Patrick Murtha
Reader
Did anyone else here read this much-acclaimed novel of nightlife and nightdeath in a Central African metropolis (apparently modeled on Lubumbashi in the Democratic Republic of the Congo)? I read it four years ago with admiration but also frustration, as my Goodreads review at the time indicates:
“I don't really get the high praise that this book has received in certain quarters. It's a fairly atmospheric read, but VERY repetitive, and weak on story if story is what you're after. I was not convinced when I finished that I had made any kind of a literary journey from Point A to Point B. The experience was a lot more like going in circles. Poetic novels do this sometimes, and this is a decent and promising poetic novel, but I wouldn't go farther than that.”
I would still basically stand by that, but the rumbustiously bleak mood of the novel and the exuberance of the language (which everyone pointed out) have certainly stayed with me. Whatever Mujila publishes next will be of interest, I am most curious to see how he develops. So even though I didn’t “love” Tram 83, I feel invested in him as an author now (this often happens).
“I don't really get the high praise that this book has received in certain quarters. It's a fairly atmospheric read, but VERY repetitive, and weak on story if story is what you're after. I was not convinced when I finished that I had made any kind of a literary journey from Point A to Point B. The experience was a lot more like going in circles. Poetic novels do this sometimes, and this is a decent and promising poetic novel, but I wouldn't go farther than that.”
I would still basically stand by that, but the rumbustiously bleak mood of the novel and the exuberance of the language (which everyone pointed out) have certainly stayed with me. Whatever Mujila publishes next will be of interest, I am most curious to see how he develops. So even though I didn’t “love” Tram 83, I feel invested in him as an author now (this often happens).
