Widely admired author Emma Donoghue manages to capture some version of fin de siècle zeitgeist while also spinning a suspenseful action narrative in The Paris Express. She sets her scene in an actual 1895 out-of-control express train that crashes into the Montparnasse station, and assembles within it a cast of historical figures, (some of whom were actually passengers on the wreck). This clever device gathers together key figures who represent the coming train wreck that is the 20th Century. It’s...
April 08, 2025
"Twist" by Colum McCann
Distinguished author Colum McCann (Let the Great World Spin, Thirteen Ways of Looking, among many others) takes up the story of an enigmatic seeker of sense and connection in our fractured modern world. In describing his hero, Conway, he achieves such subtle effects that I felt the need to go back and reread his early descriptions: a man with a focus on something so distant as to remove him from his current surroundings; his calmness and non-committal approach and way of speaking; an unwillingness...
Posts
