Book Review – The Black Book

Last updated on 2014-09-08

From the list of books that I have already read, you can deduce pretty fast that I am not the type who reads Nobel-prize authors. In truth, I usually approach them with sincere dislike, and rarely touch one. But somehow The Black Book by Orhan Pamuk made it into the bookcase on the side of my bed, and after reading the book that came before it in the bookcase (The Monk Who Sold His Ferrary, which also got there without my notice… must check who is messing with my bookcase) I decided to start reading it, worse that could happen was that I would waste a couple of days reading it (or in case it was a disaster, a lot less before just throwing it away).

To my greatest surprise, the book was really enjoyable. It tells the story of a man in Istanbul (a lawyer, but this is not really important) who has a lovely wife who suddenly disappears. He then goes on a trip to find her on which he starts to loose himself. The imagery that the book leaves on the mind is impressive, giving a taste of Istanbul that wants the reader both to visit the place and at the same time never to go there in his life. The author somehow describes places in a way that allows the mind to create them very easily, and impressively realistically. The story also changes course all the time, leaving the reader in suspense. Although sometimes it does get too long in descriptions, on the whole the book was easy to read (466 relatively large pages word-wise) and while the end was a bit anticlimactic, the whole book was worth reading it.

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