Invisible Cities, Italo Calvino

I had trouble with Invisible Cities. It’s beautiful, light, a dream of a soap bubble of a book, insubstantial and for me, really difficult. I can appreciate the writing, the dreamy nature of the book, but I can’t love it. It just didn’t quite work for me. Maybe written by Catherynne M. Valente it would have worked for me — her use of language has weight, somehow — but in this translation at least, no, Calvino didn’t work very well for me. It’s gorgeous, but I quickly got impatient with it.

It’s still a worthwhile read, I think, but don’t look for a story here: that’s not the kind of book this is. It’s more like a dreamscape.