100-word Book Review: Gene Wolfe — The Book of the New Sun
Gene Wolfe was a genius!
I doubt I’m the first person to ever think of doing a series of 100-word book reviews, but I think it’s an interesting enough idea to be worth pursuing.
Here’s my first attempt, with a quick write-up of the books that has most recently made my “Favourite Ever” list.
Gene Wolfe was a genius!
The Book of the New Sun immediately became one of my favourite books ever.
But this is the most impenetrable book I’ve ever read not written by a German philosopher.
Wolfe’s gimmick here is that the story is set so far in the future that civilisation has risen and fallen multiple times. The (unreliable) narrator Severian is describing things that are utterly alien to us in familiar, casual ways but describing things that are familiar to us as utterly alien. The task at hand is to disentangle what Severian is describing from what’s actually happening.
So, I think that mostly worked, but I think by necessity I had to bury the lede on how weird The Book of the New Sun is. Still, I think it was worth it for the “most impenetrable book not written by a German philosopher” line.
A full-length review is probably in order at some point.
But, seriously, read The Book of the New Sun. It’s awesome.