Most of the stories in this collection really surprised me, almost blew me away. The third story, I think it was, did not move me the same way. When I got to the eponymous piece, I was startled by the voice of it; it was very different from the rest of the collection up to that point, and I recognized in some of the phrases (at least, as translated by Gauvin) a style that I have seen before in a place very meaningful to myself personally. ( )

I was suckered into buying this by the publisher’s write-up: “a collection of stories from the last of the great Francophone Belgian fantasists: distilled tales of distant journeys, buried memories and impossible architecture. Described here are the emotionally disturbed architectural plan for a palace of emptiness; the experience of snowfall in a bed in the middle of a Finnish forest; the memory chambers that fuel the marvelous futility of the endeavor to write; the beautiful woodland church, built of warm air currents and fog, scattering in storms and taking renewed shape at dusk.” Well, yes. That’s all true and, from time to time, the writing and the stories even live up to the hype. But generally, I found the collection disappointing—the imagination was just a little too fantastical, the writing not quite convincing enough. However, the last two pieces in the book are non-fiction essays, one on reading and one on writing. Though I found the writing a bit self-indulgent, both essays were worth the time and I enjoyed them. ( )