About the book

Nothing about The Old Drift is simple. It’s so complex I couldn’t evaluate it with a standard 1-5 star system. There are many surreal stories and mystical characters. The storyline starts in Africa in 1903 and finishes in the future.

Why it is sometimes difficult to read

The Old Drift is an ultra marathon of a book. I mean not only the size but complexity. When you run an ultra marathon the conditions often change. Sometimes the process is fast and easy, sometimes you stumble and fall. Sometimes the path is barely visible so you have to slow down and watch every step. Sometimes you get lost and you have to trace your steps back. That’s exactly what reading The Old Drift feels like. Sometimes you catch the rhythm and go with the flow but very often you have to slow down or trace your steps back to understand what’s going on.

The writing

There are many Italian words or words from an African language (I don’t know which one, Google translated it as Swahili). The book provides no translation for them. You have to guess what they mean. Very often it’s not possible. Try it for yourself. These are actual quotes:

‘Mwashibukeni, Ba Lonode’, Ba George bowed his head fondly. ‘Eyamukwayi, bashikulu,’ Ronald panted. ‘Do you know where Miss Agnes is?’ ‘ Mm?’ The old man frowned. ‘Ah, mwelbantu, katwishi. I do not know.’

“When it rained it sounded like you were in a giant silimba. Loveness kept an mbaula outside, where she fried vitumbua to sell.”

I wasn’t sure what I’d just read. There’s lots of rare vocabulary, words like “tintinnabulary”, “mellifluous”, “recalcitrant”, “malapropism”, “fratricide”. I actually find it amazing that the author used a precise term for each situation but that’s why the book is sometimes hard to read.

The repetition of a phrase about teeth sucking gets really annoying. “She sucked her teeth”, “he sucked his teeth”, “their sucked their teeth”. This phrase is all over the book. Whenever someone gets worried, frustrated or angry they “suck their teeth”. My brain got a blister in the place where this phrase is processed.

The structure

The timeframe shifts between different years. Sometimes it goes forward, sometimes it goes backward. There’s no correlation between the characters and the years. No character belongs to a certain epoch. Instead one character appears in several different timeframes and then another one appears in a few other ones, and then the third one borrows a bit from both of the timeframes but also gets one of his own. You have to really focus to keep track on who’s in the spotlight right now and what’s going on. I wouldn’t call it a traditional saga where characters are linearly connected through generations. Most of the time the characters seem not to be connected at all.

Great things about the book

The writing

Even though the book is often hard to read the first 90 percent is unquestionably an amazing work of art. The way Namwali Serpell uses the language is unrepeatable and unique. One chapter completely blew my mind. The author combined two narratives in one piece of text. If you read the whole text you get a prose version of what happened. If you only read the parts written in italics it becomes a poem.

The events

Some of the described events did happen! Which is incredible taking into account how surreal they are. For example, the bizarre space program in Zambia.

This mix of surrealism and reality creates an effect where you can no longer distinguish between fiction and reality. That’s an interesting thing to experience. The book goes on this way for the first 90%. I have only one explanation for what happens after that – Namwali Serpell left her desk and someone else finished the book.

What went wrong in the end

Suddenly, I was no longer reading intricate prose about unusual characters. The book turned into a second-rate women’s fiction with sci-fi elements about futuristic revolutionaries.

Girlish chats about men and sex promptly appeared on the pages and the heroine started “admiring muscles of his back”.

As the mutations of the book progressed, my notes on it narrowed down to one phrase only: “WTF has happened to the book?!”

I was considering DNFing The Old Drift 97% into the book! The remaining three percent seemed like too much torture. I even counted how many clicks it took to cover one percent (it took 16 clicks)! I was counting the clicks left till the end of the book!

Final thoughts

I cannot come up with one definite conclusion about this book. It’s beautiful in some places and not so much in others. You might love The Old Drift or you might hate it. Most likely you’ll do both at the same time.

I’m very thankful to the publishers for providing me with a copy in exchange for my honest and unbiased review.

1. Classic fiction

A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway

I’ll never grow tired of recommending this book. It is actually a memoir, but it’s much more than a personal story. It tells you about the way Paris looked and lived in 1920s. A Moveable Feast has a complicated history. Read my post to learn more.

Goodbye to Berlin by Christopher Isherwood

The book is a beautiful farewell to Berlin. The stories tell about people Isherwood met in Berlin in 1930s before Nazis came to power.

I don’t think anybody ever read my review of the book because I posted it in the very beginning of my blogging when nobody was reading my blog yet.

Daphne du Maurier’s short stories

I am starting to suspect that no works by du Maurier can disappoint. I’ve read only her short stories so far, but I can recommend all of them. Here are the posts where I talk about the short stories: Short Stories By Daphne Du Maurier and Reading Books In December. And here’s the post about Birds.

2. Modern fiction

Virgil Wander by Leif Enger

I really liked this book. I would prefer a more solid ending, but even with the ending as it is, it’s still a perfect book with well-developed characters and an interesting plot.

The Air You Breathe by Frances de Pontes Peebles

It’s a wonderfully written story about two women, and their lives and love to music. The story starts in Brazil in 1930s when both of them are still kids. In my personal rating this book is definitely among the best I read in 2018.

A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman

If you are looking for something really kind and heart-warming, you will definitely like this book.

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

I wouldn’t call this book my personal favourite, but I do realise many other people will like it more. The book does entertain. It’s a gripping fast-paced story about an elderly movie star who decides to reveal all her secrets to a writer.

Melmoth by Sarah Perry

Melmoth is quite the opposite of the book mentioned above. It’s not an easy read aimed to entertain. It’s perfectly written and it has several interesting stories, but the main treasure of the book is its message which is thought-provoking and deep. I am in love with the book, but I know that some people found it disappointing because they expected it to be a gothic ghost story. Even though there’s such an element in the book, it’s merely a tool for delivering an idea. If you are looking for a book that will make you think, Melmoth is a good choice.

The Last List of Miss Judith Kratt by Andrea Bobotis

This book hasn’t been published yet but it’s the best book I read in 2018. You might like it less than I did, but I think you will still like something about it. It’s perfectly written, and perfectly made, with an intriguing start and a beautiful ending. It’s about a complicated history of one family from the American South. It will be published in July 2019. I definitely recommend pre-ordering it, or marking the date in your calendar so that you can read a sample when it’s out and make your choice. I can read my full review of the book.

3. Thrillers

I think 2019 will become the year when I’ll finally accept that thrillers are just not my genre. I love being thrilled, spooked and scared by a book, but unfortunately most of the thrillers I encounter are either horribly written or have silly plots (or both). Still, I was lucky enough to have found these two thrillers that I can recommend.

You Were Made For This by Michelle Sacks

This is a psychological thriller about relationships that look perfect on the outside, but in reality have some other, often sinister dynamics, and about disasters that such relationships can cause.

Force of Nature by Jane Harper

This is a crime thriller about a group of women who venture out into Australian wilderness as a team building exercise. And then, of course, something goes wrong…

4. A strange book

The Third Policeman by Flann O’Brien

If you are looking for something surreal and crazy, this might be the right book. I was initially very confused by the book. But as time goes by, I’m starting to understand how deep and genius it actually is. In fact, chances are I will be re-reading it to discover more of its philosophy and craziness.

4. A book with good humour

The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion

I love the humour of this book. It’s funny but not dumb. Besides, the story is also kind and quite interesting. The Rosie Project is about one very special scientist on a quest to find a wife for himself.

5. A young adult novel

Bone Gap by Laura Ruby

I hardly ever read young adult novels but I really liked this one because of its deeper message. It’s a story about young people living in a strange town where people, animals and things keep mysteriously appearing and disappearing. It’s a story about friendship and love, but most importantly it’s about people who are learning to see the true nature of others and themselves.

6. Controversial

There’s actually nothing controversial about these novels. They are perfectly written and I find them very interesting but they focus on some taboo or traumatic topics and so I think some people might find them disturbing.

Patrick Melrose novels

There are 5 novels about Patrick Melrose. Patrick is a very troubled man. The novels are perfectly written (at least the first four, I haven’t started the fifth one yet), but they are hard to read because of the topics they focus on such as child abuse or drug addiction. Here are my reviews of the first two novels: Never Mind (Patrick Melrose novel #1) by Edward St. Aubyn and Bad News, Patrick Melrose novel #2 by Edward St Aubyn.

Everything Under by Daisy Johnson

The story is based on a myth. It’s a magical realism story about a river, a mother and a daughter. It’s so beautifully written, it brings a whole new world to life.

7. Memoirs

Miss Ex-Yugoslavia by Sofija Stefanovic

Guess what? That’s the book that finally got me into blogging! I loved the book so much that I just couldn’t keep quiet anymore. I wrote to the author to express my gratitude but I still felt like I had more to express. So I wrote a post about it, and this post became the first one on my blog.

When Sofija Stefanovic was a kid, her family immigrated from Belgrade to Australia. In her memoir she speaks about her experience of changing countries, cultures and languages. It’s exciting to see the world she then discovered from the perspective of a young child who was never before exposed to such education, entertainment or customs. You become aware of many things that are taken for granted nowadays, and you also become aware of the fact that there are often several truths all of which are equally real.

I understand that I liked the book so much because I’m from a similar background but I’m sure that this book will be interesting for many other people too.

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah

Even though Born a Crime describes so many horrible things that happened to the families in South Africa during the times of apartheid and later, I still think about this book as kind and often funny. It takes a great comedian to write a heart-warming book about something that is often heart-wrenching.

8. Non-fiction

What if? by Randall Munroe

This book is very funny. It’s scientific but it’s written in a language that everybody can understand. It answers many strange and silly questions in a clever and interesting way.

Bad Science by Ben Goldacre

It’s another book I often suggest to read, especially when some homeopathy or “detoxing” treatments arise in a conversation. It focuses on some popular wrong beliefs about medicine, pills and beauty products. It provides and explains researches for each statement. It also explains the mechanisms behind popularising these products. Although the book is based on science, it’s written in a fun and entertaining way, so it’s really interesting to read. Reading this book can save your money and health.

This will be it for now. Hopefully I’ll make another post like this in a few months. Meanwhile I’m very interested in what you would recommend, especially when it comes to Strange and Humour categories.