“The Infatuations” by Javier Marias:
What a great book, what a wonderful novel, what an extraordinary story!
The book starts with the depiction of a seemingly cruel and senseless murder.
What follows is a first-person narrative, an excursion on death, life, existence and meaning, an irresistible maelstrom of language and thought of such eloquence and profound philosophical weight which I have seldom come across lately.
Almost every aspect of living, loving, dying, existing, is covered and looked at from different angles. The book is not a light read, far from it. Sometimes it is quite oppressing, the overall nihilistic undertone makes it hard to find joy in just simply reading. But joy obviously is not the novel’s intention. It is an existential, moralistic tale and that alone is incongruent with joy. But there is joy to be found in the revelations the book might provoke.
And then, when you least expect it, about half-way through, there’s a twist and it turns into a murder mystery … dramatic! All of a sudden there arises a threat of imminent danger to the narrator who is the woman who used to see the murdered man and his wife every morning in the same café, the woman who became friends later, after the deed, with the wife of and a lover to the murdered man’s best friend. Now the novel gains momentum, turns more psychological and touches on questions of conscience, morality, justice and what truth really is and if there ever is only one truth.
A very good book!
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