Nineteen-year-old Little Lea lives in a rural town where life ends at the edge of the forest.
When a stranger loses his dog on the first day after the end of the world, Little Lea warns him not to follow it into the forest, that people who enter never come out. Over a shared joint, she tells him about the burning in her gut, winding a tale of loss, desire, and conspiracies.
A largely conventional affair ... Eventually we realise that what is meant by 'the end of the world' is less something real that might put these traumas in perspective, than a variation on a theme ... Soon enough all this becomes just a little too introspective and ponderous, to the point that even startling premonitions—such as a snowstorm in summer— aren’t enough to break the general ennui ... That might make for a more accurate depiction of life in a small town, but it doesn’t always make for compelling fiction. If not even the impending apocalypse is enough to raise the stakes, regardless of how it’s defined, it’s hard to imagine what will ... That’s All I Know is at its strongest when Lea talks of loving and caring for Nora, her older and severely disabled sister. Here Levi’s prose is genuinely affecting ... Yet this depiction of full-time care, while keenly felt, is still not quite enough for That’s All I Know to meet its full potential, which seems to be always sitting there without ever being reached.
An unconventional and memorable coming-of-age story ... In MacSweeney’s translation, Little Lea’s voice—at once casual and haunted—emerges as a compelling element, both casual and occasionally jarring, as when Little Lea’s struggles with her sister culminate in an image both visually stunning and deeply transgressive. Much like the forest that surrounds the setting here, this is a novel capable of lethal shocks and bold transfigurations.
