Michal Ajvaz: Druhé Město (The Other City)

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The latest addition to my website is Michal Ajvaz‘s Druhé Město (The Other City). This is a full-blown fantasy tale, telling of the unnamed narrator who discovers that there is another city in Prague, one that lives underground or comes out at night, where the laws of science and everything else that we know have been subverted. His journey start with a book he finds in an antiquarian bookshop, which is written is strange script, and leads him on a journey which involves talking fish, meetings where it is compulsory to bring a weasel, a fight with giant shark, a strange green tram which travels through the suburbs and into the woods, leaving its tracks, and a high priest who is killed by a tiger. All too often we are lost but that does not matter, as our hero is sure to find some different part of the other city to take us to, where nothing much makes sense. It is a wonderfully enjoyable book, if you are prepared to take it for what it is and perhaps it will help you recognise the other city in your home town.

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