C

C is, without a doubt, one of the most frustratingly brilliant and beautifully wearisome novels I've read in a very long time, if ever. Rather than a typical story, the book is one long coded message, a cypher of meaning that is so densely structured and intricately constructed that it is the quintessential English Lit Major's wet dream.The novel contains four sections. The first follows Serge as he grows up in his father's mansion, which doubles as a preparatory school for deaf children who learn to talk. The second sees Serge join the military as an aerial observer in the war. The third follows him through a typically disillusioned (and drug-infused) college experience. The final sends Serge off to Egypt to discuss Her Majesty's communications systems as they are set up among the jumbled tombs of the desert. Each segment bleeds into the other, and the symbols and tropes of each ricochet back and forth, exposing connections, confidences, meanings, and codes.What does C stand for? A lot of things. The symbol for carbon - the basis for life. It also stands for the complexity of communication, the chaos of codes, and the crucible of context. I think, even more so, it is a symbol itself of life interrupted. The book is very much about the cyclical nature of the world, how the signals we create simply by living weave and repeat throughout existence, but Serge's signals seem aborted and flattened (he has a hard time with perspective), and so the C's he is constantly encountering do as much to expose those connections as to sever them. Therefore, instead of the O of order, openness, and oblivion, a piece seems to be missing, creating the C of calamity, confusion, and collision. S's, too, are prevalent throughout the book, and not just in the names of our key players. S's, I assume represent the C's turned back on themselves, one-half of the symbol of eternity, the flowing forward and then backward of life, the looped repetition of failure and hope.This probably sounds pretentious and impenetrable to most of you. Such is the book. Although I loved the craft of the writing -- it is impossible not to see the breath-taking architectural delicacy of the novel's themes -- it is highly alienating. In fact, the first five or six pages of the book describe a man trying to find his way into the Carrefax's home. The descriptions of the man weaving through gardens, groves, around walls and past hedges were so baffling and complicated that I must have re-read them half a dozen times. I could never clearly picture where this man was or what he was doing. It wasn't until the sixth read that I realized that that was probably the point. The final passage of the novel, during which Serge travels on a boat down the Nile, features multiple conversations in multiple languages about the collusion and conflicts between multiple cultures. It is similarly distancing. You will need to be an historian with the command of at least four languages and a working knowledge of Egyptian mythology to even glimpse the depth of McCarthy's meaning. Again, perhaps the disorientation is the point. Also, meaning. After all, the book reads like the perfectly described strata of TV static. If you're wondering what the message is, I think it is this: we must not stop trying to figure out what it means. Not just the book, but the circle of life, the circle none of us will ever be able to complete, our death chopping off a piece, leaving us all in the C of a coffin, the consolation of consternation.I have now read the book twice, and although a second reading helped me understand much more than the first time around, it also more clearly showed my dearth of knowledge. I drew closer to and further from the narrative. Even the most patient of readers is bound to feel similarly exhausted and humbled by the novel. While I truly loved the book, I also found myself annoyed by its encoded aloofness. I know I will be reading it again in the future, and with great relish, but I also know that there are very few people in my circle of friends to whom I would recommend it. It's not entertaining in the way of most novels. Imagine removing the panels of a computer and showing the complex innards to a child, explaining that this is what makes it play music, videos, and games. The child might be bored and annoyed or may be bewilderingly enthralled. If you feel like you might be the latter, pick up this book. It's a joy to figure out, but a frustration when you learn that, perhaps, there is no way you will ever do so completely, just like with life.

Remember the mid-'90s tune "Everything Zen" by Bush? Remember how everyone loved the song 'cause it rocked, but no one had any idea what it was really about because the lyrics are a goofy mess of seemingly unrelated phrases and ideas? That's kind of how I felt about Tom McCarthy's uber-literary, Man Booker-shortlisted novel C.There's a pretty straightforward story here that I enjoyed strictly on a "beat and rhythm" level. And then there's what it really means. McCarthy creates a laundry list of themes, images and ideas that recur throughout the novel. The meaning of these in terms of how they fit together and complement each other and the story holistically is frequently tough to decipher.The story is Serge Carrefax's, who is born to English wealth right before the turn of the 20th century. Serge's father runs a school to teach deaf children to talk and experiments with various wireless communication technologies, and so Serge becomes infatuated with the burgeoning field of radio from an early age. He fights in World War I as a navigator, parties in post-war London and then moves on to Egypt to scout locations for new communications ventures.Serge is a bit of an odd ball. He finds out early in his life during an art class that he "just can't do perspective: everything he paints is flat." And Serge's lack of perspective -- in the broader sense of the phrase -- is a cornerstone of the story. Serge is an impartial observer to his own life. In fact, oftentimes, the reader is left to form his/her own conclusions about things Serge tells us about, but doesn't understand or doesn't care enough about to explain more fully. Is that his sister he sees having sex in an early scene in the novel? Or is it something else he's describing? It's hard to tell.The novel also has its own unconventional logic and rules, which McCarthy uses to pack in his list of tropes and tricks. For instance, he'll mention something seemingly inconsequential at the time, only to have the idea re-emerge later in a more symbolic context. Serge and some of his fellow soldiers discuss free will vs. determinism, and then soon after, they're building a tunnel to nowhere and no one is in charge of its construction. The effect is disorienting -- it's hard to figure out which instance is the one McCarthy intends you to decode and add to the meaning of the story. And then there is the recurrence of several images and themes: Insects, wireless communication, descriptions of shapes and geometry, and drugs all flit in and out of the novel. What do they all mean?C is not difficult, as some reviewers have purported. But extracting meaning might be. You constantly feel like you're missing something or left out of a joke or not understanding a reference. And that can make reading frustrating at times. There's so much going on here, it's obviously a novel meant to be read several times -- like an Andy Kaufman or David Lynch film is meant to be viewed several times to pick up a little more each time. The story's interesting, but I'm not sure it's enough of a draw to get me to read again. So, three out of five stars for C.

This is the third book I have read from McCarthy and my first review which is interesting in that it’s my least favorite of the three books. One thing I have noticed about McCarthy and the reviews is people either seem to love him or hate him there is no middle ground. This book feels a lot more like a conventional story from McCarthy compared to Satin Island and Remainder both of which I loved. This book actually starts out rather slow and takes time to build up but by the time he is in the Sanatorium I felt fully dragged into the story. What I love about McCarthy and his writing is there always quite a few what I like to call ah-ha moments of insight where he hits you over the head with an idea or concept. This book there are not as many of those. A lot of the reviews on Amazon commented that they really liked the book until the last section where he is in Egypt. I admit I didn’t like that section as much as the rest of the book but there were also some parts of it that I really thought were excellent. Something interesting that I have also noticed is that in all of McCarthy’s books all the main characters in their relationship with women there is always this sort of aloofness, detachment, and even perhaps some built up resentment. I think it’s highlighted more in this book than the others. It’s interesting in the Sanatorium how the attractive girl who is interested in him he is indifferent towards, but the crippled unattractive girl who massages him he desires and pursues. This is one of the things I admire about McCarthy is most of his characters end up doing things, and/or saying things that are unconventional. Even though C is more of a conventional story for McCarthy, if you’re like me and admire the unconventional then C is still a book worth reading.

The C of the title ostensibly refers to the novel’s central character Serge Carrefax but late in this novel we discover it also refers to carbon, the basic element of life. The fax in Serge’s surname provides a clue to the novel’s central theme. Communication in all its proliferating forms during the early part of the 20th century. In C we find ourselves in a world of coded transmissions. The establishing and plotting of networks pervades the novel. The continual extending outwards of technology.The central character Serge barely changes at all during the course of the novel. He’s much the same at twelve as he is in his thirties. Little more than a conduit for knowledge, for the scientific discoveries of the first quarter of the twentieth century, “the source signal” as McCarthy puts it. Serge gathers rather than alchemises information, like a data base. Not that this means his life journey isn’t compelling. On the contrary parts of this novel are genuinely exciting, especially when he’s flying above German trenches as an observer/navigator during World War 1 or when he visits the excavations of Egyptian tombs.As a boy Serge is fascinated with charting radio waves – “the static is like the sound of thinking.” His father teaches deaf mutes to speak and his sister, with whom he shares a near incestuous relationship, is studying natural history and is especially fascinated by insects. Each in their own way establishing a connection, a network with a mute or invisible world. We then see Serge in a sanatorium seeking a cure for “black bile” when the novel calls to mind Mann’s the Magic Mountain (McCarthy writes as though post-modernism never happened, reminded me at times of Cowper Powys with his hermetically sealed imagination, eccentricity and free range vitality). Then Serge, at the behest of his cryptographer godfather, learns to become a pilot at the advent of World war one. Unlike the usual template of world war one fiction Serge relishes the experience and never wants the war to end. He remains essentially adolescent. He has a fling with a French prostitute. In fact Serge has a casual affair in every section of the novel. This is a more mysterious motif in the novel. There’s a sense Serge has no interest in heredity, in procreation, in love, in reaching out beyond himself. He craves the sexual act in and for itself, disinterested in all its ramifications, a paradox for someone who is obsessed with plotting and connecting networks of communication. We learn from his drawing teacher that Serge is uncomfortable with perspective and depth. He likes flying because it flattens everything out, conceals depth, makes of the world a map.After the war Serge attends college. By now he is addicted to cocaine. He meets Audrey, an actress who takes him to a séance. Again we find ourselves in the plotting of an invisible kingdom. Serge is determined to find the trick. Finally Serge is sent to Egypt to help set up a worldwide communications network. Here he is shown around the excavations of tombs and the honeycomb nature of the adjoining chambers with all their cryptic significance. Much of the novel’s symbolism is clarified here. All communication is coded.McCarthy is super intelligent. This doesn’t always work in his favour as a novelist. He perhaps over indulges in his obvious fascination for analysis at times which renders certain sections of the novel hard work, if not plain boring. On the whole though this was a high flying novel with many exciting depth charges. Brilliantly researched and imagined. In many ways C resembles a road novel. A character who never lingers, both physically but more pointedly emotionally, long enough anywhere to forge binding ties with the world around him but who, paradoxically, learns more about how the world communicates. Also, in many ways, it’s a novel about the internet long before the internet existed.

C by Tom McCarthy is a strange little book, I got it when it was on the Booker shortlist nearly 2 years ago now, and had several false start attempts with it before finally completing it a few weeks ago.Unlike many books I read in which I have a lot of areas to discuss about things I did and didn't enjoy with C I find myself at something of a loss.C is the story of Serge Carrefax and the novel follows him through his childhood in the grounds of the Deaf School run by his father, then to a period of recuperation following an illness, then to the Great War and then Egypt.Though the novel initially gets off to a good start : Serge's sister Sophie is an interesting character; after it moves on from his childhood and adolescence the novel entirely lost me, I understood what was going on but felt a total sense of disconnect as a reader from either the plot or the characters.I read it but I was completely disinterested in it, and was not moved in any way by it nor engaged in its outcome.I suppose fundamentally what I'm saying here is that I was bored, and couldn't find anything about it either remarkable or special which leaves me mystified at its Booker inclusion.

It's years since I admitted defeat and actually failed to finish a book - but in those cases, the book was put away on the basis that perhaps, at some stage, I might pick it up again and finish it. Not this one. With "C" by Tom McCarthy, I have taken a conscious decision at around page 70 that this is a contrived load of rubbish which I will never, ever finish. It looks like McCarthy has populated a potentially half-interesting tale with as many obscure facts about Victorian Britain as he could possibly find on the internet - utterly dull accounts of how silk is spun, or how primitive telephone systems worked, etc. Totally, irredeemably boring. For anoraks and insomniacs only.

struggled with this! not everyone's cup of tea not popular in book club either

This book falls neatly into three sections for me.The book starts badly and boringly. We are told in tedious detail the path a Doctor takes walking around a garden. There are more similar narratives at the start of the book and I nearly gave in.Then suddenly it picks right up. The story becomes far more interesting and we follow Serge's part in the first World War and then afterwards as a druggie bohemian in London in the immediate aftermath. There's even a bit of comedy when Serge decides to out the Spiritualist Church he attends with his girlfriend. In volume the interesting bit is just over half the book and is enough to justify the effort to read.However the end bit I really hated. It is based in Egypt as Serge is posted to cover a dig in the Ancient burials in the South. Time and time again it felt like McCarthy had read a text book on Egyptology and then used his characters voices to tell us what he'd seen. And then suddenly, without any build up, Serge dies. In retrospect it semms like McCarthy had run out of ideas whilst still afew thousand words short of his target - so he flung something tegether from "DK Ancient Egypt" and thought "That'll do".And one more thing. People keep referring to these 'clever references' in the book. So What? I'd rather he wrote something like the middle part that was actually entertaining to read.