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A review by pridiansky
The Ice Museum: In Search of the Lost Land of Thule by Joanna Kavenna
Did not finish book. Stopped at 21%.
DNF'd at 22%.
I have been trying to read this book for over a year. I must have started and stopped reading it 5 or 6 times and never got past page 24. I finally picked it up again after ages and tried giving it one last shot. Spoiler alert: the last half dozen times should have been enough for me to know that this wasn't the book for me. I don't even know how to describe it. It just cannot hold my interest. Part of it is that the subject matter has not been as engaging as I thought it would be, but the other half of it is something to do with the writing style. It straddles the line between good and bad, settling in mediocrity. The descriptions themselves are nicely written, but on the other hand, this author's sentences felt so choppy to me. Way too short, and consistently so. At least that's how it felt. I especially noticed it in sections where they used 'I' and 'They.' Here's one section that felt particularly jarring to me:
"The air was crisp; the sun shone dimly. I walked out onto the streets behind the hotel, away from the centre. I passed through part of town called Majorstuen and began to stumble slowly uphill. Cyclists slipped along the slope, scuffing their heels on the snow. I moved across the ice, making glacial progress, until I could see the silvery sea below, heavy and becalmed. It was a still day and the ships were hardly moving at all. I noticed as I walked that there were places where the snow was turning to water and the ice was breaking up. A slight fragrance was rising from the earth, where it had been released from a winter layer of snow: a smell of dust and grass, unfamiliar in the sterile air. Across the fjord, I could see a ferry arriving from Denmark, a huge ship with Dansebaten on its side. It sounded its horn.
It took a while to walk up the hill. In the suburbs, the white-wash had made everyone vanish into their houses. A few four-wheel drives ground slowly along the ice roads. I passed through a patch of forest, until I arrived at a main road. I padded on for a few more minutes, and then turned left, sliding across the ice until I reached a row of small brown wooden houses, like chalets. Kicking the snow from my boots, I hammered on the door of one of the houses. There was a movement from within, and then, after a long pause, a wiry, slightly hunched man opened the door. He looked astonished to see me, astonished and not yet delighted."
In those two paragraphs the word 'I' is used 12 times, which is far too many. While you could say that there isn't anything technically wrong with the writing, it just feels amateurish. The problem with that kind of repetition, particularly here, is that the word 'I' keeps needling you as you're trying to read. It's a distraction that needed to be done away with. The rest of the writing feels like the author made a definite effort to write in a way they thought would be descriptive and interesting, but to me it came off as almost robotic. It's hard for me to put my finger on, but it's as if an A.I. wrote how it thinks a human would write. Not technically wrong, but somehow off. I guess that would be called dry writing, maybe. I would suggest this book if you just want to zen out and read the same paragraph ten times, or if you have a hard time sleeping.
I have been trying to read this book for over a year. I must have started and stopped reading it 5 or 6 times and never got past page 24. I finally picked it up again after ages and tried giving it one last shot. Spoiler alert: the last half dozen times should have been enough for me to know that this wasn't the book for me. I don't even know how to describe it. It just cannot hold my interest. Part of it is that the subject matter has not been as engaging as I thought it would be, but the other half of it is something to do with the writing style. It straddles the line between good and bad, settling in mediocrity. The descriptions themselves are nicely written, but on the other hand, this author's sentences felt so choppy to me. Way too short, and consistently so. At least that's how it felt. I especially noticed it in sections where they used 'I' and 'They.' Here's one section that felt particularly jarring to me:
"The air was crisp; the sun shone dimly. I walked out onto the streets behind the hotel, away from the centre. I passed through part of town called Majorstuen and began to stumble slowly uphill. Cyclists slipped along the slope, scuffing their heels on the snow. I moved across the ice, making glacial progress, until I could see the silvery sea below, heavy and becalmed. It was a still day and the ships were hardly moving at all. I noticed as I walked that there were places where the snow was turning to water and the ice was breaking up. A slight fragrance was rising from the earth, where it had been released from a winter layer of snow: a smell of dust and grass, unfamiliar in the sterile air. Across the fjord, I could see a ferry arriving from Denmark, a huge ship with Dansebaten on its side. It sounded its horn.
It took a while to walk up the hill. In the suburbs, the white-wash had made everyone vanish into their houses. A few four-wheel drives ground slowly along the ice roads. I passed through a patch of forest, until I arrived at a main road. I padded on for a few more minutes, and then turned left, sliding across the ice until I reached a row of small brown wooden houses, like chalets. Kicking the snow from my boots, I hammered on the door of one of the houses. There was a movement from within, and then, after a long pause, a wiry, slightly hunched man opened the door. He looked astonished to see me, astonished and not yet delighted."
In those two paragraphs the word 'I' is used 12 times, which is far too many. While you could say that there isn't anything technically wrong with the writing, it just feels amateurish. The problem with that kind of repetition, particularly here, is that the word 'I' keeps needling you as you're trying to read. It's a distraction that needed to be done away with. The rest of the writing feels like the author made a definite effort to write in a way they thought would be descriptive and interesting, but to me it came off as almost robotic. It's hard for me to put my finger on, but it's as if an A.I. wrote how it thinks a human would write. Not technically wrong, but somehow off. I guess that would be called dry writing, maybe. I would suggest this book if you just want to zen out and read the same paragraph ten times, or if you have a hard time sleeping.