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A review by nick_lehotsky
Knots by Nuruddin Farah
2.0
In a word, mediocre.
When we see our own quirks in another creative work, it usually evokes a stronger reaction. Something we like about our work? Great to see it in others. Something we loathe? It evokes a seething rage. Thoughts which I’ve compiled are below.
Farah’s plot takes about forty pages to kick into first gear.
Early chapters have few page breaks. This is me, a grumpy old man, complaining about page and chapter breaks.
As Cambara meets and gets to know people, it becomes clear they will all unite for a single purpose---but Farah reveals that purpose much too late, and interest has since vanished.
And then, to make up for lost time, we are rushed through a denouement after almost 400 pages.
Characters are utilitarian. They each seem to serve some ultimate function(s), which is perfectly acceptable. What’s not is the brazen nonchalance Farah has through his protagonist, Cambara, in writing them off as useful. Each character in this work seems to exist to serve a purpose only to the protagonist.
Initially, Farah has us spend most of the book inside Cambara’s mind. The disassociation from the painful present (Cambara has suffered two abusive husbands and the death of her son) to try and reckon with the past would have been better merged with more action/sequences of events in the present.
The focality is mostly Cambara’s, but occasional shifts to other characters---which would be great, except in this liminal third-person limited perspective that means an observation or two which read no differently than those of Cambara.
When we see our own quirks in another creative work, it usually evokes a stronger reaction. Something we like about our work? Great to see it in others. Something we loathe? It evokes a seething rage. Thoughts which I’ve compiled are below.
Farah’s plot takes about forty pages to kick into first gear.
Early chapters have few page breaks. This is me, a grumpy old man, complaining about page and chapter breaks.
As Cambara meets and gets to know people, it becomes clear they will all unite for a single purpose---but Farah reveals that purpose much too late, and interest has since vanished.
And then, to make up for lost time, we are rushed through a denouement after almost 400 pages.
Characters are utilitarian. They each seem to serve some ultimate function(s), which is perfectly acceptable. What’s not is the brazen nonchalance Farah has through his protagonist, Cambara, in writing them off as useful. Each character in this work seems to exist to serve a purpose only to the protagonist.
Initially, Farah has us spend most of the book inside Cambara’s mind. The disassociation from the painful present (Cambara has suffered two abusive husbands and the death of her son) to try and reckon with the past would have been better merged with more action/sequences of events in the present.
The focality is mostly Cambara’s, but occasional shifts to other characters---which would be great, except in this liminal third-person limited perspective that means an observation or two which read no differently than those of Cambara.