The City of Earthly Desire

a book recommendation

This is a small post to make a book recommendation, a novel called ‘The City of Earthly Desire’, written by fellow-blogger Francis Berger.

This won’t be a typical book review as I don’t know how to write those things. I tried to write a ‘review’ on Amazon but, even though I bought it, I couldn’t. Just one more reason to hate that damned company.

I don’t wish to spoil anything, so I won’t talk much about the plot. Instead, I will simply describe my feelings about it.

The novel gripped me immediately and kept me interested throughout - I accompanied the changes in scenery, from the Communist-ravaged Danube-Swabian culture of rural Hungary, to the hustle and bustle of New York and lastly to the seedy underbelly of Budapest, and the development of the characters throughout. I was always eager to know what came next from beginning to end.

The main characters come alive without being over-described, the choices they make make them feel like real people. After a while it does seem like you know them, which only makes the dark subject matter harder to stomach and their downward spirals and disappointments more unnerving and disheartening. Some reviewers apparently found one of the main characters, Béla, ‘too stupid to be realistic’, but I don’t share their opinion: I know how stupid I am, and how stupid people can be. Others found another character, Suzy, ‘too evil’ and ‘too narcissistic’, but once again, I know how evil and narcissistic I can be, and how evil and narcissistic some people are. A few minor characters, the English journalist Verge and the Russian kingpin Vikshi especially, I felt could have been major ones in other novels - despite their relatively short appearances, they were rich enough to make you wonder about their origin stories.

Despite its dark topics there is never any doubt as to where the narrator stands, there is no moral relativism, instead one knows exactly what is right and what is wrong, even when the characters do not, or especially when they do not. To use a prominent symbol from the book, there is always a white stag, a traditional symbol of goodness and beauty and truth, to serve as a moral and spiritual compass, as it did for the Danube-Swabians who adopted it as their own symbol and as it does for the main characters, even if they sometimes lose sight of it.

This is a self-published novel, and not having had the benefit of a professional copy-editor, a few typos do appear and a few small words are missing from time to time, but they don’t really affect the reading in my opinion. I always knew what was meant, and if you’re a fast reader, you won’t even notice them as you, too, will skip over pronouns and prepositions to get to the meat even when they appear where they’re suppose to, and so you will add them instinctively even when they are not there.

To say I liked the book, or enjoyed it, is not to do it justice. It reads very well - despite its size it took me about a week - but it is a hard book. I am glad I read it, and I consider it a well written and effective book. I finished it yesterday and, as I went to bed last night, the main characters and their stories were still going around in my mind. Most books don't do that to me.

I won’t give it a number of stars or a rating or whatever. I simply recommend it.