One of the better books I have read recently is Ghostwritten by David Mitchell; however, I have doubts about my ability to get one of my book groups to pick it up. It is a series of linked short stories (apparently a current fad) united by their connection to an explosion in the Tokyo subway system. Each chapter has a different narrator and locale but each turns out to be linked in some way to the original event. Some of magical aspects. It is puzzling, thought-provoking, worthy of argument--or discussion as we call it. Mitchell notes at one point that each act of memory is an act of ghostwriting. And there is an actual ghost-writer who may or may not have a happy ending.
And why wouldn't my book groups be eager to take this on? Well, it's not easy. It's puzzling at times, definitely not The Hotel at the Corner of Bitter and Sweet. Multiple times the reader has to get into the story. Some of the narrators are likable, some are quite repellent, some sympathetic, some not so much.
While it is challenging, it is also rewarding and to my taste well worth the effort.
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