9 Comments

This is one of the few books I vividly remember reading for the first time. It was in high school, and I was simultaneously fascinated and disturbed by it. Definitely sensed there was more there than I was capable of ‘getting’ at that point in my life. Might have to look into trying it again!

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Well, I’m 47 and still found it both fascinating and disturbing. One of the weirdest books I’ve read all year.

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It is certainly unlike any other book I can think of

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I read this years ago. I dug it but I had to reference to online summaries off and on to know what was happening. I’ve got my eyes on Dr Zhivago soon.

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There were definitely some passages where I was swimming. The zaniness saved it from ever descending into incomprehensibility. Dr. Z is supposedly great. I ought to put that on my list.

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Wow. Ok. That book has been on my shelf for years, now I have to pick it up. For some biased reason, I always assumed it was in the style of 18-19th c. Russian romance.

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It’s the strangest novel I’ve read in years. It took me about three weeks to decide what to even say about it :) Literary critics talk about it as an early example of magical realism. It has some of the challenges of 19th and 20th century Russian literature; I could barely keep track of all the characters. But it’s a brisk read and utterly unpredictable. Every page is a surprise.

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I am reading a novel, The Father's Tale (2011, Ignatius Press) by Michael D. O'Brien, presently. It is about a father's search for a rebellious son. The author describes the book as a re-telling of the parables of The Good Shepherd and The Prodigal Son. Much of the story takes place in post-Gorbachev, pre-Putin Russia. The novel includes plenty of references to the struggles of the Russian people, especially the hardships writers faced during the Communist regime. The Master and Margarita might be a good book to read after The Father's Tale - if it isn't a thousand pages long. A single thousand-page book a winter is my limit, I'm afraid.

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Great review. Plan to read "The Master and Margarita" in 2024. No, not the P&V translation.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/184749014X/

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