The Mookse and the Gripes discussion

Simpatía by Rodrigo Blanco Calderón translated by Noel Hernández González and Daniel Hahn (Seven Stories), Spanish/Venezuela

From Chapter 2

On the morning of the crucial day, Ulises dreamed of Claudia Cardinale. The actress was reenacting the sequence in The Leopard that made her famous, when Alain Delon’s character dances with her.

But isn’t the dance with the Burt Lancaster character (the Delon character’s uncle)?

There is a shot where Cardinale dances with Delon in the crowd, but the iconic Cardinale dance scene is with Lancaster, yes.

It may depend on what is meant by "sequence." It is all part of the same scene, if I recall.

I have started this one too. Another thing that puzzled me was the reference to Khan being a Hindu name - all the ones I know of (mostly cricketers) are Muslims. Maybe there is some deliberate unreliable narration going on.

I think we have a winner ... of the Bad Sex in Fiction Award

Paul wrote: "I think we have a winner ... of the Bad Sex in Fiction Award"

Oh no - I just ordered myself a copy of this book!

I'll plan to skim those sections! :P

They are easily skimmed as they don't seem to have much to do with the story - think the author just wanted to appeal to the soft porn market.

Hugh wrote: "I have started this one too. Another thing that puzzled me was the reference to Khan being a Hindu name - all the ones I know of (mostly cricketers) are Muslims. Maybe there is some deliberate unre..."

Could be or...
https://www.huffpost.com/archive/in/e...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khan_Sahib

And think there were regions where surnames didn't necessarily operate along religious lines.

From the Booker page:

"Ulises devotes himself to one of the saner choices left to him: complete the task by saving the dogs, with the help of his Medea-like lover, Nadine."

Medea-like lover is not a term I expected to hear! Based on this, some dogs are going to die?!

If you don't like dogs dying don't read this book.

If you do like finest literary fiction I'd also suggest not reading this book.

I'm not familiar with Medea but I assume she is an adult movie star as that seems to be Nadine's main function in the novel. E.g. after a detailed discussion of various key plot points:

“It’s absurd Martín forgot about this specific thing,” said Ulises. “Maybe the old man wasn’t all there toward the end. I barely saw him during the last month. Shall I ask Segovia?”

Nadine set aside the thick white tome she was browsing and looked at Ulises tiredly.

“Come on, take off my panties.”
Ulises knew what was coming next. Nadine asking him, or rather ordering him, to start sniffing and licking her.

Hahaha. Right....

Paul wrote: "If you don't like dogs dying don't read this book.

If you do like finest literary fiction I'd also suggest not reading this book.

I'm not familiar with Medea but I assume she is an adult movie st..."

Boo, it's too late to cancel my order... :( This does not sound like my thing, and it's not something I would've expected in a book purportedly about the people (and dogs) left behind in a country experiencing a flood of emigration, which is what I was thinking I would get...

I rather enjoyed it in the end...

Hugh wrote: "I rather enjoyed it in the end..."

Well, it's short (or at least not overly long) and I'll own it, so ... I'll be looking forward to more feedback!

It is about the dogs left behind. The dogs therefore don’t tend to fare terribly well. Plus some get tortured to force their absent owner to do something, or poisoned out of jealousy.

I agree that parts of it are tasteless, but it rather reflects the setting, and I think it is supposed to be read as satire. No real dogs were harmed. And I learned a lot about Elizabeth von Arnim...

Agreed entirely on the no real dogs were harmed - but animal cruelty on the page does seem a trigger for some people, and a book that might have read as a lovely tale of someone rescuing dogs, largely isn't. So seems useful to flag.

Why does setting a book in Caracas though mean it needs to have intermittent porn injected into it of the 'and while unblocking his sink, he used his plunger on me as well' variety?

Soft porn and animal cruelty? This will be a hard pass for me. Thanks for the heads up.

Not at the same time though for the avoidance of doubt.

Those two at the same time actually won the IB a few years back.

Yes put them together and it might have been a good book

I also noticed the bad sex immediately ("Ulises opened the apartment and let her in. They threw themselves at each other hungrily. Nadine came quite quickly. Her orgasm wasn't one of those stones that falls in the water and spreads into waves. It was more like the burning heat of an axe, brief and rough.").

The bigger problem is that the bad writing is not limited to the sex scenes. Now at page 80 and getting very annoyed. Could it be a translation problem too?

Close to DNF'ing.

Well one of the translators is Daniel Hahn so I suspect it is the original.

Paul wrote: "Well one of the translators is Daniel Hahn so I suspect it is the original."

Well, if I ever get around to reading it, I'll let you all know (I ordered the Spanish edition). Although all of this commentary certainly isn't putting it at the top of my TBR!
And it does sound like the problems go beyond a mere translation glitch...

This was one I was very interested in, and bought.

And now you’re all making me regret it.

Was hoping it might be more interesting, as the concept wasn't bad but the execution...

Hmm yeah there was just something off about this one. Despite the backdrop of the dictatorship and turmoil of the country, the stakes never really felt all that high or convincing.

This book is breezy, quirky, and a little bit silly. I can see why it's not landing for a lot of people. It's a style that would usually be more at home on another prize list.

If I picked this up a few months ago in another context, I might have liked it for what it is, but it's hard to read it now without thinking about all the books that were passed over for it.

at least in the uk there is no alternative prize list for translated fiction on the “more breezy” side