book review: Crawling at Night by Nani Power

-
The backstory: Crawling at Night was longlisted for the 2002 Orange Prize.

The basics: Ito is a sushi chef who works with Mariane, an alcoholic waitress. Both are haunted by their past: for Ito, the life left behind in Japan, and for Mariane, the daughter she chose adoption for fifteen years ago.

My thoughts: As someone who both worked in restaurants full-time for several years (and met  Mr. Nomadreader while working together at the same restaurant) and has a fondness for food, wine and city life, I expected to love Crawling at Night. It is certainly a novel of urban despair, and I'm not generally one to shy away from bleak novels. I wouldn't, however, have chosen to read this one during the read-a-thon had I known just how bleak it was. I finished it, but it effectively killed my reading mood.

Crawling at Night is written with a haunting beauty. It is raw and gritty. It may make many readers uncomfortable at times. Its characters are unlikable. While typically I don't have a problem with these things. In this story, it was simply too much. Perhaps I needed more characters to spread around the grim realities of their lives. As I read, I kept wishing it were a movie. Somehow watching these people would have been less bleak. Sharing their sad internal thoughts was discomforting.

The verdict: Crawling at Night is a raw, dark, difficult novel, but it is certainly one with merit. It didn't fully resonate with me, but I admire what Nani Power tries to do with it.

Rating: 3 out of 5
Length: 240 pages
Publication date: April 9, 2011
Source: library

As an affiliate, I receive a very, very small commission when you make a purchase through any of the above links. Thank you for helping to support my book habits that bring more content to this blog!

Comments

  1. ZibileeNovember 8, 2011 at 9:18 AM

    I am intrigued by the way you describe this one. Raw and gritty have never bothered me, although I do find that there are times when I am better suited for those types of books. It sounds like this was a bit of an uneven read for you, and I am not sure what to make of that cover. What is that thing next to the belly-button? A bug, a leaf? I am just not sure...about anything!

    ReplyDelete
  2. AndiNovember 8, 2011 at 10:39 AM

    It sounds like an interesting premise, and I'm futher intrigued by your reaction to it. The next time I'm in the mood for dark, I'll give it a look.

    ReplyDelete
  3. TiNovember 8, 2011 at 10:55 AM

    This sounds like a book I'd like. Dark, raw and gritty. Love that in a book.

    What is that cover of, though? I even made it bigger and still can't tell what it is. Sort of looks like sushi on a woman's stomach. LOL. Is it?

    ReplyDelete
  4. nomadreaderNovember 8, 2011 at 11:00 AM

    @Zibilee and Ti - yes, it's sushi on a woman's stomach! I much preferred the hardback cover of the library copy I read.

    ReplyDelete
  5. BNovember 8, 2011 at 12:32 PM

    Interesting... errr... cover art.

    ReplyDelete
  6. JennyNovember 8, 2011 at 5:11 PM

    There have been a few times I read a book and thought a movie version would be better lol. I'm still having trouble with my reading "mojo" lately do I think I'll stay away from thi for now!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Thank you for taking the time to comment. Happy reading!

Popular posts from this blog

book review: A Dangerous Place by Jacqueline Winspear

-
Image
The backstory: A Dangerous Place  is the eleventh historical mystery featuring Maisie Dobbs. My reviews of the other eleven (plus Winspear's stand alone historical novel) are in my Book Review Database . The basics: Set four years after the last Maisie Dobbs novel, Leaving Everything Most Loved , in A Dangerous Place , we meet up with Maisie in Gibraltar in 1927 during the Spanish Civil War. She gets off her England-bound ship in Gibraltar because she's not quite ready to return. Note: this review contains spoilers about what happened in those four years of Maisie's life between books, all of which are revealed in this novel's first thirty pages.  My thoughts: Sunday I wrote about the Maisie Mail I received. These postcards appear in the book itself, along with many others. After setting the stage in Gibraltar in the opening pages (Maisie stumbles upon a dead body), Winspear recounts the last four years of Maisie's life in the form of postcards, letters, an...
Read more

book review: Run by Ann Patchett

-
Image
The backstory: After loving State of Wonder  ( my review ), I set out to read all of Ann Patchett's books. The basics: Run  is the story of the Doyle family: Bernard, an Irish Catholic ex-mayor of Boston, his deceased wife Bernadette, their adult son Sullivan, and their two adopted college ages sons, Tip and Teddy, who are biological brothers. My thoughts: I'm beginning to think Ann Patchett is my soul sister. Her writing reaches me deeply, and I've adored everything she's written. It was a special treat to read Run , the novel of hers I knew the least about going in. Although I had the framework of two of her novels and one memoir, I didn't know what to expect. Run  isn't as universally loved as some of her other works, so I was particularly curious to see how it measured up. Admittedly, Run  started off slowly for me. It took two chapters to really get into the heart of the story, but once it happened, I was hooked. One of the things I love most about ...
Read more

book review: Gilead by Marilynne Robinson

-
Image
The backstory: Gilead  won the Pulitzer Prize in 2005, the National Book Critics Circle Award in 2004, and was longlisted for the Orange Prize in 2006. The basics: As Rev. Ames nears the end of his life in the 1950's, he begins a letter to his young son because Ames realizes his son is too young to really know him. Gilead  is that letter. My thoughts: Gilead  is a novel I'm been meaning to read for years. It's a character-driven, Midwestern narrative by one of our best contemporary writers. It should be a novel I love, yet I struggled to finish it and admit I was wowed by neither the story nor the writing. Gilead  seemed almost stream-of-consciousness at first. I appreciated that Robinson jumped right in: this novel is a letter from father to son; the reader's ignorance of these two characters is not the focus. As the novel progressed, more details began to be filled in, and the reader begins to understand the characters, setting and purpose. I enjoyed the ...
Read more