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A review by bobthebookerer
7 1/2 by Christos Tsiolkas
4.0
This book hovers in a place between novel and auto-fiction memoir, and I thought slowly revealed itself to be much deeper than the slightly fragmented stories that the book seems to present at the beginning.
Indeed, the small fragments introduced and then built on early into the book then start to come together at the end quite interestingly. For example, early on, Tsiolkas muses on the idea of what a novel does, what storytelling is all about, and on writing a novel about beauty. He then goes on to explore his nascent sexuality as a child, and how there are echoes of that in his current life.
However, it then did something quite interesting, and almost deconstructed the idea of what a novel of beauty would be, showing us behind the scenes as he creates a character named after a porn star he had a crush on, and gives other traits and names to characters based on other people he knew.
This 'behind the scenes' look did not always work for me, but where it did, I thought there was something quite beautiful about the meditations on love, sex and desire that underpinned those stories.
This book can feel quite fragmented, and as if it jumps quickly between various narratives and times, and that can be somewhat jarring. But I believe there was something at the heart of the book that kept me wanting to read.
I received an advanced copy of this book from NetGalley and the publishers in exchange for an honest review.
Indeed, the small fragments introduced and then built on early into the book then start to come together at the end quite interestingly. For example, early on, Tsiolkas muses on the idea of what a novel does, what storytelling is all about, and on writing a novel about beauty. He then goes on to explore his nascent sexuality as a child, and how there are echoes of that in his current life.
However, it then did something quite interesting, and almost deconstructed the idea of what a novel of beauty would be, showing us behind the scenes as he creates a character named after a porn star he had a crush on, and gives other traits and names to characters based on other people he knew.
This 'behind the scenes' look did not always work for me, but where it did, I thought there was something quite beautiful about the meditations on love, sex and desire that underpinned those stories.
This book can feel quite fragmented, and as if it jumps quickly between various narratives and times, and that can be somewhat jarring. But I believe there was something at the heart of the book that kept me wanting to read.
I received an advanced copy of this book from NetGalley and the publishers in exchange for an honest review.