"The act of memory is an act of ghostwriting. ... And it's not just our memories. Our actions too. We all think we're in control of our own lives, but really they're pre-ghostwritten by forces around us." (286-7)

David Mitchell's 1999 debut Ghostwritten is one of those rare fictions that has a useful reason to subtitle itself "A Novel." It seems at first to be a string of nine tangentially connected novellas, each with its own speaker, and separated by great leaps of geography. But the short tenth chapter--almost an epilogue, though set chronologically before the first--for any readers who were still confused in the previous climax should clarify the identities of the two superhuman ghostwriters whose machinations have propelled the rich array of characters and settings throughout the book.

There is a lot of unreliable narration and dramatic irony in this book that starts with a narrator who is a terrorist adherent of a lightly-fictionalized version of the Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult. Many central and incidental characters re-appear in Mitchell's subsequent novels, usually at chronological points prior to their stories in Ghostwritten.

As Mitchell would later do even more assertively in books like Cloud Atlas and The Bone Clocks, he gives an account that moves from the past through its time of inscription into a projected future. Of course, the "present" of Ghostwritten is now a full generation old, and its relatively tight diachronic window shows its age a little bit, but that is amply compensated by the vivid characters and mordant prose, leavened with recurring motifs that intimate the larger shapes behind each scene.

"I added 'writers' to my list of people not to trust. They make everything up." (145)

Ghostwirtten is a collection of nine interconnected stories that introduce themes Mitchell expands on in his later books: chance, crossed paths, untethered souls, and the nature of time. Each of the nine stories are complete enough to stand on their own although many of the characters in them touch on and sometimes change the lives in the others. Imagine the tracks of a recording and how overlaying them creates a song - these stories work together the same way. Only someone with Mitchell’s skill as a writer could have pulled this off. ( )

David Mitchell's first book, and what a masterpiece of a short story collection it is.

In a similar way to 'Cloud Atlas' each short story is subtly interconnected as you move from one to the next. But whereas in 'Cloud Atlas', where each story is a jump through time, in 'Ghostwritten' one is left with this weird feeling of the oddest synchronicity.

The image i'm left with in my head after reading this book is that of the never ending stairs...

It really is an incredible piece of writing and a wonderful use of short stories. I do plan to read it again, so i'll update this post if i have a different idea of it after a second reading as i'll already know where i'll end up when i start the book so it'll be a whole different experience.

So have a read and see what you think at the end - or maybe that should be 'when you get back to the beginning'.

I've now got 'Number9Dream', also by David, lined up, then i plan to read the rest of David's books in order and when David's added a few more to the pile i'll definitely be coming back to re-read them all over again from the beginning.

I'm definitely a huge fan of David's writing and can truly see why he's been shortlisted with two books for the Booker Prize already and has won other awards for his writing also. ( )

This is a really wonderful book. I would probably have given it five stars, but I read Cloud Atlas a few years ago and that seems to me to be Mitchell's perfection of this form. One failing of Ghostwritten is that a couple of the stories are not quite as brilliant as the majority. Also the thread that runs through the whole book is at times tenuous and in the end a little bit unsatisfying. However, Ghostwritten is still full of driven characters, evocative prose and most importantly, a sense of grandiosity and purpose weaved through ordinary lives. Sometimes our lives do feel important and we are aware of our historical context, and Mitchell writes about and for those times. It's a wonderful approach and I think a crucial component of secular spirituality. Even his more conventional narratives have a sense of this, but it's at its most inspiring in Mitchell's sprawling, non-linear works such as this one. I'd highly recommend it, although just behind Cloud Atlas. ( )

When I finished reading David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas a friend said she loved Ghostwritten and recommended I read it. And I must say; I'm glad she did. It's hard to believe this is a debut novel. The variety and depth of the characters is amazing. I will definetly be reading more of his books ! ( )