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Participation
When the weather revolts, certainties dissolve and binaries blur as members of two reading groups converge at the intersection of theory and practice to reshape their lives, relationships, and reality itself.
In the latest novel from Anna Moschovakis, two reading groups, unofficially called Love and Anti-Love, falter amidst political friction and signs of environmental collapse. Participation offers a prescient look at communication in a time of rupture: anonymous participants exchange fantasies and ruminations, and relationships develop and unravel. As the groups consider―or neglect―their syllabi, and connections between members deepen, a mentor disappears, a translator questions his role, a colleague known as “the capitalist” becomes a point of fixation, and “the news reports” filter through in fragments. With incisive prose and surprising structural shifts, Participation forms an alluring vision of community, and a love story like no other.
In the latest novel from Anna Moschovakis, two reading groups, unofficially called Love and Anti-Love, falter amidst political friction and signs of environmental collapse. Participation offers a prescient look at communication in a time of rupture: anonymous participants exchange fantasies and ruminations, and relationships develop and unravel. As the groups consider―or neglect―their syllabi, and connections between members deepen, a mentor disappears, a translator questions his role, a colleague known as “the capitalist” becomes a point of fixation, and “the news reports” filter through in fragments. With incisive prose and surprising structural shifts, Participation forms an alluring vision of community, and a love story like no other.
202 pages, Paperback
First published November 8, 2022
14 people are currently reading
564 people want to read
About the author
Anna Moschovakis
25 books60 followersAnna Moschovakis is a translator and editor, and the author of several books of poetry, including I Have Not Been Able to Get Through to Everyone (2006) and You and Three Others Are Approaching a Lake (2011), which won the James Laughlin Award. She is the recipient of awards and grants from the New York Foundation for the Arts, the Fund for Poetry, the Edward F. Albee Foundation, and has completed an apexart residency in Ethiopia. Moschovakis lives in Brooklyn and Delaware County, New York.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews
December 5, 2025
I have so many questions…
Reading Vlog with full review: [https://youtu.be/z87Modokypw](https:/...
Written review to come!
Reading Vlog with full review: [https://youtu.be/z87Modokypw](https:/...
Written review to come!
June 1, 2023
Wowza
i'm ready
for climate catastrophe to rattle the bones of society and shake loose tethers
i'm ready to start fresh in a wilderness village -
- but it won't feel as clean as all that, just the same things but boneless:
books, lovers, cafes
it was hard to follow and abstract and, to steal words from Willa on Succession, "formally inventive" but i didn't mind all that. it broke the fourth wall more forcefully than i've ever felt in a novel. and it definitely wasn't ABOUT climate catastrophe even though it was. i think this book's magic is in restructuring - losing almost all Proper Nouns leaves us just with things more as they are- village, town, city, store, park, person, cell phone - and yes i sometimes got a little lost without Proper Noun roadsigns but it's ok to be a little lost i think.
"Swipe Swipe Swipe"
maybe the best thing about my reviews is that i mirror the tone of the book, so you can get a real sense that way.
i'm ready
for climate catastrophe to rattle the bones of society and shake loose tethers
i'm ready to start fresh in a wilderness village -
- but it won't feel as clean as all that, just the same things but boneless:
books, lovers, cafes
it was hard to follow and abstract and, to steal words from Willa on Succession, "formally inventive" but i didn't mind all that. it broke the fourth wall more forcefully than i've ever felt in a novel. and it definitely wasn't ABOUT climate catastrophe even though it was. i think this book's magic is in restructuring - losing almost all Proper Nouns leaves us just with things more as they are- village, town, city, store, park, person, cell phone - and yes i sometimes got a little lost without Proper Noun roadsigns but it's ok to be a little lost i think.
"Swipe Swipe Swipe"
maybe the best thing about my reviews is that i mirror the tone of the book, so you can get a real sense that way.
Read
October 25, 2025I am so confused but I think I love it
January 2, 2023
Achieves a remarkable grasp on its linguistic positioning and narrative discursions and probing musings on theory to disarming effect, unraveling the facades of seemingly objective theory to demonstrate that beneath even the most detached intentional thought remains innate human desires—desire for connection, desire for love, desire for empathy, desire for desire. By placing her language in such strictly theoretical framework from the beginning, Anna Moschovakis makes the passages where she genuinely interrogates the ache for recognition behind that language strike with all the more poignancy. Though I do think the novel's final sequence is too much of a whimper and a fumble and an unnecessarily neat coda, the ways Participation subverts and upends structural and prosaic expectations of the novel form have made it one of my favorite experiences reading a novel in years, one I wanted to take my time relishing as I patiently waited for it to catch me off-guard and pierce me again.
December 16, 2022
very lovely. inspiring and intuitive. felt like looking in a mirror in some aspects
April 6, 2025
very very fascinating and fun read thank u zoe for the recommendation! huge fan of meeting in the field and describing the 27 (really only 20, but ok) shapely figures. a little confused by the capitalist w/ nipple rings (ow) and the not-armageddon. scenes with S and E very lovely and familiar. also loved splice the dog. all things considered, a great novel to read angstily at my service job.
January 17, 2023
2.5
this book is for people that are smarter than me. and thats ok
this book is for people that are smarter than me. and thats ok
March 22, 2024
There’s good and bad here.
The first five pages were possibly the best to me. Throughout the novel, I enjoyed the teasing of S and who they are and what they look like. I was intrigued to find out whether or not S would accept E, the main character because E was acting obsessively and S didn’t seem to reciprocate any romantic or sexual feelings. Once they met, their relationship was nice and a reminder for myself, however I was confused as to why S ignored E for so long and all of a sudden came back with increased interested and reciprocation. If there was more explanation for that rather than randomly throwing S in and giving them a connection, it would have made more sense. If I could read S slowly or suddenly realizing their feelings, it would clarify things for me. I also enjoyed the pages where E was at an intimate house gathering between friends watching two versions of the same movie while passing around what I believe was a pipe. I found it interesting and well illustrated. I also found it relatable to an extent.
I didn’t like how the narration had been taken away from the main character and gave us nothing in return. The two types of narrations in this novel were not doing what I think the author believed it would. Personally, I found both dull but considering the second narration was supposed to be something seemingly exciting and intriguing, it felt less than. At page 186, the narrator suggested that the reader must be waiting for updates on previous characters and E’s current state. Frankly, I was not interested in finding out. This is one example of where I think the second narration missed the mark. If it was written differently, I might have found myself wondering about the past characters but because they were mentioned very briefly and ambiguously, I wasn’t curious at all. I think it would have enhanced the story to have changed the writing style, opinions and thought processes once E wasn’t narrating. It would feel like a different person therefore giving the reader a different perspective which I would have appreciated more. I was glad when E came back near the end of the book to narrate for a bit.
The first five pages were possibly the best to me. Throughout the novel, I enjoyed the teasing of S and who they are and what they look like. I was intrigued to find out whether or not S would accept E, the main character because E was acting obsessively and S didn’t seem to reciprocate any romantic or sexual feelings. Once they met, their relationship was nice and a reminder for myself, however I was confused as to why S ignored E for so long and all of a sudden came back with increased interested and reciprocation. If there was more explanation for that rather than randomly throwing S in and giving them a connection, it would have made more sense. If I could read S slowly or suddenly realizing their feelings, it would clarify things for me. I also enjoyed the pages where E was at an intimate house gathering between friends watching two versions of the same movie while passing around what I believe was a pipe. I found it interesting and well illustrated. I also found it relatable to an extent.
I didn’t like how the narration had been taken away from the main character and gave us nothing in return. The two types of narrations in this novel were not doing what I think the author believed it would. Personally, I found both dull but considering the second narration was supposed to be something seemingly exciting and intriguing, it felt less than. At page 186, the narrator suggested that the reader must be waiting for updates on previous characters and E’s current state. Frankly, I was not interested in finding out. This is one example of where I think the second narration missed the mark. If it was written differently, I might have found myself wondering about the past characters but because they were mentioned very briefly and ambiguously, I wasn’t curious at all. I think it would have enhanced the story to have changed the writing style, opinions and thought processes once E wasn’t narrating. It would feel like a different person therefore giving the reader a different perspective which I would have appreciated more. I was glad when E came back near the end of the book to narrate for a bit.
March 5, 2023
3.5 stars. very strange and compelling.
i love the way this book plays with form and experiments with the very core of what a novel is. what is a narrator? a setting? a character? a story? after reading this book, i feel a little less certain in all of these things, and i think that’s very cool.
also had some very beautiful moments/quotes and some very resonant themes. i think sometimes the fragmented narrative style - even though i found it super cool - slowed me down and hindered my enjoyment a bit. but overall i really enjoyed this and it made me think a lot.
i love the way this book plays with form and experiments with the very core of what a novel is. what is a narrator? a setting? a character? a story? after reading this book, i feel a little less certain in all of these things, and i think that’s very cool.
also had some very beautiful moments/quotes and some very resonant themes. i think sometimes the fragmented narrative style - even though i found it super cool - slowed me down and hindered my enjoyment a bit. but overall i really enjoyed this and it made me think a lot.
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April 20, 2023Thanks again, Canadian booksellers.
And how vindicating to see my original expression "as loud as the sun" finally printed somewhere
And how vindicating to see my original expression "as loud as the sun" finally printed somewhere
Read
May 10, 2025i didnt get it 😔😔😔
February 18, 2023
Do I know what this was about? No. Did I like it? Yes.
August 22, 2023
WOW!!!!!!!!! This my blew my mind—it's sexy, queer, and erudite. Taut, like some of my favorite books—Borges comes to mind. Lispector as well (though less dialectical), and of course the fabulous Annie Ernaux, whom the author has translated. Love that Moschovakis is a poet too—not enough of them these days, at least not translating their poesis into such razor-sharp prose. I loved it!
January 23, 2024
mmmmm honestly no plot just vibes. sexy prose
August 7, 2023
beautiful, i loved it. I think i hated it too. Not sure i understood it.
January 1, 2024
occasional moments of beauty surrounded by an intangible fog of empty philosophizing. eventually gives up the game completely, trading profundity for overwrought self-awareness
June 4, 2023
I'd almost always rather read an experiment that succeeds and fails in unexpected ways than a solid normie novel.
Parts of this arrangement staggered me with their concise insight. Many individual sentences or two-three sentence ideas were better than tons of the poetry I read and could stand on their own. The mix between registers -- philosophic, diaristic/daily routine, and journalistic/ecodisaster worked great. The barest of plots, which were the discord/inperson meetings of these supposed reading/discussion groups also allowed for a huge variety of staging of intimacies. Some parts I never figured out how they related to the ostensible reality, especially the long section on Figures. Were these figures hallucinations?
Loved all the intertextuality with the books on the syllabi. Loved the fearless tackling of overwrought subjects such as pair bonding, conflict resolution, and gender. Loved moments of recognizable events, like the woman who sells leather bracelets door to door or the managing of multiple jobs. Interesting way to relate issues of interior/exterior through concepts like language translation or meta-relationship conversations. I am tempted to copy the flier that advertises the discussion group (complete with No Fascists and Beer and Coffee) and hang it up around here to see who would come.
Parts of this arrangement staggered me with their concise insight. Many individual sentences or two-three sentence ideas were better than tons of the poetry I read and could stand on their own. The mix between registers -- philosophic, diaristic/daily routine, and journalistic/ecodisaster worked great. The barest of plots, which were the discord/inperson meetings of these supposed reading/discussion groups also allowed for a huge variety of staging of intimacies. Some parts I never figured out how they related to the ostensible reality, especially the long section on Figures. Were these figures hallucinations?
Loved all the intertextuality with the books on the syllabi. Loved the fearless tackling of overwrought subjects such as pair bonding, conflict resolution, and gender. Loved moments of recognizable events, like the woman who sells leather bracelets door to door or the managing of multiple jobs. Interesting way to relate issues of interior/exterior through concepts like language translation or meta-relationship conversations. I am tempted to copy the flier that advertises the discussion group (complete with No Fascists and Beer and Coffee) and hang it up around here to see who would come.
January 22, 2023
3.5 ⭐️
For the first third of Participation, I felt very untethered from the reader-writer relationship. I wasn’t really following what was going on and it was hard for me to assemble all the parts.
“Marina always read equally with her hand and her ear, sometimes also with her mouth, voicing the words at a low volume. But this time it was enough to feel the words as she pronounced them in her head. She was aware of the cliché as it came to her, that the words - not this particular arrangement of them, but words in general - felt like friends.”
Words are friends and great writers can be besties. Once I let go of tight squeeze in the story and enjoyed the words and how Moschovakis puts them together, I was able to really enjoy what remained of the book and appreciate more of what the story was relaying. She is an exquisite talent with a tendency to assemble her words, phrases, paragraphs, chapters in a way that both accents and contrasts, creating a mesmerizing rhythm.
For the first third of Participation, I felt very untethered from the reader-writer relationship. I wasn’t really following what was going on and it was hard for me to assemble all the parts.
“Marina always read equally with her hand and her ear, sometimes also with her mouth, voicing the words at a low volume. But this time it was enough to feel the words as she pronounced them in her head. She was aware of the cliché as it came to her, that the words - not this particular arrangement of them, but words in general - felt like friends.”
Words are friends and great writers can be besties. Once I let go of tight squeeze in the story and enjoyed the words and how Moschovakis puts them together, I was able to really enjoy what remained of the book and appreciate more of what the story was relaying. She is an exquisite talent with a tendency to assemble her words, phrases, paragraphs, chapters in a way that both accents and contrasts, creating a mesmerizing rhythm.
February 25, 2023
📖Review: Participation by Anna Moschovakis
Thank you to @zgstories and @bookhugpress for this book in return for my honest review.
I was intrigued by the premise of Participation - a dystopian exploration of love through two rival groups. However, the style of the book was not the right fit for me. I found the nonlinear storytelling a bit too esoteric, but I can see how the short chapters and suspense created through limited details could create intrigue for the right reader. It is possible that I don’t have enough philosophical background to truly appreciate the story and the existential inquiry of the characters. It is creative and interesting, but the style and story was not a good fit for me.
Thank you to @zgstories and @bookhugpress for this book in return for my honest review.
I was intrigued by the premise of Participation - a dystopian exploration of love through two rival groups. However, the style of the book was not the right fit for me. I found the nonlinear storytelling a bit too esoteric, but I can see how the short chapters and suspense created through limited details could create intrigue for the right reader. It is possible that I don’t have enough philosophical background to truly appreciate the story and the existential inquiry of the characters. It is creative and interesting, but the style and story was not a good fit for me.
October 5, 2023
The style of prose is beautiful and I enjoyed the dreamlike nature of the writing style. However, the plot grows increasingly dull, and the narrator often comes off as pretentious and unlikable. I quickly started to feel that the author was trying to too hard to make the novel feel smart and profound. In this sense, the story sometimes felt secondary to the author's attempt to appear intelligent.
I immensely enjoyed the language and mood of the story, but felt let down by everything else. I enjoyed the first half a lot more than the second, partially because I felt the first half had more interesting writing than the second (without saying much more, as I do not want to spoil anything), and partially because my issues with the novel felt more and more grating as they kept showing up.
I immensely enjoyed the language and mood of the story, but felt let down by everything else. I enjoyed the first half a lot more than the second, partially because I felt the first half had more interesting writing than the second (without saying much more, as I do not want to spoil anything), and partially because my issues with the novel felt more and more grating as they kept showing up.
March 6, 2024
this is one of those books where I can really say 'I have never read a book like this before' and not because it was extra crazy in any regard but rather just the way it seems to blend between fiction, non-fiction, and essay was really cool. It's not that it's switching between those but sort of doing all of them at the same time. I don't even really know what this book is about and I almost read it twice but like I was really interested and taken by it. It did have enough narrative handholds for you to get through it, but then there's also so much other crazy stuff going on,,,
February 1, 2023
|| PARTICIPATION ||
#gifted @bookhug_press @zgstories
#minibookreview
✍🏻
Dubbed LitFic mixed with Dystopian, this sounded right up my alley! PARTICIPATION is a tough book to summerize. It's radical, poetic, philosophical, funny and intelligent. Reading this book felt like I was being pulled on a wild adventure I didn't know I wanted/needed to go on. I enjoyed how Moschovakis played with structure, it made for a quick read. I will be thinking on this one for a while, letting all it offer's sink in.
For more of my book content check out instagram.com/bookalong
#gifted @bookhug_press @zgstories
#minibookreview
✍🏻
Dubbed LitFic mixed with Dystopian, this sounded right up my alley! PARTICIPATION is a tough book to summerize. It's radical, poetic, philosophical, funny and intelligent. Reading this book felt like I was being pulled on a wild adventure I didn't know I wanted/needed to go on. I enjoyed how Moschovakis played with structure, it made for a quick read. I will be thinking on this one for a while, letting all it offer's sink in.
For more of my book content check out instagram.com/bookalong
January 4, 2023
This book is bizarre and, even after having finished it, I don’t really know what to make of it and/or what to say it’s about.
Three stars because the book wasn’t downright terrible, but I would not recommend this book to anyone.
Three stars because the book wasn’t downright terrible, but I would not recommend this book to anyone.
January 7, 2023
I really enjoyed this book, definitely a different and intriguing kind of hero. It also read very poetically… and definitely had fun wordplay. The ‘book groups‘ felt more like philosophical or politically fringe groups as did the tented gathering like a strange kind of polyarchic reckoning ….
January 25, 2024
Kind of close to a 3.5/5. Did I know what was going on. Not really. But I kind of liked that. Definitely a quick, but good time. I preferred the first half to the last, and while I can appreciate some of the structural risks, some of them fell flat in my opinion.
July 3, 2023
I like the mind-puzzles and the friendships very much. Some of the internal dialogue seems overly precious near the start. Pays off by the middle & end, tho.
September 1, 2023
I do like it when poets write novels. This is a very successful one.
A lot to think about in here, and I can imagine re-reading it.
A lot to think about in here, and I can imagine re-reading it.
April 9, 2024
this book wanted to be little weirds so badly..... sadly, my heart does, in fact, lie with little weirds. cool book but couldn't get into it
April 26, 2024
least annoying graduate student
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February 14, 2025i finished this a few days ago i loved it. theory & community & imagined spaces for thinking together - a field.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews