Review: Senselessness

Senselessness by Horacio Castellanos Moya
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I think I like thinking about this one more than reading it.

Our protagonist is a writer who’s been hired to put the finishing edits on an 1100-page collection of testimonies of victims of recent massacres in an unnamed Latin American nation. On the one hand, he’s sensitive enough to be drawn to the simple, often poetic power of the voices he’s helping to recover.

On the other, he’s a conniving womanizer who, when he finds his first paycheck isn’t ready, abuses the otherwise decent people he’s working for. Then, throughout the rest of the novel, he lies and manipulates his way into one woman’s bed after another.

The contrast is powerful. On the one hand, he’s doing work that gives a sense of healing deep damage to the country where he finds himself. On the other, he’s a first-rate asshole, as far as possible from the stereotype of the decent hero of such a context.

At a broader level, there’s something liberating in a novel about such atrocities that, without diminishing the power of the violence, avoids the obvious pieties.

So, as I say, I enjoy thinking about this, about the contrasts Moya gives us. Actually reading it, though, is another matter. It’s a small point, but the paragraphs are relentless, running 2-3 pages at times and leaving little opportunity to catch a breath. It’s also tough sometimes to keep up with the abrupt changes of narrative from one chapter to the next. And the unreliable narratorial perspective gets a bit frustrating. [SPOILER] We don’t know for a long time whether he’s correct that some of the people he knows are trying to sabotage the project, and the eventual reveal – in the final page – is dark in a way we haven’t quite been prepared for.

So, while I admire the experiment here a great deal, I enjoy it a bit less than I’d have liked. It’s a powerful concept, though, so I won’t be surprised if – in thinking about it – I come to enjoy it more in retrospect.


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