Release Date: January 15th 2015Synopsis:
A quirky and unsettling tale, of dark humour and strange realities, about a bureaucrat, an open plan office and a secret room..
The Authority looks favourably upon meticulousness, efficiency and ambition. Bjorn has all of this in spades, but it's only in the Room that he can really shine. Unfortunately, his colleagues see things differently. In fact, they don't even see the Room at all.
The Room is a short, sharp and fiendish fable in the tradition of Franz Kafka, Samuel Beckett and Charlie Kauffman. If you have ever toiled in an office, felt like the world was against you or questioned the nature of reality then this is the novel for you.
Review:
I got this ebook from Netgalley in return of an honest review.
This is nothing like I usually read and I was positive I wasn't going to enjoy it that much. I was right and so wrong at the same time.
On one side, the characters were all detestable and extremely unreliable narrators, but I absolutely loved every minute of this book.
A little introduction in the beginning of the book compares the style of 'The Room' to that of Kafka, and I totally agree. It has the same gift of being able to mess with your mind, leaving everything out of place, while making you question everything you thought was true and everything you believed in.
It points a finger at the reader directly, making sure we see our own faults in these flawed characters and that makes us uncomfortable, the best kind.It's a psychological journey through a story were nothing is certain and, by the end of the book, we get to take our own conclusions, based on what we got out of it. That's the magic of books of this kind (and books in general, but this one takes it to levels is almost impossible to describe).
Honestly, I read this in a day. It kept me wanting more, I couldn't think about anything else but to know how it ended, even though I knew, deep down, that the ending would only raise even more questions, as it did.This was just an immensely mind blowing, surral and desconcerning story that deserves to be read by everyone.
Plus, the publisher was kind enough to offer me some extra material to share on the release date!
First of all, Vintage hosted a competition for an animation promoting the novel, and I must say that the winning video is absolutely fantastic and captures the book so well. You can watch it here: http://youtu.be/4ssVuB2ALCE
And here is my favourite part of the email they sent me: audio links of the author, Jonas Karlsson, reading from his book! I will leave the links below, you can just click the name of the scenes to listen to this amazing gift from the publisher.
1 - Reprimand
2 - What are you doing?
3 - Door/Wall
4 - The meeting
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