road to the Deep North: “Move, if you can hear, / Silent mound of my friend, / My wails and the answering / Roar of autumn wind.”

Counterweight by Djuna, translated by Anton Hur

1/5 stars

How’d I find it? A face-out at Solid State Books that I couldn’t resist.

Why not 3 or more stars? The all-powerful LK Group colonizes the island of Patusan for the establishment of Earth’s first space elevator. Mac, an investigator in LK’s External Affairs department, discovers a plot that could threaten the LK Group and his own identity. While this sounds like the start of a promising mystery, the most interesting plot turns are given in dialogue between characters, and the space elevator makes only a brief appearance. Alas, my favorite thing about Counterweight is its incredible cover.

Sonnets to Orpheus by Rainer Maria Rilke, translated by Christiane Marks

4/5 stars

What's it about? In a span of days, Rilke composed these heady, dreamy sonnets about phases of being, inspired by the death of a young dancer. Brilliant in their form and drenched in gratitude, these poems celebrate life in all its forms, rendered delicately by Marks’s translation.

How’d I find it? A thoughtful gift from my beloved.

Who will enjoy this book? Fans of Greek classics and Seamus Heaney should enjoy.

What stood out? Just as impressive as the burst of inspiration that birthed these poems is the lyricism of every piece, which Rilke intended to be enjoyed aloud. This book is therefore best consumed in heard form — serenade a friend or yourself as you go. You will wish you spoke German to fully appreciate Rilke’s rhyme scheme.

Which line made me feel something? Sonnet 2:1 is a gorgeous meditation on the marvel of breath and opens thus: “Breathing—you invisible poem! / Outer space, continually / exchanged for my own pure being. Counterweight, / site of my rhythmical realization.”

Dark Matter by Aase Berg, translated by Johannes Göransson

4/5 stars

What's it about? Honestly, this is a tough question to answer. Strange, creepy, and savage, Aase Berg describes a transformed world in which the rules of body and boundary have changed. The surreal and consuming poems of Dark Matter challenge the definition of being.

How’d I find it? I bought directly from Black Ocean, the publisher, because I’m fancy sometimes.

Who will enjoy this book? If you appreciate Jeff Vandermeer's Dead Astronauts, Olga Ravn's The Employees, or the body horror of Alex Garland's film Men, you'll get a kick out of Dark Matter.

What stood out? The aftertaste of the poems linger in your mouth — fitting, as mouths are a common theme. I felt unsettled in the best way by this book. Dark Matter portends encroachment and uncertainty that is hard to shake. A bit like Jeff Vandermeer's Area X trilogy.

Which line made me feel something? This stanza from "Strong Bodyfault's Orbit:" "There is no space now for the hold / There is no eye for the hold / the skeleton is beshivered / with surfaces with barbs / hold catatonia"