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The Unconsoled –Kazuo Ishiguro
Audiobook performed by Simon Vance
3***

From the book jacket: It is the story of a man named Ryder. He is a pianist of international renown who has arrived in a European city he cannot identify to give a concert he cannot remember agreeing to give. In the days before the concert, he is led in and out of the lives of seeming strangers, but his fleeting recollections of them and of his purpose among them are invariably overwhelmed by their inexplicable knowledge and expectations of him.

My reactions
Ishiguro is a brilliant writer, but this was a really challenging work. It is the stuff of dreams, or perhaps nightmares. People come and go, and Ryder (not to mention the reader) is left trying to puzzle out what is happening. He sets off with one purpose and gets waylaid time and again. As an example, one evening he goes to a movie, only to be introduced to a group of men who are playing cards and having loud arguments about local politics. Or he goes to a fancy dinner in his dressing gown and slippers. Or he’s in the middle of town and then driving for a long time into the countryside where he parks in a field, then enters a gallery which, he later discovers, is actually attached to his hotel (which is in the middle of town).

I was kept constantly off balance by these strange sequences. And really never did wrap my mind around whatever Ishiguro was trying to say. I appreciated the work more than I enjoyed it. And I’m not sure I would recommend it to most people I know.

I listened to a good portion of this on audio, narrated by the marvelous Simon Vance. But I think this is a book that is best tackled in text format, and I read about 30 percent of it rather than listen.


LINK to my review

This sounds like parts of When We Were Orphans. There were sections that seemed to be hallucinations or dream sequences, but it was never clear if they were or not. It was confusing, but still interesting.

Oh, and as is sometimes the case with stream-of-conciousness works ... a paragraph can last several pages!