you must read fugitive pieces

it was a chance buy but in many ways it has changed how i look at things.

i was waiting for a friend by the bookshop, window shopping. spotting an english book is like spotting a needle in a haystack in germany. english books on sale?! in a second i was inside, telepathically telling my friend to come late. i bought anne michael's fugitive pieces because it seemed like a better choice. one chapter down, i know i have accidentally bought the book that i will cherish forever. fugitive pieces is a must read, i'll tell you why.

for one, the prose is so poetic that you cannot help but applaud michaels's mastery of english: she does have a very intimate relationship with the language. the characters. each one of them, however brief they appear in the book, are so well defined that you could swear they exist and not plucked out of someone's imagination. in fact, after reading the first two chapters i tried to do a google search on the main protagonist, jakob beer, believing as i did that the book is really a biography of this fictionary poet. the imagery. michaels replaces every clichéd expression with figurative description that immediately takes shape in your mind in all splendid colours (the one that pops to my mind: instead of the regular wringing hands, she writes washing hands in the air). and the by-the-way bits and pieces of information. from geology to greek culture to lullabies. fugitive pieces is packed with information. you turn a page, you learn something new. nothing is a distraction, btw. these nuggets of information are entwined so beautifully with the plot that you cannot spot a fray. the plot, in a word, is holocaust. but let me just say it goes beyond facts and figures. it loops around the very existence of humanity. surprisingly, when i googled, i found out that the reason why i liked the book -- that it went beyond the obvious -- is the biggest criticism of michaels. she is actually being taken to task for getting philosophical! apparently, some people believe she has glossed over the hard reality of holocaust. but hey, if you need a book that describes the horrors of the holocaust in minute details -- so minute that it numbs your mind and thus serves no purpose, if you ask me -- go read the rise and fall of third reich. what michaels has attempted to do is far more noble. she is prompting us to look deep inside our very being and spot the demon that is lurking there. for only when you know what you are, you can come to terms with what you are.

in fugitive pieces, i think i have found my bible!