Boasting such promise, Season of Ash crashed inert, leaving nary a sound in my frustrated forest. It is admitted that I wanted to kick a tree or simply throw this novel out into the street. I didn't. I do have values. These standards are routinely tested by violation. Don't worry, there's always remorse. The novel links Chernobyl, the IMF and astrophysics in a mediocre tapestry fraught with every suspense cliche availible this side of Breaking Bad.

I dare say avoid this. ( )

This novel concerns the lives of three women: Irina, a Russian biologist working in Moscow, Jennifer, the privileged daughter of a U.S. senator, who is a high-ranking economist with the IMF, and Eva, an amoral Hungarian emigrant, who is a computer specialist. The stories of these women are narrated over the course of most of the 20th century, from 1929 until 2000. Their lives frequently intersect with major historical events and characters: the market crash of 1929, the Gulag, the death of Stalin, the human genome project, various human rights movements, and so forth. Jennifer tends to be the IMF's representative in countries in which capitalism is nascent.

For much of the book we are puzzled by what connects the three women and their families and friends. However, as the events of the 20th century inexorably progress, their stories approach, intersect, and encircle each other.

This novel is jam-packed, and sometimes feels like Volpi has bitten off more than he can chew. However, the New York Times describes him as the first Russian novelist who is not Russian, which I think is meant as a compliment. I'm not quite sure why Volpi has chosen to write of matters that are so far removed from his own background. While the novel is not fully successful, it is a fascinating read. ( )

I read this book because it was on an NPR list of best foreign fiction of 2009. The author is Mexican and founded a literary group that is attempting to move Mexican literature beyond the bounds of magical realism. This book follows several characters: mostly scientists, economists, and business types with a few dissidents and poets thrown in the mix. It takes place almost everywhere: Moscow, Zaire, the West Bank, Germany, Boston...to name a few. The characters seem to become somehow involved in every major event in the late 20th century. The book talks about Chernobyl, Israeli occupation of the West Bank, the WTO protests in Seattle, the collapse of the Soviet Union, the mapping of the human genome, etc. (A reviewer from the New York Times aptly wrote the book could have been called "We Didn't Start the Fire- A Novel.")

Overall, it was just too much. It had a lot of potential, but there was just too much going on. None of the characters were all that likable or memorable, which is odd, given the amount of time dedicated to characterization. Some of the historical context was interesting, but it never seemed fully developed. One of the characters works for the IMF, first in Mobutu's Zaire and then in post-communist Russia. The process of trying to privatize Russia's economy after years of communism is fascinating, but it was too complicated for me to sort through in the book.

I really wanted to like this book, but sadly, it just never pannned out. ( )

I received this book from LibraryThing, as part of their Early Reviewer program. It's taken me a while to get to it, as I've gotten distracted by reading other things (and by doing things other than reading).

So, what is this book about? It's going to be hard for me to describe. The story stretches from the late 1920's to the early 2000's, following (primarily) three women: Jennifer Moore, uptight economist working for the IMF; Eva Halasz, free-spirited computer scientist, jumping from man to man, trying to keep her outsized intelligence employed; and Irina Granin, a Soviet biologist, living through the fall of the Soviet Union. We follow each woman independently for most of the book, but the Volpi brings all three women's storylines together at the end. Ostensibly written by Yuri Chernishevsky, after he murders Eva Halasz (this is disclosed VERY early in the book, so I'm not giving anything away), the book takes readers from the Chernobyl disaster through the fall of Communism and the rise of capitalism in the former USSR, and also works in the development of the Human Genome Project, as well. Volpi name drops Russian and American politicians and biologists throughout.

I mostly enjoyed the book while I was reading it, but I found it hard to go back to, once I'd put it down. I mostly went back to it to discover Yuri's reasons for murdering Eva, but when the revelation came, it was somewhat anticlimactic. I think it would have helped to have been better versed in Russian history (especially the history of the late 20th century), but I did learn a lot from what I read in the novel. I have a much better understanding of the meaning of perestroika and glasnost and how the fall of the Soviet Union was orchestrated than I ever did in my school days (when I was living through it!). Part of my issue with the novel was that there wasn't enough action. I like plot-based books and this was much more of a character study...not least the character of the swiftly changing USSR. I think I just needed more action to keep me involved.

I would have to give this novel three out of five Whatevers. Good, but not excellent. There were a lot of typos. I don't believe my copy was an ARC, so I don't know how to explain that, and it really bugged me. Recommended for those who like slow-moving, character-based books; for those who have an interest in either Russian history of the late 20th century, or the development of the Human Genome Project; or for those who don't mind a more literary style of writing. (I did like how all major politicians and large cities were almost always modified by a particular phrase. For example, Moscow was "city of wide avenues" and Yeltsin "of strong arms.") ( )

Jorge Volpi (1968-) is one of the leading voices in contemporary Mexican literature, having written several novels that have received critical acclaim within and outside of Mexico. His most famous novel is In Search of Klingsor (En busca de Klingsor), the winner of two major international literary awards, which "explores the nexus between science and human nature and how they shaped the world in the aftermath of World War II." He is one of the founders of the 'Crack' literary movement in Mexico, whose members seek to revisit the roots of the Latin American literary boom of the 1960s, and go beyond magical realism and other standard forms which have characterized much of the literature from the region in recent years.

Season of Ash (No será la tierra) was originally published in Spanish in 2006. It was translated into English by Alfred Mac Adam and published by Open Letter Books in 2009.

The novel, which is separated into three acts, begins at the nuclear plant in Chernobyl in 1986, on the day of the disastrous accident. The first act follows this prelude, and we are introduced to the three main characters: Irina, a Soviet biologist; Eva, a Hungarian computer scientist; and Jennifer, an American economist. Each mourn the death of someone dear to them on the next to last day of 2000. The narrator then introduces himself, and tells us that these apparently disparate stories and characters are linked through him, and that one of them will reach a tragic end.

Volpi describes the lives of the main characters and those close to them, through historical fictional accounts of the Soviet Union and Russia from Stalin to Yeltsin, the 1929 stock market crash, financial crises in Zaire, Mexico and Russia, human rights movements in the US and abroad, and other topics. Their stories are told separately but chronologically, in a manner that was very readable, unique and interesting to me.

In the final act, Volpi links the lives of the characters through the narrator, and the novel is transformed into a detective story and a murder mystery. Unfortunately this was where [Season of Ash ]became a major disappointment to me, as the fusion was not a successful one, and the novel ended abruptly and incompletely. ( )