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From Amazon
Nicole Krauss's elegant, haunting debut, Man Walks into a Room, is a what-if novel. What if, asks Krauss, a man woke up one day and he'd forgotten everything he knows? Samson Greene is found lost in the desert near Las Vegas, memory-less thanks to a tumor "applying its arbitrary, pernicious pressure to his brain." Once the tumor is removed, he can remember his childhood up until his 12th year, but then all is blank. He returns to New York, to his wife Anna, to his life as a Columbia University English professor, but none of these things makes sense to him anymore: "Samson could dredge up no feeling for his own life but that of vague admiration." When he receives a call from a mysterious scientist inviting him back to the desert for a sinister-sounding memory experiment, Samson heads West with a kind of despondent fatalism. Krauss's novel moves gracefully from exploration of a lost soul to science fiction to a meditation on memory. If the book unravels a bit at the end, it's only because Krauss is trying to do too much--certainly no literary sin. --Claire Dederer
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
From Publishers Weekly
This elegiac first novel achieves a kind of beguiling dreamy tenderness as it tells the story of Samson Greene, a seemingly happy, well-adjusted English professor whose life is thrown wildly out of kilter by a small brain tumor. It is discovered only after he suddenly leaves home and is found wandering in the Nevada desert. Once the tumor is removed, he can remember nothing beyond the age of 12, so that his adult existence, his friends, his professional life and especially his wife, Anna, are a profound mystery to him. He and Anna try to resume their lives, but it is no good pretending that things can be as they were. Eventually Samson leaves again, this time for an experimental research station, also in the Western desert, where attempts are being made to graft the memories of one human into another's mind. Samson becomes friends with another resident at the station, an elderly eccentric called Donald, but when Donald's memories are grafted into Samson's mind, they are of a test nuclear explosion he witnessed as a young soldier. Adrift again, and even more disillusioned, Samson convinces himself he must find his medical records and also determine where his dead mother is buried; he succeeds in both endeavors, one with the aid of a drunken teenager in Las Vegas, the other with a senile uncle and achieves a kind of hard-won reconciliation to his lot. This outline of the story suggests a somber tale full of dark symbolism, but in fact it is surprisingly lighthearted, sharply observant and often touching. Krauss is a sure writer thoroughly in control of her material, and she creates, in Donald and Uncle Max, a pair of memorable characters. Only the ending, from the viewpoint of Anna, the lost wife, fails to bring quite the expected epiphany.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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Most helpful customer reviews
3.0 out of 5 stars
Strong start, weak finish,
By
This review is from: Man Walks Into a Room (Paperback)
I just finished reading this book while on a flight from SFO to YVR and while the start of the book was very engaging and interesting, once you get past the major turning point, it just felt like it lost all pacing and interest. A man loses all of his memory from after the age of 12 and is given the opportunity to recapture someone else memories to fill in the blanks. Instead of an interesting take on the idea, it just goes all over the place and ends on a sour note. Again, the first half is just incredible but at the key plot point in the novel, it just feels like the author wasn't sure where she wanted to go with the novel and it ends up being a mess. It definitely has it moments but also shows that this is the work of a first time author.I'd still recommend reading it but be prepared for your own thoughts of how the book would/should end to be tossed aside.
3.0 out of 5 stars
Mixed review,
By
This review is from: Man Walks Into a Room (Hardcover)
This IS NOT science fiction meets literature... Its literature, deep and reflective at times, meets exploration of one to find meaning in a new/blank slate life self with a weak scientific plot to compliment that. The plot shows promise in the beginning, the dialogue and introspection are well-written, but the story ends up fizzling out.
2.0 out of 5 stars
Easy to Put Down,
By Judith Schonhoff "Judy" (Somerville, MA USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Man Walks Into a Room (Hardcover)
I love the potential story of this book. Someone loses their memory and can only remember up to age 12. There is SOO much one could do with this idea. However, I find myself scanning this book's text quickly trying to find interesting conversation or observations. The book transitions to the scientific side when the main character is implanted with a singular memory from another's life. At this point I lost interest. Though this book does cover some of what could be considered typical responses to losing one's memory after age 12 (you don't know your friends, your wife, you don't remember your schooling, you no longer have the education for your career), I was hoping this whole book would deal with more of those responses. Instead, the choices the main character makes I cannot relate to and then the sci fi event when a single memory is implanted into his brain happens. I guess it is a matter of expectations and I wan't expecting this novel to move to the scientific.
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