By the logic of the second story in this book (“Ronald”), I need to give this book a bad review. It came without swag. It came without first class comped orgies. It came without packages, boxes or bags. It did come from Germany, so I got to put my basic German to good use reading the envelope’s customs declaration form (although I could have probably guessed what buch meant even without a German 101 course). But I’ve got to channel Ronald here — pull out an awful passage and compare the book to Kafka. Except there aren’t really any truly awful passages in this book, and I’ve never read Kafka, so I suppose I should just review The Book of Names properly.
The Book of Names is a collection of stories about horrible people doing horrible things to each other in absurdest fashions. Right up my alley. It was an amusing read, sometimes a bit spooky, sometimes a bit mirthful. We jump around, from Germany to the UK to Australia to Canada. Completely readable and the technique is more than fine. I would say the performance is wound very tightly. It’s a compelling group of stories and there’s the fun, at least in my copy, of matching up the people in the stories with the diagrams on the front and the alternative titles for the short stories on the back. And the stories aren’t all about men. There are stories about women, a little more than a third with female protagonists. But therein lies what about this collection makes me uncomfortable.
Now, it’s hardly as if the men here are pinnacles of virtuousness, but the woman all seem to be variations of bitches be crazy. Catfighting (“Sandra”). Promiscuity (“Barbara”). Delusional (“Emily”). Vindictive (“Shannon”). Man-hating career woman (“Marty”). They seem so much more one-note than those stories with male protagonists. Is it the stories? Or are my ovaries just more attuned to lousy feminine characterizations? I mean, realistically, does Marty, an educated, well-placed career woman really think that enslaving men forever and having women run everything is really a solution? And what’s wrong with Barbara, a senior, enjoying sex? I don’t see why I should be disgusted by that, like the man through whose eyes Barbara’s story is told.
So I can’t embrace The Book of Names completely. But I had an enjoyable two evenings reading it. Now off to sell my copy on ebay (the last Ronald reference since it’s the end of the review).
The Book of Names by Royce Leville went on sale January 13, 2015.
I received a copy free from Librarything in exchange for an honest review.