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A review by medievaljuliana
White on White by Ayşegül Savaş
I saw many reviewers using the word "subtle" and I certainly see this. There's something austere about the language and prose here, something that leads you to the edge of a ravine but never takes the plunge--nor pushes you into it.
It works beautifully when it touches upon art (historical or contemporary) and its makers, as in constructing the relationship between the unnamed protagonist and her landlady Agnes.
However, this same spareness left me wanting more as the narrative winds further away from a one-on-one psychological dialogue and further into an unsettling, quasi-thriller resolution. Indeed, while I'm all for unsettling unresolved endings, there was not a lot of buildup, which made it so that the last two pages felt like coming from leftfield, tone-wise.
While it's not a book that will likely find its way into my list of favorites for the year, I would recommend it for its meditation on art and self and how one makes the other.
It works beautifully when it touches upon art (historical or contemporary) and its makers, as in constructing the relationship between the unnamed protagonist and her landlady Agnes.
However, this same spareness left me wanting more as the narrative winds further away from a one-on-one psychological dialogue and further into an unsettling, quasi-thriller resolution. Indeed, while I'm all for unsettling unresolved endings, there was not a lot of buildup, which made it so that the last two pages felt like coming from leftfield, tone-wise.
While it's not a book that will likely find its way into my list of favorites for the year, I would recommend it for its meditation on art and self and how one makes the other.