Tim's Reviews > The Tsar of Love and Techno

This book of collected stories begins in Leningrad in 1937. It's narrated by a censor whose job is to make faces disappear from photos. Whenever possible he paints a portrait of his brother, murdered by the state police, into these photos. One day he's confronted by a photo of a prima ballerina who has been murdered by the KGB and who strikes up in him a crisis of conscience.

All the other stories are about the descendants of this man's brother and the ballerina and their lovers.

The composition of this book was ingenious. My least favourite element though was the writing itself which was just a bit too purple, ebullient and colourful for me. In one story he deploys a similar character to David Mitchell's narrator in Black Swan Green - both in their formative years have a poetic sensibility, both love to write in aphorisms. I didn't quite love this as much as his A Constellation of Vital Phenomenon but an impressive achievement all the same.