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Earwig
A novel by iconic artist and author of cult bestseller, The Vorrh
Earwig got his nickname from his grandfather.
At the start of this story he is employed to look after a strange little girl in a flat in Liege. He spies on her, listens to her by holding a glass up to the wall.
But he never touches her except when, as part of his duties, he is required to is to make teeth of ice and insert them in her gums.
Earwig takes a rare day off, which he spends drinking by himself in Au Metro, a seedy bar full of drunks, dancers and eccentrics. It is St Martin's day and in the evening as crowds parade through the street carrying lanterns through the snow, he is drawn reluctantly into a conversation with a sinister stranger called Tyre. As a result Earwig accidentally maims a waitress with a broken bottle. He understands that on some level Tyre meant this to happen.
Shortly afterwards a black cat is delivered to the flat, unasked for. The girl forms an immediate bond with it, but Earwig identifies it as the enemy.
Travelling across country by train, transporting the girl and her black cat, Earwig is increasingly caught up in a web of unfortunate and increasingly violent coincidences.
Not since Edgar Allan Poe and the Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita has there been such a masterly tale of feline evil.
Earwig got his nickname from his grandfather.
At the start of this story he is employed to look after a strange little girl in a flat in Liege. He spies on her, listens to her by holding a glass up to the wall.
But he never touches her except when, as part of his duties, he is required to is to make teeth of ice and insert them in her gums.
Earwig takes a rare day off, which he spends drinking by himself in Au Metro, a seedy bar full of drunks, dancers and eccentrics. It is St Martin's day and in the evening as crowds parade through the street carrying lanterns through the snow, he is drawn reluctantly into a conversation with a sinister stranger called Tyre. As a result Earwig accidentally maims a waitress with a broken bottle. He understands that on some level Tyre meant this to happen.
Shortly afterwards a black cat is delivered to the flat, unasked for. The girl forms an immediate bond with it, but Earwig identifies it as the enemy.
Travelling across country by train, transporting the girl and her black cat, Earwig is increasingly caught up in a web of unfortunate and increasingly violent coincidences.
Not since Edgar Allan Poe and the Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita has there been such a masterly tale of feline evil.
304 pages, Hardcover
First published September 5, 2019
About the author
Brian Catling
32 books318 followersAlso publishes as B. Catling.
Brian Catling was born in London in 1948. He is a poet, sculptor and performance artist, who makes installations and paints egg tempera portraits of imagined Cyclops. He has been commissioned to make solo installations and performances in many countries including Spain, Japan, Iceland, Israel, Denmark, Holland, Norway, Germany, Greenland and Australia. He is currently writing novels.
He is Professor of Fine Art at The Ruskin School of Drawing & Fine Art, University of Oxford, and a fellow of Linacre College.
Brian Catling was born in London in 1948. He is a poet, sculptor and performance artist, who makes installations and paints egg tempera portraits of imagined Cyclops. He has been commissioned to make solo installations and performances in many countries including Spain, Japan, Iceland, Israel, Denmark, Holland, Norway, Germany, Greenland and Australia. He is currently writing novels.
He is Professor of Fine Art at The Ruskin School of Drawing & Fine Art, University of Oxford, and a fellow of Linacre College.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 39 reviews
August 27, 2019
This is an oddly bizarre short novella by Brian Catling with its chilling undertones of horror, primarily set in Liege, with a train journey to Paris. Herr Aalbert Scellinc is responsible for the care of his strange charge, the young drooling girl Mia, whose teeth of ice need replacing after they melt. There is only the two of them in the apartment, humming with the sounds of a newly acquired more powerful refrigerator. He feels the frustrations and torment of his hypocritical, if diligent, subservience that has him launching multilingual loud swearing sessions. Aalbert is named the eponymous Earwig for his extraordinarily astute hearing that was instrumental in keeping him alive during WW2. He acquired his current role after answering a recruitment advert that was less than clear what the job was precisely.
To get some respite from his duties, he sedates Mia to visit the Au Metro bar to drink and be amongst others. On one such visit he meets a stranger who knows all about him and his past that leaves him unsettled and disturbed. Is it the devil? Certainly what follows seems to have been engineered by him, as Earwig seriously assaults Celeste and runs away. He experiences further agitation and apprehension at being commanded to accompany Mia on a train to Paris, Mia who has never ventured out of the apartment and clings to him. The arrival of a cat that forms a close bond with Mia is a weird and threatening presence. Where did it come from? This is for those readers who enjoy off kilter, understated dark fantastical horror. Many thanks to Hodder and Stoughton for an ARC.
To get some respite from his duties, he sedates Mia to visit the Au Metro bar to drink and be amongst others. On one such visit he meets a stranger who knows all about him and his past that leaves him unsettled and disturbed. Is it the devil? Certainly what follows seems to have been engineered by him, as Earwig seriously assaults Celeste and runs away. He experiences further agitation and apprehension at being commanded to accompany Mia on a train to Paris, Mia who has never ventured out of the apartment and clings to him. The arrival of a cat that forms a close bond with Mia is a weird and threatening presence. Where did it come from? This is for those readers who enjoy off kilter, understated dark fantastical horror. Many thanks to Hodder and Stoughton for an ARC.
September 6, 2019
I had heard quite a lot of good things about Brian Catling’s Vorrh trilogy before reading this novella, and so I thought I had a good idea what to expect. I had heard that The Vorrh was a strange and sometimes obscene book with beautiful prose and some suggestions of horror. Earwig certainly fits that same description, but even so… I was not prepared for this.
I just didn’t expect it to be quite so… weird.
I don’t mean that in a derogatory way. There are plenty of people out there who adore weird fiction, and this book might well be right up their alley. It’s just that my personal threshold for weird is really quite low, and unfortunately that really hampered by enjoyment of this story.
The blurb communicates a fair bit of what’s going on. We have an older WW2 survivor named Aalbert who is known as “the earwig” due to his incredible hearing. He is tasked by a mysterious group of people to look after a small girl, who must never leave the flat that they live in, and who must have teeth made out of her own frozen saliva inserted into her gums every few days.
This is quite a “literary” book, with stylised prose that is full of metaphors. When we are first introduced to Aalbert, he is physically described in a way that could lead you to believe he actually is an insect. This kind of thing happens throughout, such that at times it can be difficult to determine what is “real” and what is just a narrative device. I got the feeling that the author’s love of metaphor extended to the story as whole, with these characters and situations acting as symbolism for… something. Something that I didn’t pick up on, unfortunately.
To be completely honest, I bounced off this book in a lot of ways. At some point, there is a mention that Aalbert is aroused by the girl in his charge. This, coupled with the listening to her at night with a glass held to the wall, did little but make me feel uncomfortable. Which I guess was the point. But I still don’t want to read about it.
This wasn’t a book for me. I could appreciate Catling’s skill for building tension and atmosphere, and admire some small turns of phrase here and there, but it wasn’t a good fit for my tastes.
If you like the weird and the surreal, and you’re not the kind of reader who demands “why?” and “what does that mean?” while reading, there’s a good chance you’ll like this book more than me. In that case, it might be worth checking out the sample, or searching for another reviewer who is able to peel back the layers of symbolism. Regrettably, that reviewer isn’t me.
I just didn’t expect it to be quite so… weird.
I don’t mean that in a derogatory way. There are plenty of people out there who adore weird fiction, and this book might well be right up their alley. It’s just that my personal threshold for weird is really quite low, and unfortunately that really hampered by enjoyment of this story.
The blurb communicates a fair bit of what’s going on. We have an older WW2 survivor named Aalbert who is known as “the earwig” due to his incredible hearing. He is tasked by a mysterious group of people to look after a small girl, who must never leave the flat that they live in, and who must have teeth made out of her own frozen saliva inserted into her gums every few days.
This is quite a “literary” book, with stylised prose that is full of metaphors. When we are first introduced to Aalbert, he is physically described in a way that could lead you to believe he actually is an insect. This kind of thing happens throughout, such that at times it can be difficult to determine what is “real” and what is just a narrative device. I got the feeling that the author’s love of metaphor extended to the story as whole, with these characters and situations acting as symbolism for… something. Something that I didn’t pick up on, unfortunately.
To be completely honest, I bounced off this book in a lot of ways. At some point, there is a mention that Aalbert is aroused by the girl in his charge. This, coupled with the listening to her at night with a glass held to the wall, did little but make me feel uncomfortable. Which I guess was the point. But I still don’t want to read about it.
This wasn’t a book for me. I could appreciate Catling’s skill for building tension and atmosphere, and admire some small turns of phrase here and there, but it wasn’t a good fit for my tastes.
If you like the weird and the surreal, and you’re not the kind of reader who demands “why?” and “what does that mean?” while reading, there’s a good chance you’ll like this book more than me. In that case, it might be worth checking out the sample, or searching for another reviewer who is able to peel back the layers of symbolism. Regrettably, that reviewer isn’t me.
July 16, 2022
What a fantastic book - enormously imaginative, beautifully written, tragic, frightening, weird and impossible to put down. Catling has my full attention; I can't wait to read more of his work.
August 18, 2023
I just didnt get it
which is fine i just think it was not a book for me
which is fine i just think it was not a book for me
March 5, 2022
This is unconvincing. There's some wonderful pieces here, and parts of it feel like a genuinely compelled revelatory tale (the kind of story or image that forces itself on a writer), but too often those parts felt held together by something more wilfully contrived. It feels like it's been over-edited by too many hands, so there are periodic dead spots and leaden moments in the prose which oughtn't to be there in a book of this kind and this length. (The Greek's just affected gibberish, for example). Reading the acknowledgements it looks like it was cultivated from the original inspired visionary moment too quickly into a film - this reads like someone providing a partial recollection, partial summary, of a film they once saw, but not in any frenzied or driven way.
Disappointed, but I remain curious about his prose.
Disappointed, but I remain curious about his prose.
February 6, 2022
Beautifully written, dark, inscrutable and alien. Felt too detached for me.
Shelved as 'abandoned'
February 14, 2020I adored Catling's Vorrh, found its first sequel frustrating, and ended up not even attempting the trilogy's conclusion. But when I saw a new, short, standalone novel I didn't know existed just sat there in the library, I thought I should give him another chance. Alas, whether it just caught me in the wrong mood, or the light has got in on whatever made that debut cast its spell so well, this didn't connect at all, the weirdness lacking the hook on me it needed. That said, even the few pages I read were sufficient cabinet of dental horror to give Chibnall nightmares for years (although just imagine if the ensuing lack of sleep made his writing even more flat and lifeless? An horrific prospect worse than anything here).
May 31, 2023
Received as a Christmas present. Reviewed with a few weeks' hindsight. Tricky to review - The Vorrh trilogy was such a force that expectations were high for this, yet the size of it doesn't really allow the same kind of indulgent expansionism that infested the trilogy.
There were some fine parts here, chilling and exhilarating, depressing and dangerous as you might expect. But it almost felt unfinished, rushed. A bit like the third Gormenghast, or as a Catling snack while you wait for the train in a week. It makes sense that it could be a film - it reminded me of Cronenberg's "Spider".
3.5 stars, may also improve on a re-reading, as there is a lot of foreshadowing going on.
There were some fine parts here, chilling and exhilarating, depressing and dangerous as you might expect. But it almost felt unfinished, rushed. A bit like the third Gormenghast, or as a Catling snack while you wait for the train in a week. It makes sense that it could be a film - it reminded me of Cronenberg's "Spider".
3.5 stars, may also improve on a re-reading, as there is a lot of foreshadowing going on.
November 10, 2019
Literally no idea what this was about
February 2, 2021
Absolutely wonderful. A thread of disquiet that is renewed on every page and made so vivid by metaphors both malicious and beautiful.
September 8, 2019
This book holds many layers. It tells a story in symbolisms and with surrealistic elements. It is part general fiction, historical fiction as well as part of it might be nonfiction as well.
It is the story of Aalbert Scellinc or Earwig and Mia who get set up in a moment of stasis in a third floor apartment in Liege. And then one drop falls down into their stagnant pond of routine and a story unfolds that touches Aalbert, Earwig and Mia as well as quite a few other people during the course of this 16o pages novella.
This is a book, at least in my perception about our emotional bodies and the hurts they take by traumatisation or by actual physical disfigurement and how healing or at least a new balance might be found.
It raises questions of who actually draws the strings in any ones life. It also touches down on questions of the definition of good and evil and what is good or evil if you are not master in your own home?
This book made me try to figure out things as it did not present me with many immediate answers. It made me chuckle at times and the train journey, that one I loved the most.
First, I was disappointed with its ending. Until I realised the reason why I was disappointed, and how many strong links, likings and dislikings I had formed to the characters within the story over the journey of this book, and then I started to consider how the author built this characters, and I am in awe with the mastery of words he has. The book, as mentioned is only 16o pages long. And it is packed full with many moments that draw you into interaction, try to make you think, but also leave you to your own conclusions. And that is something I have seldom come across in recent readings.
Meanwhile I suspect that the conclusion is possibly even more fitting than I currently can make out.
I appreciate very much to have been gifted with an eARC of this book from the publisher in return for an honest review. And although this book is not for everybody, I am sure it will find the readers that need to find it, and thank you, Brian Catling, for writing this book that makes me think for myself and also amongst many other things makes me dwell on one book for a little bit longer than consumer oriented reading tastes currently allow for. This is a book to be savoured and to be read more than one time. Most definitely.
It is the story of Aalbert Scellinc or Earwig and Mia who get set up in a moment of stasis in a third floor apartment in Liege. And then one drop falls down into their stagnant pond of routine and a story unfolds that touches Aalbert, Earwig and Mia as well as quite a few other people during the course of this 16o pages novella.
This is a book, at least in my perception about our emotional bodies and the hurts they take by traumatisation or by actual physical disfigurement and how healing or at least a new balance might be found.
It raises questions of who actually draws the strings in any ones life. It also touches down on questions of the definition of good and evil and what is good or evil if you are not master in your own home?
This book made me try to figure out things as it did not present me with many immediate answers. It made me chuckle at times and the train journey, that one I loved the most.
First, I was disappointed with its ending. Until I realised the reason why I was disappointed, and how many strong links, likings and dislikings I had formed to the characters within the story over the journey of this book, and then I started to consider how the author built this characters, and I am in awe with the mastery of words he has. The book, as mentioned is only 16o pages long. And it is packed full with many moments that draw you into interaction, try to make you think, but also leave you to your own conclusions. And that is something I have seldom come across in recent readings.
Meanwhile I suspect that the conclusion is possibly even more fitting than I currently can make out.
I appreciate very much to have been gifted with an eARC of this book from the publisher in return for an honest review. And although this book is not for everybody, I am sure it will find the readers that need to find it, and thank you, Brian Catling, for writing this book that makes me think for myself and also amongst many other things makes me dwell on one book for a little bit longer than consumer oriented reading tastes currently allow for. This is a book to be savoured and to be read more than one time. Most definitely.
November 4, 2019
Weird, surrealistic and intriguing, Earwig by Brian Catling is as absurd as it is surrealistic. It packs quite a lot into such a short book. It takes you on a strange journey, one with images that makes the experience unforgettable.
The language is very literary and gives you many challenges, especially with the dialogue.
An interesting and unforgettable reading journey.
The language is very literary and gives you many challenges, especially with the dialogue.
An interesting and unforgettable reading journey.
August 27, 2019
I received a free copy from Netgalley to review, here is the blurb
"Earwig got his nickname from his grandfather.
At the start of this story he is employed to look after a strange little girl in a flat in Liege. He spies on her, listens to her by holding a glass up to the wall.
But he never touches her except when, as part of his duties, he is required to is to make teeth of ice and insert them in her gums.
Earwig takes a rare day off, which he spends drinking by himself in Au Metro, a seedy bar full of drunks, dancers and eccentrics. It is St Martin's day and in the evening as crowds parade through the street carrying lanterns through the snow, he is drawn reluctantly into a conversation with a sinister stranger called Tyre. As a result Earwig accidentally maims a waitress with a broken bottle. He understands that on some level Tyre meant this to happen.
Shortly afterwards a black cat is delivered to the flat, unasked for. The girl forms an immediate bond with it, but Earwig identifies it as the enemy.
Travelling across country by train, transporting the girl and her black cat, Earwig is increasingly caught up in a web of unfortunate and increasingly violent coincidences."
After reading the blurb I was quite excited to read this book even though it seemed a little weird and different to what I would normally read. From the blurb I thought the main part of the book would be about the train ride and the unfortunate coincidences when in fact this is a very small part of the book. I did enjoy the book to start with and thought it showed great potential although I have to confess I didn't always understand what was going on. However, the ending was a bit of a let down and I felt even more confused. Overall if you like the weird and way out you will probably enjoy this book but don't expect it all to make sense at the end, and if you do please explain it to me! I did like the photos in the book by the way.
"Earwig got his nickname from his grandfather.
At the start of this story he is employed to look after a strange little girl in a flat in Liege. He spies on her, listens to her by holding a glass up to the wall.
But he never touches her except when, as part of his duties, he is required to is to make teeth of ice and insert them in her gums.
Earwig takes a rare day off, which he spends drinking by himself in Au Metro, a seedy bar full of drunks, dancers and eccentrics. It is St Martin's day and in the evening as crowds parade through the street carrying lanterns through the snow, he is drawn reluctantly into a conversation with a sinister stranger called Tyre. As a result Earwig accidentally maims a waitress with a broken bottle. He understands that on some level Tyre meant this to happen.
Shortly afterwards a black cat is delivered to the flat, unasked for. The girl forms an immediate bond with it, but Earwig identifies it as the enemy.
Travelling across country by train, transporting the girl and her black cat, Earwig is increasingly caught up in a web of unfortunate and increasingly violent coincidences."
After reading the blurb I was quite excited to read this book even though it seemed a little weird and different to what I would normally read. From the blurb I thought the main part of the book would be about the train ride and the unfortunate coincidences when in fact this is a very small part of the book. I did enjoy the book to start with and thought it showed great potential although I have to confess I didn't always understand what was going on. However, the ending was a bit of a let down and I felt even more confused. Overall if you like the weird and way out you will probably enjoy this book but don't expect it all to make sense at the end, and if you do please explain it to me! I did like the photos in the book by the way.
August 19, 2021
I really enjoyed Catling’s The Vorrh trilogy, which was a dazzling tour-de-force of metaphor, beauty and weirdness that blended real historical figures with an alt-history setting, as well as bizarre religious fantasy and more than a little horror, both physical and metaphysical. This novella is very much in that same vein, but with the shorter length, feels a little more focused.
Earwig sees an odd, solitary middle-aged man in Liège tasked with house-sitting for a very strange little girl. He’s to ask no questions, and she’s to never leave the house. At the end of his contract, he’ll be paid handsomely and forget all about it.
If you want a measure of the weirdness of Catling’s work, look no further than the fact that part of the man’s role is to keep the girl well supplied with teeth made from ice, which she regularly inserts into her surgically altered gums.
When the caretaker dares to venture out to a bar one afternoon, he meets a man - or is it the Devil himself? - and the relative tranquillity of his existence - and that of more than a few innocent bystanders - is shattered forever.
Only 160 pages long, you can tell from the very first one whether you’ll get along with it or not, as our protagonist is described in an elaborate metaphor that paints him as indistinguishable from the titular earwig. Are we being introduced to a man, or a man-sized earwig? As ever with Catling, it’s hard to be sure.
Much like The Vorrh, every sentence here is gorgeous, every paragraph and honeyed metaphor a thing of memorable, unsettling beauty. And much like The Vorrh, I have absolutely no idea what any of it was about. This is an instance where it doesn’t really matter though.
From wondrous miracles to mesmeric horror, the journey here is what counts, and when you delve into Catling’s vivid worlds, with his striking prose, there are few journeys like it.
Earwig sees an odd, solitary middle-aged man in Liège tasked with house-sitting for a very strange little girl. He’s to ask no questions, and she’s to never leave the house. At the end of his contract, he’ll be paid handsomely and forget all about it.
If you want a measure of the weirdness of Catling’s work, look no further than the fact that part of the man’s role is to keep the girl well supplied with teeth made from ice, which she regularly inserts into her surgically altered gums.
When the caretaker dares to venture out to a bar one afternoon, he meets a man - or is it the Devil himself? - and the relative tranquillity of his existence - and that of more than a few innocent bystanders - is shattered forever.
Only 160 pages long, you can tell from the very first one whether you’ll get along with it or not, as our protagonist is described in an elaborate metaphor that paints him as indistinguishable from the titular earwig. Are we being introduced to a man, or a man-sized earwig? As ever with Catling, it’s hard to be sure.
Much like The Vorrh, every sentence here is gorgeous, every paragraph and honeyed metaphor a thing of memorable, unsettling beauty. And much like The Vorrh, I have absolutely no idea what any of it was about. This is an instance where it doesn’t really matter though.
From wondrous miracles to mesmeric horror, the journey here is what counts, and when you delve into Catling’s vivid worlds, with his striking prose, there are few journeys like it.
August 6, 2021
Despite the beautiful prose, interesting premise and elaborate descriptions, Earwig is not an enjoyable read.
For a slim book it packs quite a punch on the consciousness taking one places, one perhaps has no need to go whatsoever.
I was curious about the writing style of the author known for the sci fi series, The Vorrh and decided to try out this book before engaging in the series. I can say with absolute certainty, this is not my cup of fun.
To put it bluntly, I read books to understand. Stories have a beginning and an end and the expectation that at the end, the pieces will connect and make sense. Brian Catling, based on this book, does not belong to the same school of thought.
It's like reading a Salvador Dali painting in book form. Absurd, disturbing, slightly horrifying images, disconnected from each other, occurring simultaneously and represented in the same plane for no rhyme or reason. And while I like a good Dali, I do not like the same in books.
After I finished, I felt like I wasted way too much time in the world of Earwig and come away with no answers and a sickening feeling in my gut. Considering that a movie will be coming out this year (2021), based on this book, perhaps there is an audience for surrealism in books.
If you do read the book and like it, I'd love to hear from you. I'm curious about our different experiences and what appealed to you about the book so drop me a message please.
For a slim book it packs quite a punch on the consciousness taking one places, one perhaps has no need to go whatsoever.
I was curious about the writing style of the author known for the sci fi series, The Vorrh and decided to try out this book before engaging in the series. I can say with absolute certainty, this is not my cup of fun.
To put it bluntly, I read books to understand. Stories have a beginning and an end and the expectation that at the end, the pieces will connect and make sense. Brian Catling, based on this book, does not belong to the same school of thought.
It's like reading a Salvador Dali painting in book form. Absurd, disturbing, slightly horrifying images, disconnected from each other, occurring simultaneously and represented in the same plane for no rhyme or reason. And while I like a good Dali, I do not like the same in books.
After I finished, I felt like I wasted way too much time in the world of Earwig and come away with no answers and a sickening feeling in my gut. Considering that a movie will be coming out this year (2021), based on this book, perhaps there is an audience for surrealism in books.
If you do read the book and like it, I'd love to hear from you. I'm curious about our different experiences and what appealed to you about the book so drop me a message please.
August 26, 2019
I received a copy of this book via NetGalley.
Aalbert has an acute talent for listening, earning him the nickname 'Earwig' at a young age. Now he is much older and working in Liege (Belgium) as a carer for a young girl with a mechanical jaw and teeth made from her own frozen saliva. Following an altercation involving a broken bottle at a bar in the city, and then the arrival of a feisty, toothless cat, Aalbert and Mia leave Liege and journey by train to Paris (with cat in tow), supposedly at the behest of Mia's guardians.
This book is all kinds of bizarre, strange and downright odd with some very peculiar characters, including a sinister individual Aalbert meets down the pub who may or may not in fact be the devil. I enjoy a book that breaks away from the norm as much as the next weirdo, but Aalbert's voyeurism and deviant behaviour, particularly in the first half of the book, overshadowed what was otherwise a very original, intriguing, and surreal story.
A somewhat unpleasant and unsavoury read at times, but I didn't actually dislike the overall book. It won't be for everyone but fans of the bizarre might enjoy, though perhaps 'enjoy' isn't quite the right word to use.
Aalbert has an acute talent for listening, earning him the nickname 'Earwig' at a young age. Now he is much older and working in Liege (Belgium) as a carer for a young girl with a mechanical jaw and teeth made from her own frozen saliva. Following an altercation involving a broken bottle at a bar in the city, and then the arrival of a feisty, toothless cat, Aalbert and Mia leave Liege and journey by train to Paris (with cat in tow), supposedly at the behest of Mia's guardians.
This book is all kinds of bizarre, strange and downright odd with some very peculiar characters, including a sinister individual Aalbert meets down the pub who may or may not in fact be the devil. I enjoy a book that breaks away from the norm as much as the next weirdo, but Aalbert's voyeurism and deviant behaviour, particularly in the first half of the book, overshadowed what was otherwise a very original, intriguing, and surreal story.
A somewhat unpleasant and unsavoury read at times, but I didn't actually dislike the overall book. It won't be for everyone but fans of the bizarre might enjoy, though perhaps 'enjoy' isn't quite the right word to use.
June 1, 2022
This reads like someone's frame by frame retelling of a weird, old film, maybe. Or someone found a cache of old black and white photographs of oddments and strangenesses and decided to craft a story around them, maybe. Catling has a sweeping imagination, that is undoubtable. What I couldn't find here was a point, a plot, a trajectory that had any purpose or made me interested in the characters and the outcome. I like weird fiction, but for me books are, at their core, stories, regardless of the manner in which they are told or the details and messages they employ. After DNF-ing his first 'Vorrh' book for much the same reasons, I am reasonably sure Catling and I are not a good match.
August 23, 2024
Well, that was a quantity of words in a row. Many of them were adjectives.
I know a lot of people adore dark whimsy of this sort, but the book didn't do much for me. I felt it was straining too hard for effect, and I neither believed in nor cared about any of it. My loss, perhaps.
I know a lot of people adore dark whimsy of this sort, but the book didn't do much for me. I felt it was straining too hard for effect, and I neither believed in nor cared about any of it. My loss, perhaps.
August 24, 2021
I don't understand anything that happened in this book, don't even ask me about the plot, and I can't even IMAGINE it because it was so weird.. but lowkey?? such a good read? It was disturbing and chilling and straight-up weird and I wouldn't recommend it for everyone but I think this book just came into my life at the right moment. Gave me major Master and Margarita vibes.
April 4, 2022
This book did not hold my interest in any chapter. It took me 3 months to finish a 170 page book because of the lack of interest. It felt too random, I did not understand what was happening majority of the time, things did not follow a smooth direction, a laughable ending and just a book that doesn't know what it wants to be.
July 11, 2021
Hat mir sehr gut gefallen, aber hauptsächlich wegen der absonderlichen Protagonisten. Aber was genau die Story ist, hab ich noch nicht kapiert. Und: Lüttich, Liége als Setting eines phantastischen Romans!
January 6, 2023
weirdest book I've ever read , in the best way. Really respect the author's decision to make it weird in ways he never even gives a reason for ! (I mean that! It's refreshing. Sometimes life is just weird)
August 10, 2024
Enjoyed the knotty wayward sentences, simmering malice and chaotic grotesquerie, but wonder if it was a mistake to try and tie it all together. Will be reading more Brian Catling though, because I liked the feel of it.
December 31, 2019
A truly original tale of horror. Beautifully written and a pleasure to read.
January 18, 2021
Fairly short surreal horror story, beautifully written.
February 6, 2021
I feel awful giving it 2 stars, but it honestly wasn’t for me!
I found it annoying, confusing and like it was trying too hard
Too much unfinished possibility for me
I found it annoying, confusing and like it was trying too hard
Too much unfinished possibility for me
June 25, 2022
A sub-standard imitation of Kafka, except heavy on the detail. Unfortunately, it has put me off reading anything else by Catling.
A blessing or a shame? Looks like I'll never know...
A blessing or a shame? Looks like I'll never know...
September 23, 2022
A disturbing read, well-written if it's for you.
February 26, 2023
Catling rules
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