After reading "To Be Sung Underwater" in which the prose flowed like water, this book, "The Unnamed" was a jolt. It is terse, cold, brusque and felt like a piece of staccato music. The characters are not terribly likeable although you might have a bit of sympathy for them and you are compelled to read just to find out what happens to them.
The main character Tim has an unnamed disease: uncontrollable walking. He cannot predict when this malady will strike nor can he stop it when it does. The best he can do is keep a backpack with him at all times so once the marathon walking begins he at least has a hat, gloves, new socks, something to shield him from the forces of the weather. The urge comes over him at any moment, he could be in the middle of a sentence, in the middle of a court case, and he turns and walks away and doesn't stop sometimes for days. When exhaustion finally overtakes his body he simply falls asleep somewhere. It is up to his wife to find him and pick him up. She finds him sleeping in graveyards or behind gas stations or on park benches, dirty, torn and incredibly weary.
This is a tough story, nothing about it is fun or even remotely like life. It's an allegory of modern day disconnect. This man is controlled physically by his body and yet his mind cannot overcome that physicality. He moves relentlessly without desire, faces brutal weather and exhaustion, has alienated his daughter and wife and co-workers, has no friends and basically no purpose in life other than to obey the command to move. It could have been depressing but instead I found it more distancing than depressing.
About three quarters through the book I was wishing for a little hand-drawn map of where Tim's walks took him. Something that would give credence to his unwilling walking. That would have been too real, it would have made his story seem plausible. I suppose that's why I wanted it.
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I do not want this book for Xmas. It sounds definitely depressing. Just letting you know.
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