pickI was blown away by this book, but it is in no means a book for everyone. Consisting of only one long paragraph and touching on themes such as #antiSemitism, #Serbia, and #Kabbalah, it is dark and deeply disturbing. It starts off totally labyrinthine and only eases up as the novel is about to end. Try it if you like a challenging read.
“Words...never say what the speaker means for them to say, but what the listener wants to hear.”
Yeah. That often seems to be the case. *sigh*
“I‘m not certain, to be frank, that making coffee counts as a culinary talent...”
Well, why not?! 🤔
“From one day to the next we are witnessing, at all levels of society, especially in the government and church, an indifference to the flood of ethnic intolerance.”
This novel is about #Serbia in the late 1990‘s, but to how many other countries is this statement currently relevant as well?! 😟
So I‘m trying to figure out where to pause in this novel with no indentation, paragraphs or chapters. I finally decided to pause each time the narrator‘s friend Marko lights up a joint...which is frequently enough! 😃
“Reality had reached a mind-boggling degree of ugliness: we were living under a dictatorship pretending to be a democracy, which was closing in ever more tightly around anyone who dared voice a divergent opinion.”
Aha! I have been reading & reading this book, trying to make sense of it. It‘s not easy, but I might‘ve found a key to what the author is trying to say in this sentence. Only by finishing this book completely will I know for sure.
“The only decision we make...is what we‘ll be like in this life, because good souls seek out good people, just as evil souls search for the bad.”
I‘m sticking with the good souls!
“...there are worse things than dying, for instance, betrayal or deception...”
Indeed a thought to ponder in this world of ours...
“It is always like that, said Marko, you put one book down somewhere, and two or three days later it‘s a pile, as if books get there by themselves.”
Hahahahaha!
Yikes! This book is like a labyrinth. There are no paragraphs or indentations in the narrative, but also one new discovery is leading to another. It‘s almost making me dizzy. I have to take notes so that I don‘t completely lose the thread of this story which seems to deal with #antisemitism in #Serbia. Continuing my journey down the “rabbit hole” of this book...
“...sooner or later, everybody shows their true face.”
Quickly this book is becoming very dark. This quote is related to an antisemitic incident. It‘s leaving me very uncomfortable. David Albahari writes very unsettling works. I need to be prepared for whatever will come next...
“It was better than watching #television, which never ceased to be a source of official propaganda, a parade of bizarre creatures often of stunted intellectual capacity.”
Heh!
FYI: The setting of this novel is #Belgrade, #Serbia.
“...because everything speaks to us, it‘s just that we are not skilled enough to hear and understand.”
Haha! I could‘ve sworn my alarm clock was trying to tell me something this morning!
I recently received this book from a fellow BookCrosser because I‘d had this novel on my wishlist since reading yet another novel by the same author. I opened the book and found this entire story has no paragraphs or indentations whatsoever! Should I still read it?! Would you?!!!! This goes on for 309 pages... 😳
Leeches | 
