Faces in the Crowd

Faces in the Crowd / Valeria Luiselli 
trans. from the Spanish by Christina MacSweeney
Minneapolis, MN: Coffee House Press, 2014, c2011.
146 p.

I've always meant to read Valeria Luiselli, and saw this book in my library's audiobook collection, her first novel. So I picked it up to give it a try. I found it clever, and interesting in its metafictional approach -- the character in Mexico City is remembering her time as a translator in NY City, and the object of her research. She's writing a novel about him. Meanwhile, the character she is researching is narrating his own story, and they cross over strangely in the end, both becoming equally real and fictional, and existing in the same space. 

I listened to this one, and the two narrators were both very good, especially the woman reader. I think listening made this a bit of a different reading experience, as the different voices really made the two storylines distinct, and the merging at the end particularly startling. 

The setting ranges between Mexico City (mainly in the character's home), NY City, and Philadelphia. The characters shift around in time and place as they recall their pasts and situate themselves in "then" or "now". It gives an expansive feeling to a small book. 

There is an uncertainty about the solidity of existence in both characters, the male author feeling like he's wasting away, and being separated from his children. The female character doesn't leave her house and feels absorbed in her children. This vagueness about individual reality reflects the structure and theme of the book too, and it makes it a bit of an unsettling read. At the end I wasn't quite sure what I thought of it, or if I really understood what she was going for. 

The style is compelling, the characters are intriguing, and as mentioned I found the narrators excellent. I can't stop thinking about parts of this story. However, I don't know if I can say that I "liked" it or not -- it felt a bit prickly and as if it was keeping itself at a remove, somehow. I might have to reread it in a paper copy to really get a handle on it. For now, I'll say that it was an interesting experience, and a clever read that appeals to the intellect.