Entertaining but ultimately disappointing

This is a rollicking comedy-thriller with no pretensions to literary style or taste, and I'm rather surprised that it got such good reviews. It takes place in Brussels, and its main topic is the EU warts and all. Actually, warts is about all. The civil servants, think tanks etc are all about being a waste of time and money. The main strand in the plot is the idea to organise a celebration of 60 years since the Treaty of Rome (1957-2017) to improve the image of the Commission in the eyes of the people of Europe, and the culture section of the commission plump for a party at Auschwitz, which ultimately gets cancelled.

Culturally, it is interesting (for me) to read a book by a contemporary Austrian author. I couldn't believe how continuously it referred to WW2. Every character was either the son of resistance fighters, collaborators, or Nazi sympathisers, or, of course, one of the few camp survivors still alive. The only English character (I think there was only one) is a Boris-type ginger haired toff. A rather unflattering stereotype of the Brits.

The book is topical, obviously, but it is not informative. The only argument put forward in defence of the EU is 'Never Again.' Because of Auschwitz, we must have the EU to prevent any recurrence. This argument is put forward as an assertion. No effort to explain why there can never be another 'European civil war' once we have the EU as a forum to jaw-jaw.

But my main reason for rating this book quite poorly is the plot - or rather lack of plot. The book starts with an assassination in a hotel. We are told that the wrong person was assassinated, but not who they are or who the real target was. We are told that NATO has hushed the whole business up. An honest, very tall, Belgian police officer, son of two generations of resistance fighters, with terminal cancer, gets cued up to become a rogue investigator. Then he kind of gets bored with it and we never hear any more about the murder or NATO plot. There is a pig loose in Brussels who, in a very neat introductory chapter, is spotted by each of the key characters on that same one evening of the hotel murder. The pig motif runs through the novel (pig farmers lobbying the EU powers etc.) but at the end of the book we never learn where this pig came from - we are left hanging on a number of somewhat fantastical sub-plots. I really don't think authors should be allowed to do that.

So. Ultimately a bit silly, but entertaining and witty along the way.

Narration. Professional quality.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

Well written intriguing and compelling book

Well written with numerous plots. Good insight into Europe. Excellent narrated. Never heard of this writer but he is excellent

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

Narrator saves the book

The good old German tradition of writing novels without a proper plot is still alive. Even wins awards. Pale puzzle pieces of murder, of EU-chitchat and overchewed Holocaust-reminders glued together with inapropriate essay droplets. The whole whatever would be more terrible if Mr. Menasse hadn't have an excellent style. But still it was painful to listen to it.
After the first hour I thought the author must be a very old man. In fact he is only sixtish, but the prose smells of a ninety-year-old retired scolar trying to put forward his dated theories wrapped into a patchwork paper. It is like he forgets half way where he had begun and where he is planning to go.
Good luck, reader! Surely the extraordinary translation and the professional narration will help you a lot to get through this one. But you won't be richer at any rate. I listened the German and the English version side by side so my vocabulary gets the best of it. Otherwise... avoid it. Life is so short.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

As straight forward as the EU

At times the story was hard going at times, and only fully makes sense when you get to the end 🐖🇪🇺

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!