Er Is Hier Niemand, Behalve Wij Allemaal (2012) - Plot & Excerpts
While this author made some very brave & possibly foolhardy decisions in this story treatment of the Holocaust, the depth of writing did not match the depth of the premise. I did not actually "get it" until I read another review. I found myself saying "Oh, that's what the author was trying to do!" I think the reviewer was too generous. But nevertheless, I gave one star for the alleged attempt. Minus 4 stars for asking too much of the reader. Characters are too thin & some come across as downright village idiots because their thoughts/characters are so stunted. I think the author was going for a "still waters run deep" sort of thing, but gave us the equivalent of dry rocks. This book needed to be fleshed out a little more before publication. In 1939, the families in a remote Jewish village in Romania feel the war close in on them. Their tribe has moved and escaped for thousands of years- across oceans, deserts, and mountains-but now, it seems, there is nowhere else to go. Danger is imminent in every direction, yet the territory of imagination and belief is limitless. At the suggestion of an eleven-year-old girl and a mysterious stranger who has washed up on the riverbank, the villagers decide to reinvent the world: deny any relationship with the known and start over from scratch. Destiny is unwritten. Time and history are forgotten. Jobs, husbands, a child, are reassigned. And for years, there is boundless hope. But the real world continues to unfold alongside the imagined one, eventually overtaking it, and soon our narrator-the girl, grown into a young mother-must flee her village, move from one world to the next, to find her husband and save her children, and propel them toward a real and hopeful future. A beguiling, imaginative, inspiring story about the bigness of being alive as an individual, as a member of a tribe, and as a participant in history.This was a very strange book. It feels like you're in a dream when you're reading it. Not my favorite but she does create some very unique and powerful descriptions.
What do You think about Er Is Hier Niemand, Behalve Wij Allemaal (2012)?
Brutal, grotesque, beautiful. This was just an amazingly captivating book for me.
—Rebekah
Very odd book and I could not get in to the style or any of the characters.
—katrina
Beautiful text, nice thoughts but also weird and a bit confusing read.
—Yang
Boek met woorden en beelden om je ermee in te zwachtelen.
—vaeiou
