Jim Brown reviewed The Deserters by Mathias Énard
parallel or asymptotic narratives?
This book tells two stories that may or may not ever directly intersect (at one point, I thought there was a direct link...but I think that was a misread), and that gambit alone is pretty interesting. But both stories are also arresting. I only wish I could read it in French because I suspect based on the translator's (Charlotte Mandel) couple of footnotes that there's a lot there in the language prior to translation. Much like Erpenbeck's Kairos (though set earlier than that one), it made me wish I knew a bit more about the history of East Germany but also taught me some of that history.
This book tells two stories that may or may not ever directly intersect (at one point, I thought there was a direct link...but I think that was a misread), and that gambit alone is pretty interesting. But both stories are also arresting. I only wish I could read it in French because I suspect based on the translator's (Charlotte Mandel) couple of footnotes that there's a lot there in the language prior to translation. Much like Erpenbeck's Kairos (though set earlier than that one), it made me wish I knew a bit more about the history of East Germany but also taught me some of that history.