Life is Good

One (dis)advantage of being a member of a book club is that you get to read books you would not select yourself. You get to know new authors (you might not bother about otherwise), new topics that might (not) interest you.
Reading about Sevilla bar in Olten is an eye-opening experience (to keep on reading one needs to constantly open the eyes that are trying to close). The bar owner is a likeable character with a lot of (somewhat) funny stories to tell. As a lifelong small-town resident he has many local friends (nearly all of them he cannot stand) and loyal customers (most of whom have nothing to say). They are lonely people glued to their mobile phones and beers. He is not like them, he refuses to get a mobile phone and he is a show more perfect family man, a loving father (rarely exchanging more than one sentence a day with his three sons) and husband (regularly calling his wife “you - stupid cow”).
I will likely (never) read another book of this author. I have to admit I did laugh out loud a few times (somewhat unexpectedly to myself). show less

Max’s wife has taken a job in Paris and she will be gone four of the seven days of the week. Their boys, all teenagers, are generally self-sufficient, so Max, who is an author and also runs a local pub, is left to himself and his own thoughts. We spend those first four days (of his wife’s new job) with Max as he tells us about his wife, his boys, and stories of the pub and its many patrons (quirky and otherwise) and life in general. No matter what he is talking about, there seems to be an underlying love of life itself, and a fondness for all manner of humanity with it being at all saccharine.

I’ve read all of Alex Capus’ fiction that is available in English and, while this novel will not unseat my favorite, which is still [Leon show more and Louise] , I enjoyed this book immensely. There is something about Capus’s stories—the way he sees people—I thought it might be empathy, and that’s there...but his translator, John Brownjohn,puts it this way: "…I think ‘humanity’ is a keyword in Capus’ writing. He always gives one a sympathetic insight into the essential humanity of his characters, from the homesick German shipbuilders in [A Matter of Time] to the young lovers in [Léon and Louise] to the youthful bank robbers in [Almost Like Spring] or the three protagonists in his latest novel [A Price to Pay] …."

Translating Alex Capus: An Interview with John Brownjohn by Daniel Hahn show less

I read it in one go basically. There are many short, almost unconnected stories contained in the few days in the life of the storyteller.

A lot of them are really fun, that what makes you keep reading. The least fun are the ones that the storyteller just imagines for himself. Which is weird. Normally real life should not be more absurd than the imagination, but then he IS swiss after all.

What really bugs me about "belletristik" is that at the end, I have no idea what I just read and why.

very human content. easy reading, funny.