Michael
Written as a road trip with a middle-aged man and his frail, alcoholic, drug addicted, possibly demented 80-year-old mother.
Much of it went over my head, but much of what didn’t seemed a little condescending and pretentious. The main character, named Christian Kracht, seemed very unlikeable. He ridicules Switzerland and especially Zurich for its self-satisfied fixation on luxury bands and money. (The author Christian Kracht lives in Zurich).
Beyond some increasingly surreal events, not very much happens. Mother leaves the psychiatric hospital, joins son for a road trip, they have a couple of adventures, and (view spoiler)That’s it.
In the novel, the mother’s father was a Nazi and later implicated in arms dealing. The mother’s husband, and Christian’s father was a social climber who divorced his mother and took all the valuable art, leaving the mediocre paintings behind. This is a big deal for Christian. I would have loved it if the author had gone into this background a little more.
There were some witty moments, and I thought the ending was genuinely moving, but all-in-all, this wasn’t for me.
Written as a road trip with a middle-aged man and his frail, alcoholic, drug addicted, possibly demented 80-year-old mother.
Much of it went over my head, but much of what didn’t seemed a little condescending and pretentious. The main character, named Christian Kracht, seemed very unlikeable. He ridicules Switzerland and especially Zurich for its self-satisfied fixation on luxury bands and money. (The author Christian Kracht lives in Zurich).
Beyond some increasingly surreal events, not very much happens. Mother leaves the psychiatric hospital, joins son for a road trip, they have a couple of adventures, and (view spoiler)That’s it.
In the novel, the mother’s father was a Nazi and later implicated in arms dealing. The mother’s husband, and Christian’s father was a social climber who divorced his mother and took all the valuable art, leaving the mediocre paintings behind. This is a big deal for Christian. I would have loved it if the author had gone into this background a little more.
There were some witty moments, and I thought the ending was genuinely moving, but all-in-all, this wasn’t for me.