Tuesday, August 8, 2017

Paul Kingsnorth, Beast ****

Beast is the new book from the author of The Wake, my favorite book that I've read so far this year. The narrator has come, alone, to an abandoned farmhouse in the high moors of England, for reasons that aren't entirely clear but resemble the reasons most people might undertake such a pilgrimage. As the story begins, he has been there for just over a year.

In the first two-thirds of the book, the narrator presents a vivid account of meditative experiences. One minute he is paying strict attention to his natural surroundings, the next he is noticing the feelings swarming inside himself, and the next he's dissolving into a communion with the world. When he reaches this last state, he sees something move out of the corner of his eye: "It was big and long and dark. It seemed to be a couple of yards in length it was low to the ground and it was black." It disappears when he turns his attention to it.

And so he sets off in search of the beast. What is it? Where does it live? And should he really be pursuing it since it may want to devour him?

I was less fond of the final third of the book, when his search gets more mystical.

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