RaveiNews (UK)This is no history of 19th-century Russian literature; the Booker Prize-winner is clear that he neither reads Russian, nor studies its literature systematically ... Yet the illogic is deliberate, the stories chosen because the author loves them as much (if not more) than English-language texts. They also, in his view, offer unique insights not just for short-story practitioners, but for anyone seeking to understand how reading affects us and why it is important ... an appealing and original synthesis. More practical and playful than formalist analysis, it also probes exactly how narrative techniques make us more alert, attentive and sympathetic in reading books and the world around us ... We thankfully avoid truisms about the Russian soul, and instead see how these four writers arranged their stories in such a way as to reveal how complex and fallible anyone, and life in general, could be.
