BOOK REVIEW
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I picked up this book in April while I was in Bucharest on holiday. We had spent time learning about the history of the beautiful country of Romania, including the troubled times under dictatorship. I love picking up books by local authors when I visit different countries, it's a great way of expanding my reading. When visiting Carturesti Carusel in Bucharest, they had a lovely section of books by Romanian authors, translated into English, where I picked up The Fox Was Ever The Hunter.
The rest, as they say, is history. The blurb gives an enticing summary of the book's key concepts, and I knew when I picked it up that this would be a tough read (style and subject matter both playing a part) but I also knew that this was the book that was coming home with me!
BLURB
Romania, the last months of the dictator's regime. Adina is a young schoolteacher. Paul is a musician. Clara, Adina's friend, works in a wire factory. Pavel is Clara's lover. But one of them works for the secret police and is reporting on the group.
One day Adina returns home to discover that her fox fur rug has had its tail cut off. On another day, a hindleg. Then a foreleg. The mutilation is a sign that she is being tracked - the fox was ever the hunter.
Images of photographic precision combine to form a kaleidoscope of reflections, deflections and deceit. Adina and her friends struggle to keep living in a world permeated with fear, where even the eyes of a cat seem complicit with the watchful eye of the state, and where it's hard to tell the victim apart from the perpetrator.
MY REVIEW
RATING: ⭐⭐⭐
SPICE LEVEL: 🔥🔥(not romantic spice, but some crude-ish descriptions of body parts and acts)
Where to begin? This was a difficult read, in the sense that the writing style was incredibly poetic, the prose was descriptive almost to a fault. In addition, the subject matter, life in a strict, totalitarian communist regime was dark and had a constant sense of foreboding. It's an amazing education about a time in our history that I was deeply unfamiliar with.
It took me a while to get used to the cadence and flow of the story. One thing that I found unusual was the lack of speech marks to indicate the dialogue. More than once I had to re-read a passage, slowly, to separate the dialogue, the people involved, and the narration.
The symbolism and use of metaphors blew me away, and sometimes overwhelmed me (particularly in the beginning, as the pace was incredibly slow). Describing people just by the clothes they were wearing, what they were eating, or mannerisms that they had, was wonderful to read.
As the end of the book, and the end of the communist regime, approached, the pace picked up. I felt every heartbeat, every anxious movement, and every fearful conversation. The overwhelming sense of relief and freedom was palpable in the words, it was thrilling to read.
The book follows a small group of friends as they go about their daily lives. The monotony, the deceit, the unknown and terrifying consequences of speaking out. The friends however have a spy in their midst, an officer in the secret police. None of them are safe, with the story following the friends (particularly Adina) as they slowly unravel under the unyielding mental pressure. The storytelling is intense and extremely effective.
So many moments in this book had me pausing to take in the beauty of what had just been said. This was a double-edged sword, as the magnetic, captivating prose took my breath away. On the other hand, I was taking stock so regularly that I was never completely immersed in the story.
A particularly poignant quote and beautiful piece of symbolism was "The moon inside the kitchen window is so bloated that it can't stay there. By six a.m. it has been gnawed by the morning and its face is bleary-eyed" The entire book is filled with metaphors referencing tiredness, dullness, and fatigue - that the whole country felt as the regime continued to control them.
I'm sure I will add more to this review as the story continues to soak in. I may even come back to it in the future and reread it with a renewed understanding.
I found it difficult to give this book a rating that truly reflects my feelings. It's been a couple of days since I finished it, and more elements are still sinking in. It's not an easy book to get your teeth into and my rating partly reflects that. Is it a beach read for your summer holiday? No. It requires time and attention. When you're ready to give that time and attention though, this is the book I'd suggest you pick up. It is effectively poetry in the guise of a novel, so it takes effort. The payoff for me, was worth it in the end.
Have you read this book? Tell me what you thought, I would love to get another perspective on it!
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