This is why I follow the Women's Prize each year more than any other.
pickI enjoyed this. As others have said the writing style is paired down and sparse. I think that reflects both the idea of the Eastern European and the Man. This is a character study and can be taken quite philosophically.
It is also a bit depressing! István goes along to get along and that leads to some really unfortunate situations. I really appreciate how Szalay portrayed mental health in aan we would assume avoids it.
pickI finished this just b4 the prize announcement. I see the merit in the life story of Istzan, a Hungarian immigrant, + found the book v absorbing but I dont know if I actually liked the book. Its a book abt modern masculinity, so he is monosyllabic drawn into sexual relationships and struggles to express his feelings, including significant losses. It certainly is a book to discuss in a time where toxicity of negative male influences is prevalent.
https://youtu.be/QZkjTuw3Tvw?si=97d1Shc_4_tBKZbE
Thoughts on this year's Booker winner.
Still ill and droopy lol.
Just announced the winner of this year‘s Booker Prize
I‘m quite happy about this since I enjoyed it while I read it
pickThis brief, surreal novella consists mostly of a few extraordinarily long run-on sentences, which makes for a strangely propulsive galloping pace. The narrator is a librarian named "herman melvill," obsessed with the author of the same name, as well as author Malcolm Lowry and architect Lebbeus Woods, and the idea of a Permanently Closed Library. His descent into madness is strangely compelling, although I couldn't tell you what it means.
I was hooked by the opening chapter where an older woman is seducing a young boy. This is almost like a reverse Bartleby the Scrivner as the main character passively agrees to almost anything.
