Ken > Recent Status Updates

It took until p. 138 for The School of Night to be mentioned for the first time. The big star, which played such a huge mysterious role in Book One and has become practically inconsequential since, has been mentioned once. For the most part, as per usual with KOK, an entertaining span of nothing happens, only with the added disadvantage of a 20-year-old twit as the protagonist.

Uh-oh. Recommended to me as a novel written by a poet. The uh-oh part? It opens in a hospital filled with COVID patients. (I've written before about my trouble with COVID-era novels, which mysteriously leave me cold.) Will this break the curse?

Here I am, 65 pages into the second amoeba after saying the first was enough. For this I blame the many GR readers I respect. ;-)

For a setting that's an island in the sea, lots of unexpected description of train rides and the people in them.

Surprisingly good.

Although it doesn't dwell on college scenes as much as one would hope, the book IS part of the academia genre I often enjoy.

The star's the star already, making this more like Vol. 1 (much enjoyed) than Vol. 2 (less enjoyed). Knausgård's so good at burrowing into ordinary lives (as he proved in his huge autofic series). In this case, it's just other people instead of himself and his family--ordinary Norwegians, in any case.

So. Slow. Need to set aside an hour or two and race for the finish, moor or less.

I finished Part I and, for the life of me, don't understand how any reader could care for Heathcliff whether he be hero or anti-hero. In fact, he anticipates Kristi Noem by hanging a dog (and how's THAT for overplaying your characterization hand as an author?).

Rather hilarious, so far, they way melo is having its drama and everyone's so goddamned impetuous.

Every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way, I guess.