Teju Cole is a brilliant man but his writing style is like wandering down a path with someone talking about the flowers along the edge and the pavement cracks when you are wondering what you are doing on this path and where it leads. Way too frustrating. The main character would go to a bar and suddenly begin a discussion of politics in the middle east. THe most interesting thing is the title "Open City" - which comes from WWII, when Belgium chose to let the Nazi's in rather than fight and submit to bombing. "Had Brussel's rulers not opted to declare it an open city and thereby exempt it from bombardment during the second world war, it might have been reduced to rubble". A guy goes for super long walks all over the city and thinks - sometimes about the things in front of him, sometimes about other people, sometimes about his past, which is sometimes in other countries. That's pretty much the plot of this book (though, there is a bit of a twist/surprise towards the end).This is one of those books it seems beside the point to rate because it depends on what you want out of a book. If the question is whether I was entertained and engrossed by the book, then it gets a low rating, because I was bored for much of it, maybe even the first half. On the other hand, that was because I didn't know "how" to read it. Once I figured out there wasn't necessarily going to be much plot, and that it wasn't a book I'd be able to sit down and plow through in a few unbroken hours, I was able to settle into it as a meditative experience to dip into for short periods of time, and enjoy that experience as something to take in slowly. If I'm rating the book on how thought-provoking it is and how much it will stay with me, it gets a high rating, because it has a lot of interesting ideas in it, some presented very subtly, some very straightforwardly, some to do with actual content of what the narrator says, and some to do with its somewhat strange structure and the layered, indirect way information gets presented to us. And, despite having been so bored for half the book, once I finished I wanted to read it again - this time the "right" way. Either way, anyone who spends a lot of time walking around the city meditating will certainly recognize their experience in the book, and that alone is satisfying.
What do You think about Open Stad (2011)?
smart conversationsand long walks in NYCmask troubling silence.(haiku book review)
—hollie
Wish I could walk through every city in the world like this....
—Katie
SIX WORD REVIEW: We all have New York wanderlust.
—makmak119
Lovely writing, just couldn't get into it.
—Brunohbt
