Book Review: Man Walks into a Room

I love Nicole Krauss. I read The History of Love mid 2006. I loved it, but for some reason did not hunt for other books the author had written. Perhaps I had a long enough To Read list as it was. Earlier this summer I stumbled upon this book, and after recalling how much I loved the first book of hers I’d read, decided to give her debut a go.

I thoroughly enjoyed it. I read it almost start to finish without putting it down. I put it down just the once, and because I had to. I loved Samson, I love Krauss’ writing, I sympathized heavily with Anna. Maybe this book meant even more to me because Samson was the last name of a boy I once loved and lost, despite the fact that he and the character are not in any way similar.

The story is about a man, who has lived a good life, who loses his memory from the age of 12 onwards due to a benign tumour in his brain. The novel follows the aftermath, how he views the world, his interactions and thoughts, and how he feels about the people who were once very important to him. Memory loss has become a fixture in modern entertainment, from books to films, but Krauss touched upon it so beautifully and with originality, much in the same way I feel Niffenegger did with Time Traveler’s Wife with respect to time travel. That’s not to say that their styles are similar, just that they both understand that when writing about a subject so broad and so often realised, they must find a new angle in which to project from.

I definitely loved the book, and if it weren’t for the fact that I have 35 other books waiting on my shelf to be read, I honestly think that once I’d reached the end, I would just started all over again.