Storybook ND: The First Trilogy

Best two out of three. Highly recommend "The English Understand Wool" and "Spadework for a Palace," bypass "Three Streets."

This is going to be a unique review for a unique book concept. You may be familiar with the Little Golden Books from your childhood, short classics for kids. Storybook ND (New Directions) takes that format and creates short reads for adults. These novellas or short stories are "slim hardcover fiction books—aim[ing] to deliver the pleasure one felt as a child reading a marvelous book from cover to cover in an afternoon."

Since the holidays are a busy time, I decided to space out my reading and enjoy three of these short storybooks: The English Understand Wool by Helen Dewitt, Spadework for a Palace by Laszlo Krasznahorkai, and Three Streets by Yoko Tawada. I'll go in that order.

"The English Understand Wool"

Summary:

Young Marguerite recounts her socialite childhood and demanding life to her editor, including the days leading up to "the traumatic reveal." But her experience working with the publishing industry may be more traumatizing than her family problems or the criminal activity involved.

Verdict: 8/10

I'm keeping the synopsis vague as part of the thrill of this book comes from not reading the giveaway (thanks for the recommendation #BooksUnbound. It really enhanced my reading experience). However, I did start and stop this read three times... a sad fact considering the whole story is under 70 pages. It was a bit dry at the beginning, even though that is purposeful as you'll see later on.

At first the reader agrees with the editor that the narrator might be bottling up her emotions or may even be a sociopath, but by the end, we come to understand the narrator's view more. She wants her privacy and the publishing industry wants her to dish out her deepest thoughts and life to strangers just for their financial benefit. Dewitt smartly shows that the real betrayal (SPOILER ALERT) wasn’t even that her “parents” had lied. Everyone expected her to be traumatized from that reveal, but in the narrator's view, it didn’t change her upbringing or the values/skills she was taught or who her parents were to her. The “crooks” are generous employers who continuously bestow good will on tradesman that have earned it by distinguishing themselves. Likewise they raise their daughter to be distinguished, bright, talented and intelligent. (SPOILER SAFE)

The real trauma for Marguerite seems to be everyone else invading her life and expecting her to react or live or think a certain way about this. But she refuses and sticks to her guns. I loved seeing the wit and savvy of the main character. Even if she was a bit rude and I’d probably hate her in real life or think she was a stuck up brat - she's still a badass. You have to respect her acumen and taste. The details that she finds important are high class, and it does take a lot of dedication to learn the finer things. It makes me wonder how many of those fine points I’ve overlooked or been in a rush like the editor or the investigators in the story.

This was well-written and thought out. There's not much to connect the reader to the narrator, but I enjoyed her analytical brain and how she dealt with her situations. Would read again.

"Spadework for a Palace"

Summary:

I think pg. 22 sums it up: “anyway, I am just a librarian named herman melville with problematic fallen arches, who had been dreaming for forty-one years about once, just once, not handing over to a library patron the particular volume that has been requested, and thereby taking the first step toward building"... a Permanently Closed Library. He is also on a quest to connect and track down the paths of the greatest minds in New York, including Herman Melville (the author) and three other gentleman. Yet herman with the lowercase may lose his mind in the process.

Verdict: 10/10

This story lived up to it's subtitle (“Entering the Madness of Others”). It totally felt like a descent into madness but a clever madness that bordered on genius.

The beginning was so funny and had such a real voice in this stream of consciousness. It wasn’t until pg. 3 that I realized, there were no sentence breaks! There was commas and punctuation and one semicolon - but NO SENTENCES?! What a concept! The style was just enough to get under your skin, but it kept you going nonstop like this person had just taken espresso and had to get it all out. Finally, you have the first period on page 41! Then there’s nothing but simple sentences for about a page, a refreshing break in the middle. And then it's all one sentence to the end! Some might find this tedious, but I loved it! So much respect for this writing!

And the topics that Lower-Case Melville fixates on and exposes were so bizarrely poignant. Like saying most people attend art exhibitions less to look at art than to exhibit themselves and their outfits in a social event - spot on. And I was cracking up about librarians wanting to hide books and preserve it like a museum! I GET IT! I had that same secret possessiveness when I worked at the library! Well... maybe not the exact same as I didn't end up in a mental facility... yet...

Similar to Dewitt’s the narrator feels like everyone’s invading his life and hates New York’s art scene. Both the style and the content of this novella combine to draw on connectedness and how individuality takes away from that connection. Lower-Case Melville is intent on finding connections between everything, hence why there’s no breaks and why he can imagine three very different artists in the same path that he walks and so forth.

But by the end, the quirks have spiraled to madness. Lower-Case Melville isn't “dangerous” in a violent sense, but he doesn’t care about anything other than his library palace. And that type of mentality is just disturbing enough for the reader to wonder 'how unhinged is he really? How does he seem from the outside?' Krasznahorkai includes little hints and clues throughout, which are fascinating.

An epic in short story form and a mental journey between madness and brilliance. I relished every moment.

"Three Streets"

Summary:

The selection of three stories from a larger collection, each story depicts a narrator on a Berlin street, observing and interacting with their surroundings. The narrators find surreal and thematic and sometimes supernatural connections.

Verdict: 2/10

And then there’s art that is too artsy. I know Yamada is probably saying something profound, but I don't have the mental or artistic capacity to sift through all the surrealism to understand it.

Out of the three streets, I probably enjoyed the first most. It looked at everyday children and the things kids observe or want as spectacular stories. But then it went into ghosts, and avoiding the present, and hunger, and war. There were too many themes to keep track of.

The second street was even more scattered. I couldn’t tell what was real or what was in the narrator's head. Again I liked the concepts such as people that you could have met in a different path. But again, it gets lost with in the mix of waiting, and dead poets, and art museum hallucinations. Why is he talking to a picture and then all of the sudden he’s following the ghost and then he is the ghost in a three-way affair/fight?! WTF?

And the third (I think) was all a dream sequence. It felt very similar to Alice and Wonderland (another story that I hate for the sole purpose of nothing makes sense). But it’s all about war. It’s poetic but too much.

This book was too abstract. Like a Dali painting, you can sense beauty/thought but stress yourself out trying to figure out the meaning. If you like surrealism or disjointed plots, you’ll probably like this book better than I did. For me, it's best to move on.