The Combinations

Golemgrad Pentalogy #1

by Louis Armand

In 8 octaves, 64 chapters and on 888 pages, Louis Armand’s The Combinations is a “work of attempted fiction” that combines the beauty & intellectual exertion that is chess with the panorama of futility & chaos that is Prague (a.k.a. “Golem City”), across the 20th-century and before/after. Golem City, the ship of fools boarded by the famed D’s (e.g. John) and K’s (e.g. Edward) of the 16th/17th centuries (who attempted and failed to turn lead into gold), and the infamous H’s (e.g. Adolf, e.g. Reinhard) of the 20th (who attempted and succeeded in turning flesh into soap). Armand’s prose weaves together the City’s thousand-and-one fascinating tales with a deeply personal account of one lost soul set adrift amid the early-90s’ awakening from the nightmare that was the previous half-century of communist Mitteleuropa. The Combinations is a text whose 1) erudition dazzles, 2) structure humbles, 3) monotony never bores, 4) humour disarms, 5) relentlessness overwhelms, 6) storytelling captivates, 7) poignancy remains poignant, and 8) style simply never exhausts itself. Your move, Reader.“Kafka’s The Trial meets Robert Musil’s The Man Without Qualities.”

Genres: Fiction, Literary Fiction, Czech Literature, Australia, Novels, Contemporary, 21st Century

Paperback

First published April 17, 2016

About the author

Louis Armand is a writer and visual artist who has lived in Prague since 1994. He has worked as an editor and publisher, and as a subtitles technician at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival, and is an editor of VLAK magazine. He is the author of eight novels, including Breakfast at Midnight in 2012, "a perfect modern noir, presenting Kafka's Prague as a bleak, monochrome singularity of darkness, despair and edgy, dry existentialist hardboil" (Richard Marshall, 3:AM), CAIRO (Equus Press, 2014; short listed for the Guardian's Not-the-Booker Prize), and THE COMBINATIONS (Equus Press, 2016). Described as "Robert Pinget does Canetti (in drag in Yugoslavia)," Armand's third novel Clair Obscur was published by Equus in 2011. His previous novel, Menudo (Antigen), was described as "unrelenting, a flying wedge, an encyclopaedia of the wasteland, an uzi assault pumping desolation lead... inspiring!" (Thor Garcia, author of The News Clown).

Reviews

[Vit Babenco · Rating 5 out of 5]

Prague, dirty old town: at night Kafkian spectres and alchemical apparitions stroll all over the place…And the dark shadow of golem presides over them all. A fabric of The Combinations is the stuff that nightmares are made of…

There were bridges, empty parks, railway lines, boat horns echoing in a distance calculated to sound fake. As fake as all the corbels, trefoils, lancets, spandrels, voussoirs, vergeboards, chevrons, crockets, mouchettes, buttresses, clerestories, balustres, architraves, cupolas of this Potemkin village his mind seemed determined to erect at every turn. As fake as a city made of playing cards & balsawood, scraps of newsprint, papier-mâché, celluloid & déjà vu, bits & pieces of wrecked signage glued together, with nothing behind them but empty space. Stageprops.

The Combinations – the title is an apparent allusion to The Recognitions by William Gaddis – is a tortuous journey through the world of sham things and fake identities narrated in the fanciful and psychedelic style of Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon.

Fingers tapping secret commands on the walls – Morse transcriptions of alien traffic – the groaning through the floor – the scampering of rats above the cornices – rubble sifting down into sealed-up chimneys, dumbwaiters, coalchutes, hidden passageways – the tireless inscrutable industry of ant colonies, weevils, termites, excavating through brick, mortar, red clay, foundation stones – whole underworlds feeding on the substrate of All Visible Things. But you didn’t need to see it, to know it was true. The proof was everywhere.

The Combinations is a mystical mystery, a postmodern post-noir – echoing Angel of the West Window by Gustav Meyrink and Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco as well as a dozen of other books Louis Armand tells his tale onwards, back to front, sideways and even in a topsy-turvy way.

Erdichtung und Geschichte – fiction & history. One, a picture of the imagination with its moods, its poetry & its irrationalism. The other, nothing but a reflection bereft of psychology, meaning, intention – nothing than what it is: a trick of geometry, angles of incidence. Yet, in the eye of the beholder, what could be further from the truth?

Němec – some sort of an alcoholic and schizoid Gregor Samsa and a self-styled private eye – stumbles through his life of macabre memories, eerie daydreams, weird filmmaking, conspiracy theory phobias, absurdist chess puzzles and sinister vaudevilles trying to decipher a cryptogram of existence…

It was like listening to rain falling on a windy night. Falling on metal, water, glass. Sonograms. Interference patterns in the middle-ear. Fluctuations in remote magnetic fields.
A sugar coating for History’s bitter pill.
Had the future already taken form inside the contradicted present?
Was the past real?
What mattered: if he believed in ghosts, or if they believed in him?

Combinations of insanity are as infinite as time and space…

[Nathan "N.R." Gaddis]

Okay so then this is the novel I want to press into your hands. But first make sure you exclude yourself OUT if necessary. Many of you probably. If you have even the slightest allergy to the Loose Baggy Monster, kindly..... If you've ever once complained about "logorhea", please.... If you've even once in your life even hinted at possibly considering saying "...no clothes...", if you would..... If you've more than once said something to the effect of "this novel needs an editor", please kindly.... And if you know already you prefer a 120 page shortstory/novella to an 888 page gorilla, be so nice as to consider..... Or if you scoff at words like maximalism and mega-novel or encyclopedic, do us the favor of.... If you once found that that one Franzen essay had some merits, please find the door.... If you've once described something you didn't understand as 'unreadable', no butt prints please.... Or if you can't tell the difference between the modern and the postmodern and the premodern, do us all the favor.... If you think the self-indulgence of the artist is a fault, you know where.... Or the 'overwrought' isn't metal wrought too much, you'll know....

This novel isn't for you. Go away.

Now, there's what? maybe two or three of you left? Well, you're already convinced. What more need I say then? I mean, I had a bloody fantastic time reading this thing. It was also kind of a new thing for me, reading one of these monsters near-totally blind. Usually you know I'm convinced by something before hand, my pre=judging, my spidey=snese ; this one had to do its own convincing. And it took a while why not.

Big thanks, btw, to Friend Chris Via for bringing this beast randomly to my attention. It was a quick sell -- 888 pages + "following in the tradition of Sterne, Rabelais, Cervantes, Joyce, Perec" = how the fuck knot?! Seriously, had you guys ever even once heard of it? The Millions didn't mention it I'm sure. It didn't make the booker=longlist but it did apparently make the Not THE Booker Shortlist which is even better because you know booker would've included itsdamnself OUT long ago.

eta :: okay so but this is a little factoid. And I swear this almost never happens. With this kind of novel. BUT. Every single star'd gr=Review (with one exception) is either a four or a five=star Review. Make of that what you may. But this kind of novel usually almost always begins its gr=Career with like I dunno a two=star take down. Like the profi review we'll be reading down below. But no. A bunch of gr=Reviewers with whom I've no truck and don't know from Adam have already determined before me and you that this is somehow four/five starrable. I mean, that's just data. Just facts. From ordinary folks. Warms the heart a little it does. [gr score :: 58 Ratings · 21 Reviews as of this date of the 13th of Jan in '18]

If you're 666 then I'm 888 ::
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_4MY...

Add this mofo to that one Moore list of the Großstadtromane, featuring Prague.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

***
Market Report -- Back in Stock @amazon on January 23, 18. For a simple US$22. Not bad. Otherwise, going for about seventy bucks. [I'll sell mine for US$888.88]. But you want this one new or in EXCellent condition because it's one of those fat paperbacks that get destroyed as soon it even glances at a backpack or other type of traveling/carrying/transporting device.
****

I've still not confirmed my opinion about the most excellent enjoyment factor of this novel by confirming with Sir Moore. [and some of you are going to pick up this novel and determine that I am full of shit and you'll never again believe a word I say]

Who is Louis Armand? 'tf if I know. Born an aussie ; been in Prague since '94. Isn't that interesting. Google him or whatever.

Shifting gears a bit, other focus......
Gotta get this off my chest. The novel got reviewed in The Guardian. Which I guess is better than nothing. But jesus christ don't these reviewers have any honor, any sense of nobility any more? I mean, if I think general literary culture in the US sucks ; I can't even imagine what it must be like in jolly old Old Country and stuff. Okay so let's just have this little discussion. Probably just a few points here and there.....

"The Combinations by Louis Armand review – convoluted convolutions :: This sprawling, self-consciously avant garde novel is the product of serious thought, but it’s also terribly overwritten – and much more traditional than it thinks" by Sam Jordison
https://www.theguardian.com/books/201...

Okay so we're signal'd that we're dealing with a hipster too-cool-for-skuul kind of reviewer. That "but" gives you the false impression that you'll be dealing with a fair and balanced and even=handed assessment. But we've been here so many times before that we know what we're in for.... A reviewer that should've included himself OUT.

Nemec never feels like a fleshed-out character, and we never get a glimpse of the inner workings of his mind. To be at such a remove is alienating, but it also fits the uncertainty of this story, where everything is as intangible as mist, obscuring and forever swirling out of reach. -- I don't know that it's even relevant to make this observation. There's a fleshy=norm here that maybe should not even be on the table. "Inner workings of his mind"?!!!? I know I know--it's a thing a novel can do and has done but by no means whatsoever never needs to do. 2D characters on a 2d chessboard is a perfectly legit thing to do. "...but it also fits the uncertainty of this story" ; okay so maybe, I dunno.... what's the reviewer's attitude toward this kind of fiction..... Let's read further.

All of this confusion is well reflected in the fractured, sprawling narrative. Yes! "Fractured" and "sprawling" are positive terms, yes?

the plot winds around itself as much as it moves forward. Fantastic! But why does it need to "move forward"?

Armand’s book is freighted with heavily adjectival, overloaded sentences, as well as bursting with lists, ideas half-formed, allusions uncertain and unsettling illusions. That's all good stuff, yes? I mean, "overloaded sentences"!!! That's got to be a compliment, right? "Bursting with lists"!!!!!

That doesn’t entirely invalidate my objections, however. sigh.

But the sad truth is that he hasn’t really travelled far at all. Like many who court the avant garde, Armand ends up disappointingly conservative. Jesus guys. This is the dumbest thing.... and I hear it so often. 'It wants to be/claims to be/etc avant=garde/experimental/innovative but it's not really because, well, because other books have already been written....' I mean, what?! Just because every novel doesn't go and do what ULULU does--and I know none of you know what I'm talking about because I've got gr=data--doesn't mean that, well, it doesn't fucking mean that a novel can't just go ahead and do what it does with all the loose and baggy freedom and individuality it wants to. Unique little novel this is here and yes, it's not as out there as The Wake and it's not really Tristram and it's not Danielewski and Sorrentino did it better and Pynchon can't be touched and and and. But look here, this is a great baggy bulky great great whatever... call it avant=garde (we tired hipster too-cool-for-skuul reviewers just aren't that easily impressed ; jesus guys.) I mean, the avant=garde is a tradition (and traditions are always conservative ; so there's your dialectical movement folks).

There’s little that feels new, even in spite of the relentless tide of name-checking and references. "name-checking" and "references"? Okay so this is about the reviewer now and not the novel. Of course and do we trust the judgement of this reviewer (or of "N.R."?) and who the hell is he anyway? "Sam Jordison looks after the Guardian's Reading group and the weekly Tips, Links and Suggestions page. He is a co-director of Galley Beggar Press and the co-editor of the Crap Towns series of books. You can follow him on Twitter." ? eta :: "little that feels new" ;; that's the thing--that reallyreallyreally new thing never before encountered is damn difficult to even recognize ; it's so new you don't see it don't know what it is don't know the criteria for judgment. cf ULULU again if you need a fer=instance of something reallyreally out there.

It’s all rats, alcohol, asylums, Mitteleurope, masons, Faust, alchemy, dingy laboratories, Enoch, Babbage, Hermes Trismegistus, John Dee, Rorschach blots, the sphinx, mysterious bookstores … It’s sometimes obscure Fucking Fantastic!!!!! Yes! More please!

but mainly predictable. What? Good god. Hipster.

The style too, feels too much like reheated but still undercooked William Burroughs. ? I'm at a loss. "undercooked"? "reheated"?

His metaphors are especially strained: “Like a zen cop on a permanent stakeout.” One two three four five six seven eight. Eight words in an 888 page novel..... Surely a worse metafour could be found....

What’s a zen cop? If you have to ask...... [see first para supra]

"The watery folds of the Prof’s eyes contracted as he forged ahead with his proofs and speculations like a Buster Keaton character who conceals his disappointment at finding only an inattentive audience with increasingly strange antics." --Is it the folds of the eyes that are performing those antics? Or the Prof? And when exactly does that Buster Keaton character encounter such disappointment? Inattentive much? Dear reviewer, you're reading the wrong book. But reading closely? Let's find out...

It’s that you’ve got to know enough about Kepler for it to make sense. Such references aren’t only frustrating oh holy fuck!!! You. Are. Kidding. Me.

I sometimes wondered if Armand really knew all the root meanings of all his allusions, if he cared, or if it mattered. I wonder what kind of fiction actually moves this reviewer....

I apologize for being so nasty here today with this reviewer guy from The Guardian. But dammit he really does this novel poorly and himself poorly and the whole rep of like professional reviewers. Dude got paid btw and that's enough to hold him to some kind of serious standard more serious than the bs'ing I do down here. I mean, I'm sure this reviewer guy is a nice guy and likes the kinds of novels he likes but he maybe shouldn't've been taking on the assignment of this one I mean he could've recorded his objections here on gr where they would do little harm. I dunno.

But let's wrap this up.

This will blow your socks off -- This uncertainty was increased by occasional lapses. To give a quick and minor example, he translates a bit of Latin for Pythagoras - “numero est ipsum movens” – as “the soul is the number that moves itself”. Alas, the Latin Armand provides doesn’t actually have a word for “soul” in it, leading to the suspicion that he’s quoting without properly understanding. And since there is so much quotation everywhere, a lapse like this seriously undermines faith in the book. Okay. I had the exact same question when I encountered this passage. I was all like, What is he doing? And then but I actually went ahead and read the rest of the novel. Wherein. It becomes clarus et distintus (ie, "clear as dialectical dishwater") that this is one thing that this novel is doing, Fucking With Translations. None of the translations are accurate (or maybe some). They are all (or most) pulling your leg. Why does it do this? Who knows. But it's fun. To see the disjunction between the quote and its translation ; this is a pleasure of reading when one has access to more than one language. It's the kind of practice that makes reading this kind of novel pleasurable.

So the credibility of the reviewer is clearly much more suspicious than that of the author.... That's just like facts dude. And you just can’t lose trust in a novel where so much depends on believing that the author is in control. It's more important for a reviewer to be trustworthy. There is no need whatsoever for an author to be "in control". Author can do what author will.

To go back to those metaphors, Armand possibly has a get-out clause. He could argue that those similes are deliberately half-cocked and discombobulating Does. Not. Need. A. "get-out clause". He ain't "in" your Franzen world in the first place. It's a loose baggy monster "in need of an editor" which is kind of genre I suppose. Or it just needs just clothes. Maybe what this novel needs is some nice proper clothes. Maybe some Quaker dress.

The biggest loss of belief came for me when immediately after page 202, I found myself reading page 427. There was then a straight sequence of pages until page 650 – after which page 427 arrived again and the whole chunk was reprinted. Yes. Printers' errors suck. I had the same experience with my 1st/1st inscribed Argall. Pissed me off. Because... but I found a solution... I read it in a paperback, those missing pages.

The unsettling thing was the fact that I couldn’t tell whether or not Armand had intended the pages to run in this curious manner. Again with the Kidding Me.

And when it’s got to the stage that you can’t tell the difference between an author’s intentions and a printing error, you know there’s trouble. Recuse. Recuse yourself. You can turn down a reviewing assignment when it's not working out for you. But sure. Blame the novel. Blame the author. Whatever. Finnegans Wake is just a huge 17 year joke. Seriously. What. Ever.

But even that doesn’t entirely invalidate this book. My. God. "invalidate"?! What is this, a course in Logic? What in the world could "invalidate a book" possibly mean?

Yes, it’s often boring; a few extravagantly soporific passages even rendered me unconscious. Like pianissimo passages in a symphony? It's called "dynamics". Dynamics don't mean that it's full=tilt enthralling every moment ; it means there's an ebb and flow of pacing of tone of whatever makes the thing the thing it is. If you want constantly exciting, go see one of those superhero movies with all the cgi and all the explosions and fistfits and things of this nature I keep hearing about. Nothing boring there....

But art isn’t just there to distract and amuse us and to seek easy pleasure in this work is to miss the point. Maybe the grammar of this sentence could be cleaned up a bit? But I think I get what he's saying if I pay a bit more attention to it.

Even if you hate every page, this 888-page monster still has its uses. Should someone attack you, you can use it to fend him off. Or, if you really want to mess up your assailant, you can open it up and start reading it to him. That's kind of the very definition of the hipster too-kool-for-skool kind of reader/reviewer.


At any rate. Apologies again for being so crewl to this reviewer guy from The Guardian. But I just don't trust him. I think he is wrong. Wrong about the facts ; wrong on choosing his criteria for adjudicating this novel. I really enjoyed it. You might too. But do take the time to exclude yourself OUT, if necessary.

[Nathan "N.R." Gaddis]

This an historical record. 14Jan18. Ye ole snap=shot. [dear gr=deleter :: please don't delete ; this is an original work of homage to our gr=reading community]

disclosure :: I have never once in my life had contact with a single one of the following gr=reviewers. To the best of my knowledge they have never once in their life had even the slightest contact with my ugly=self. So what the hell. What's with all the 4=5 stars? Let's find out.

CNP. [that is knot Canadian Northern Pacific Railroad]

***** "...and it is huge and fascinating and when I finish it I am going to have to start all over again because there is so much in this book that truly is unlike anything I have read before ... (the whole book is like some game of four-dimensional chess, there are actual chess puzzles in here, including 'The Sphinx' from Chandler (ha!), and also an actual labyrinth to solve, as well as a crossword puzzle, a comic strip, a film treatment with diagrams, a couple of stage plays, an interview, and bizarre footnote commentary by a 'character' identified only by a black hand (who reminds me a bit of Frank Zappa's 'scrutinizer'!) and a lot of references to a fake medieval manuscript which the Web assures me actually exists"
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Here is FZ's Central Scrutinizer ::
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-0VF...

*****"...on a psychic continuum between the arcana of the Codex Seraphinianus and an Alan Moore comic...both books transmuting the singular and local through a cosmic lens (and on an almost cosmic scale...Like David Foster Wallace's INFINITE JEST...neither JERUSALEM nor THE COMBINATIONS displays any resemblance to the so called Great American Novel...would be Iain Sinclair's DOWNRIVER, or (the least American of contemporary American writers) Pynchon's AGAINST THE DAY...If Moore's writing is comparatively Miltonic, in the Blakean vein, Armand's is more Blakean, in the Joycean vein."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

That is not me making the DFW/Pynchon/Joyce thingie. Thing is, maybe these maximalist novels constitute a major vein, not of The Great American Novel (because maybe Gatsby is one) but rather the carotid artery of Weltliterature.

***** "I hated Rubik's cubes, but I loved this book. ....If Dr Who landed in Prague for the next 64 episodes...If you like big books about puzzles and codes and ciphers that are also puzzles and codes and ciphers in and of themselves, then The Combinations... Foucault's Pendulum ... The Tunnel ... Italo Calvino...Moby Dick."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I'm going to totally second that Foucault's Pendulum nomination. Except that Armand can actually write. I mean, Eco's fine, but he's got no flair whatsoever. But, yeah, definitely an echo of that little thriller in this big monster.

*****"...myself in the INTERMISSION unreasonably persuaded THIS could very well be one of the last hopes for a bearable future mind-life on this planet"
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

btw, I'm convinced that The Guardian reviewer did not read the INTERMISSION because that would've totally cleared up to his satisfaction what kind of novel this novel wants to be. It's all there almost pedantically spelled out as if Our Author thought a few things needed to be spelled out for the more easily dup'd but yet still you have to actually read it which I'm increasingly convinced Our Guardian Reviewer did not. Heavy accusation but still damn his review sucked!

***** "I can say with confidence that I have never read a book like The Combinations, which is difficult at times, incredibly complex, occasionally infuriating. ... or its part, The Combinations doesn’t easily permit comparison and in many ways is as genuinely unique and complex as Prague itself."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

No easy comparison? Well, I dunno. I mean, it's that kind of book that fits in with several other books that don't really have their equal. Naja.

***** "Like Pynchon and Wallace, Armand can write with tireless virtuosity about almost anything. ...alongside Joshua Cohen's similarly sizeable debut, Witz, and Bolano's 2666... Prague, as Kafka long ago demonstrated.... making realism out of fiction .... because it upends our sentimentality for the postcard scenery of our historical failures."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Oh good god! The name dropping! Won't somebody think of the name=dropping!! Won't someone please get a Proust in there somewhere? [let's wait and see]

**** "Like Borges's metafictions, reading "The Combinations" is a labyrinthine experience. ...Not for everyone, but then nothing is."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

It was not indeed for The Guardian reviewer who should've kindly stepped aside. But what the hell. It's the kind of characters we have to deal with on a regular basis.

***** "....may just as well turn out to form a black&white army of pawns in some larger game..."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Will "pawns" have to be annotated one day?

***** "Holy f***. This book is a way out."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Yes. That is the whole of that review. But this one only got one Like. Were he a famous author this Review would've garnered about 1587 Likes and perhaps 17 ADDS to the tbr ; and maybe one person would read it.

**** "What is the point of a game of chess? Is it enjoyment.... Here we have the literary equivalent ... I have no doubt that this book will be considered a must read by those who enjoy challenging, clever writing.... your move, reader."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I recommend this here Review as a pretty fair portrait of the novel. But the gr=user has their profile set to private and I'm again'it so I didn't Like it; I understand, but really how social can I be with you when you're all locked up like that. No worries.

The sole ** Star=Review. Lets look...... "...only skim reading ... incredibly clever ... I wasn't engaged ... I admire ... was just a slog."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Which is totally fine. I found The Lover a real slog myself.

***** "A unique reading experience, definitely "experimental literature."... its aversion to cliche: none of the story unfolded predictably...Umberto Eco's Prague Cemetery without becoming a self-parody...in the vein of Candide..."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Wow! Candide!

***** "One of those rare "difficult" and long novels that produces rewards for the reader determined enough to penetrate the impenetrable. Overlong? Possibly. Grandiose? Maybe. Brilliant? Most definitely. Hilarious, too..... Mark Z Danielewski's House of Leaves....which is exactly the reason I totally dig both of them."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Some times gr=Reviewers just brighten your day!

***** "...despite the fact that it took a long time to read and was quite physically difficult at times. It will not only challenge your idea of what a novel is but of how a novel should be presented. ...stranger reading experiences I've had, and I’ve read many a strange book, but this one is up there with some of the strangest. ...Everyone ought to read it."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I'm already chuckling about those touchy folks that recoil every time they see one of those "oughts". They're so funny when they do that. Thing is of course, everyone knows what "Everyone ought to read it" actually means, I mean, knows what it means in actuality. [that there is my hobbyhorse about your hobbyhorse]

***** "Accessible and well written, a sort of urban-poetic mural of artistic perception and spiritual survival."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Huh?

***** "I felt changed after reading this... the Invasion of the Body Snatchers... like Donald Sutherland at the end of the film... Most books don't do this ... with a warning printed on the cover .... deeply disturbing."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I suppose it could be read like that. I mean, isn't the whole point of a novel to take over your experience ; I mean provide you experience and immerse you and no but really -- art is supposed to put you into that whole Stockholm Syndrome [I mean, if we understand the claim non=cynically]. It's the too=cool=for=skoool hipsters that won't allow themselves into the world of a novel ; they've got to maintain their totally chill ironic distance and if art actually enrapts you to the point of some kind of esoteric rapture then you are to be chastized for not thinking for yourself or some other liberal claptrap. No, art is supposed to do that whole body=snatching thing isn't it? Otherwise its just livingroom wallhangings.

No Starrage. "I haven't even read a single page, and yet, just from hefting it, flicking through it, poking my nose in here and there, I am on a natural romantic-crush-equivalent high like you wouldn't believe."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Okay so here is an instance of a reader the precise inverse of the above mentioned TooCOOOLforSkool Hipster who won't allow himself to fall immediately in love but has be totally chill and take an objective view of the situation and treat the unread novel with as much possible suspicion as possibly he can muster possibly and somehow find "merits" upon which to issue his even=handed sober judgement. Sorry, no. Fall in love ; be vulnerable ;; open to the possibility of getting your feelings hurt and your readerly heart disappointed.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

***** "A Dantesque epic of existential satire that speaks very much to the times."
[where's the link, dude?]

Dante, but I've still not gotten my "Proust".

***** "Lives up to the hype." [review in entirety]
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Seriously. What hype? Closing in on two years post=publication with a score of 58 Ratings · 21 Reviews ;; if there was hype it was futile and forlorn. But it's never too late. HYPE!!!!!!

No Starrage " Won as a first-reads giveaway, can't wait to read it! "
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

That was written quite some time ago. Ladies and Gentlemen, I implore you! If you've got books to promote, don't waste your time and money on the gr=Giveaways. Guaranteed your book will end up in the hands of a reader who doesn't give a flying=flip about what your book is on about. Unless of course...


At any rate, I'm going to give The Combinations A Little Green Rosetta ::
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crh9K...

And Ladies and Gentlemen. Now that we've had FZ appear freely and spontaneously within the context of this Großstadtroman of Prague, know this. Frank's last performance was in Prague. 1991. Here it is ::
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFtHq...

[Jonfaith · Rating 3 out of 5]

From the courtyard, a whoosh! of something in mid-collapse -- sheets of snow coming down from the rooftop -- then the sound of the giant funnel, like an articulated windpipe, belching debris, grey dust drifting in from the stairs -- a conjurer's ghost changing shape in the spectral half-light, suffusing the air.

FIRST: some grating tossing, hardly friendly to the touch.

It would be wrong to say I didn't feel invigorated by elements of this. I prefer wrong to incorrect there. There's a moral quest to the struggle of a 900 page novel which wallows in ideograms, chess problems and tight circles of narrative linked by billowing description. There's a time honored composting underway, a molecular breakdown under the forces of history and folly. Armand's painting of such isn't truly evocative. He yearns instead for conspiracy. The author longs for readers who've developed strong backs and calloused hands from generational reading into the late nights of their lives. He desires those who snap at the references to Hrabal, at Goebbels, at the Simplicissimus. Oh and lathered in Mahler.

A younger Jon would have taken the bait with glee. This Jon trudged as across muddy fields of Moravia nursing a fever and a blinding hangover. I noted the robots and respect the reference. Oh look there's a Western Civ lesson through a chronicle of the rat population: didn't Lawrence Norfolk do that? Yes, yes he did. There's a strong Czech lineage in my wife's maternial family tree. That made it cozy but first we needed more drunken philosophy, as if Bitov's Pushkin House wasn't sufficient. Maybe a montage on airbrushing and historical revisionism? This was bricolage but of the most expansive and disordered manner. What a toolbox, displaying references to 100 years of Central Europe. Shouldn't we conclude the review with a list? Armand wants them everywhere, a nod to cher Umberto and his notions of Infinity.

Finally--To-The-PLOT!
There's a young writer in the mid 1990s when everyone in the West was rich. He's possibly an orphan and definitely a mental patient but oh so sage as our protagonists must reveal and revel within. He's hounded by ghosts of a mentor with ties to ancient texts, the occult and chess. If you were going to guess the Nazis, then you would be correct as well. If you're thinking of reading this, ask yourself whether you have already read Péter Nádas, if you haven't—then go there, consider it a gift. There’s remorse and regime change. Historical expulsion wrestled with defenestration as the chic transgression. Only Hegel knows and he’s in shadow. Maybe today Gregor will accept the dialectical inevitable? Perhaps the screenplay needs an edit?

[Herzog Herzog · Rating 5 out of 5]

Louis Armand's THE COMBINATIONS is on a psychic continuum between the arcana of the Codex Seraphinianus and an Alan Moore comic; less a novel than a concept album riffing on Universal History at The End of Time, through the refracting prism of "Golem City" (Prague) circa 1999, just as Moore's JERUSALEM (I've been lucky enough to get my hands on an ARC) represents a fractalized psychogeography of "Northampton" -- both books transmuting the singular and local through a cosmic lens (and on an almost cosmic scale: Moore's magnum opus runs to 1280pp, Armand's to roughly 900 -- counting the epilogue). Like David Foster Wallace's INFINITE JEST, these are the kind of books that come along once in a generational cycle. Unlike Wallace and his forebears, neither JERUSALEM nor THE COMBINATIONS displays any resemblance to the so called Great American Novel -- because obviously they're not, but also because they speak primarily to a specificity of dwelling, of language, of the mythic currents that fuse into an existential rather than literary condition. The nearest comparison in recent UK publishing would be Iain Sinclair's DOWNRIVER, or (the least American of contemporary American writers) Pynchon's AGAINST THE DAY; both are massive works of peregrination, of the temporal and spatial enfolding of the "individuated" collective consciousness, the heavenly host nailed to a pinhead. If Moore's writing is comparatively Miltonic, in the Blakean vein, Armand's is more Blakean, in the Joycean vein -- between them they channel the major dualisms of our time.

[Ed · Rating 5 out of 5]

In 2121, around this time of year, I read three books that left me feeling utterly burnt-out, which resulted in my two-year absence from Goodreads. I'm sure the pandemic (with its high stress-levels and disruption of the rhythms of life) also had a lot to do with it. But as I'm now finding myself developing a renewed attraction to the titles on my bookshelf, I feel it's finally time to clear my inbox of these three unfinished reviews, and make a fresh start.

The Combinations felt like a book that was written for me. Specifically, for its themes centred around chess, music, literature and cinema; and more generally: because literature is the only art form that can utilise words to their maximal extent, and my favourite kinds of novels are those that achieve what cannot be expressed thorough any other medium. This is writing for the love of words; the expression of ideas and emotions by implication and allusion: cohesion and plot be damned. All style, no substance? Wrong, the freedom to break the cage of realism, to not tell a story, allows for a kind of expression that simply cannot be found anywhere else.

The Goodreads summary describes the novel as “Kafka’s The Trial meets Robert Musil’s The Man Without Qualities”, which is entirely accurate. I remember being absolutely enchanted by the first two-hundred pages, then becoming progressively frustrated by the novel's absurdity; its failure to resolve even a single element of plot, whilst simultaneously being enraptured by the prose and the possibilities of expression that were being laid out on the page.

I wouldn't recommend this novel to anyone. And despite this, I am certain that if I could only read one novel for the rest of my life, it would be this.

[Perry · Rating 5 out of 5]

I hated Rubik's cubes, but I loved this book. This book is smaller on the outside than it is on the inside, which is saying a lot. If Dr Who landed in Prague for the next 64 episodes, it might be a bit like this. I'm not sure I'd be able to condense all of the impressions of the book I have, except that it is like a circumnavigational maze whose dominant theme is unanswered questions, with swathes of brilliance, scenes that truly unnerve, outrage, illuminate. The whole thing takes place somewhere called Golem City, which (like so many things in this book) is the mirror of the already sufficiently irreal Prague of the 1990s or the 1620s or 1942, and is "about" an alchemical manuscript written in a secret language and a hapless Charlie Chaplin character who gets involved in a religious/political conspiracy surrounding it (a satirical Illuminati). The confusion and disorientation experienced by the reader (and paralleled by the characters) seems essential to its purpose, which I am assuming to be the general dubunking of the "illusions" of truth in all its shapes and forms. If you like big books about puzzles and codes and ciphers that are also puzzles and codes and ciphers in and of themselves, then The Combinations is definitely for you. It made me think of Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco and The Tunnel by William Gass with bits and pieces of Italo Calvino, and while I'm at it Moby Dick. Reading it was incredibly challenging, but also rewarding, as would be expected.

[Paul Dembina · Rating 2 out of 5]

Only managed to finish this through sheer bloody-mindedness. No need for any spoiler alerts because for 900 pages basically nothing happens - AT ALL. No end of false plot strands that go nowhere. The protagonist wanders around a version of Prague (aka Golem City) - incessantly drinking and exchanging meaningless gnomic utterances with whoever he happens to bump into.
To cap it all the book is filled with annoying spelling errors.
Some of my GR friends whose opinions I greatly respect liked this, but I'm afraid I have to beg to differ on this one

[may · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Combinations truly is a contemporary book that: falls into the category of Maximalist Literature (a new addition to the list for people into that) since this is a book of (the good kind of) excesses and, runs in the line of fun-having absurdity, anxiety & conspiracy centred novels that Pynchon’s name is attached to.

As a first comparison of structure and story, The Combinations is less Gravity’s Rainbow (other than its European setting) and more The Crying of Lot 49, extended, experimented, mutated & shuffled into 900~ pages, in which Armand shows what he’s got through very accessible chapter blocks incorporating a multitude of switches in form (from novel to screenplay to history book?), and a wide array of great influences that shape his writing into something genuinely enjoyable to read.

Within the core text there’s the sense of adventure and the page turning qualities of classic mystery writing, which smoothly allows 900 pages to slip by you. The mystery at the heart of it, however, has an almost Sine-like wave pulsing through the structure with each peak clicking the pieces into place, having the reader think they’re getting closer to the centre of the conspiracy and each trough throwing it back in your face, pushing you into another section of story that seems to dig a little deeper into the hole it’s written itself into.

The overall tone of the book for me was crafted in a way that did not do injustice to the core story being told, by being too focused on absurdity/comedy, and thus coming off as ingenuine or merely an attempt at overly paying homage to Armand’s influences. Instead The Combinations balances the sincere and yet bizarre narration of our protagonist’s journey through late 90's Prague with footnotes that become a playground leading to nonsensical digressions and signposts to other chapters, and interjections from an outside voice (almost pushing the idea of an omniscient ‘writer’ or ‘author figure’ – I’ll use Arno Schmidt as an example*, where the interjections are not all necessary but add to the overall atmosphere and wholeness of the book – to new redundant yet simultaneously essential heights); constantly pinpointing the real absurdity of the events and decisions made by characters.

I’d recommend this FFO: Pynchon (of course), Ulysses-like City Walking stories, Vollmann’s first novel (I’ve read a couple, now I’m allowed to compare books to his work) and big books that don’t sacrifice their fun element.

It’s worth the read.

* Forgive my constant pushing of his work, but I like it and he did something you don’t see from many Authors.

[Jacqui · Rating 5 out of 5]

OK, I'm still only halfway thru, but finding myself in the INTERMISSION unreasonably persuaded THIS could very well be one of the last hopes for a bearable future mind-life on this planet and not being Clockwork Orange eye socket tortured into watching the radiation slowly eat the loved ones' brains.

[Ian "Marvin" Graye]

Weed it and reap.

[Travis Meyer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Attempting to summarize and review this incendiary novel has been challenging, but I must try, so bear with me!

Our main character, Nemec, is adrift. Bar-hopping, pill-popping and wandering through his phantasmagoric existence, trying to understand his identity and purpose in a wonderfully bizarre place called Golem City, a representation of Prague, amidst a fictionally familiar political setting involving, among other things, marginalized populations, corrupt regimes, Nazi aggression, espionage, and general intrigue.

If forced to pinpoint a main thread, we have a young Nemec in the mid/late 90’s who has escaped the ‘Home’ he has grown up in, a twisted place where human-like androids oversee young orphans. We are introduced to a variety of characters curiously linked to Nemec. These include a woman named Alice, a mysterious performer and seductress. Faktor, a shady mogul with sinister intentions. Volta, Nemec’s doctor, who may not be what he appears, and a few other dramatis personae who float in and around the narrative. This is mostly Nemec’s story though, as we are swept up in his despairing quest for meaning with respect to both himself and a mysterious document known as the Voynich Manuscript (yes, I know, but this novel blows House of Leaves out of the water..)

His allies include Blecha, the Bugman, an old fellow who drinks Slivovice on his garden rooftop and imparts aphoristic nuggets of wisdom to Nemec. And there is Hajek, the Prof (and his ghost) whose strange death and apparent connection to the manuscript forms perhaps the most fundamental narrative strand. Throughout the book Nemec hears the voice of the deceased Prof, written in italics, and uses it as a kind of beacon as he struggles to understand what is real and fantastical, devised or arbitrary in his experience day to day.

The novel incorporates chess into its thematic fabric. Although I’ve never played this revered game, Armand deftly portrays Nemec’s entropic odyssey as comparable to positions in a chess match. Specifically, as I understand it, the situations in which a player is cornered, hemmed in, or trapped. The player (Nemec) is participating, but it’s all piecemeal. A foregone conclusion. The moves being made (Nemec’s actions), while perhaps possessing intention, are essentially devoid of any meaning or purpose, as the endgame has already been established.

Structurally, there are 8 lettered sections with 8 parts, resulting in 64 total chapters. Within these there are clever little symbols that functioned as nice little bookmarkable breaks for me. There is also an overture, a prologuish introduction, an intermission (containing a cartoon, advertisement and crossword puzzle!) and a sort of epilogue titled ‘Coda’, which was superbly crafted.
Grammatically there are plenty of long swirling sentences with brackets and intentionally misspelled and combined words and phrases. There are also footnotes, flashbacks and digressions. It warps time and space, shifts point of view, plays with textual imagery and format. There are wild and wacky dream sequences, stories within stories, very reminiscent of the outlandish and absurd scenarios Pynchon does. Indeed, A LOT going on, but it still somehow manages to continually maintain its allure.

In pondering the title, the word ‘combinations’ appears slyly throughout the text and perhaps the idea is that rereads, or I suppose each individual reader of this book, will naturally result in a variety or ‘combination’ of experiences, interpretations and perspectives. And, after this frantic first time through it, I realized that a revisitation of it would undoubtedly result in a quantum leap of understanding and appreciation for its intricately gorgeous construction.

Although I certainly felt fleeting moments of frustration, comprehensional despair and reluctance during the first half of this book, oddly I never once thought to set it aside. It strangely insisted itself upon me and I soon came to the seemingly unavoidable conclusion that I was reading one hell of a literary accomplishment. It swept me up, kept me submerged and made me a better reader in the process. While it demands complicity, the stylish charm, wild creativity and singular execution ultimately made this an unforgettable reading experience.

[Clayton Uhl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like Pynchon and Wallace, Armand can write with tireless virtuosity about almost anything. The Combinations is a frequently hilarious, high satire of our post-political existential malaise. A stranger, more layered critique than, say, Franzen or Lethem's recent offerings, and more damning (and demanding) than Dave Eggers. I would put The Combinations alongside Joshua Cohen's similarly sizeable debut, Witz, and Bolano's 2666: a grotesque, pathetic, comic vision of Everyman as the missing "last man alive" in a landscape reduced to being a parody of its own advertised significance. In many ways this book is a diagnostic of the "end of history" prophesied after the collapse of the Soviet Empire and the termination of the Cold War. Set in their immediate aftermath, The Combinations inhabits that gray zone between East and West which is euphemistically referred to as Central Europe, a non-place that exists as a dilapidated simulacrum of the forces at play: Prague, as Kafka long ago demonstrated, is really a metaphor - to say that the novel is set there would be to miss that point that this most photogenic of pre-modern cities is constantly undergoing wish-fulfilling metamorphoses. What impressed me about this novel is the way its author unashamedly goes about putting this fact to work, making realism out of fiction, where the most unlikely events actually happened, and the most likely have been made up. It makes for a disorienting read, not because it confuses, but because it upends our sentimentality for the postcard scenery of our historical failures. If this sounds grandiose, the writing itself, and the novel’s main character, consistently sabotage high-mindedness. The ending, in particular, is a stunning example of pathos infused with depreciation, authoritarian mockery, and a corresponding refusal to conform to the script.

[Phillip Freedenberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of literature’s all time great novels, a towering achievement unique unto itself, a must read for anyone who not only loves to experience the potential of what a novel can achieve at the peak of its maximalist brilliance, but it is also a must read for anyone who longs to submit to the power of the human mind operating under the pure vibration of the highest possible creative resonance, a mesmerizing literary performance unlike any other!

Phillip Freedenberg
Author of America and the Cult of the Cactus Boots: A Diagnostic

April 2022
Buffalo, NY

[Salem Rashid · Rating 5 out of 5]

Holy f***. This book is a way out.

[Catherine · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can say with confidence that I have never read a book like The Combinations, which is difficult at times, incredibly complex, occasionally infuriating. What you get out of it depends largely on how much work you're willing to do. The admiration and complete frustration I felt while reading this book was almost too much but I still wanted to read it again. I am also hopelessly, romantically nostalgic about Prague. The way The Combinations depicts the city is so true to life, a mixture of dysfunctional (Socialist) realism and the ineffable, mysterious, frequently gorgeous dream-like quality of its storied past. It was a refreshing contrast to Arthur Phillips’ Prague and The Russian Debutante's Handbook by Gary Shteyngart, which promised much more than they actually delivered and were compared to the work of such writers as Kundera and Hemingway - unfortunately that was not the case. For its part, The Combinations doesn’t easily permit comparison and in many ways is as genuinely unique and complex as Prague itself. If you love the city the way I do, you should read this book!

[Jackie Law · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Don’t take any of this too seriously, it’s all just smoke and mirrors. Enjoy the show.”

The Combinations, by Louis Armand, is a vast and sprawling literary game of words, ideas and form. Set in post communist era Prague, it is written with an underlying tone of cynical sarcasm. It regularly mocks and derides its own content, challenging the reader to follow the labyrinthian narrative of puzzle within puzzle, to seek meaning within the hyperbole.

The protagonist is a man named Němec who has crushing memories of being raised in an orphanage after his parents were arrested for crimes against the state. He escaped this incarceration only to attempt suicide by walking out of a window. After many months of rehabilitation he is released from hospital, another institution, bearing scars and a pronounced limp. He becomes addicted to the drugs he is prescribed and to alcohol. He spends his days in cafes, bars, clubs and at the cinema. The people he sees in life and on the screen feed his inebriated, vivid imagination.

Němec is invited to play chess by a man he comes to know as the professor. This man tells him of an interest he has in a valuable manuscript, location unknown, its provenance shrouded in mystery. It is written in a language that no one can translate.

After the professor’s death Němec’s curiosity is piqued when the old man’s papers are locked away by the state. He starts to suspect a conspiracy linked to the professor’s past and takes it upon himself to investigate.

“As usual Němec’s thoughts are getting carried away by themselves.”

It is difficult to describe the way in which the great arc of this tale is presented. There are rambling and disjointed discourses on Němec’s thoughts and activities, on episodes from the Second World War that mix possible fact with the films he has watched. There are lengthy lists that present ideas from many angles, dense outpourings of thought from which it is difficult to fish coherency. I was reminded of ‘Infinite Jest’, although found ‘The Combinations’ more readable.

“like a game of chess which goes on to the bitter end, long after the outcome has lost its meaning. Each remaining move a dumb mechanical persistence”

What is the point of a game of chess? Is it enjoyment, a challenge to exercise the mind, a game played to teach strategy and ordered thought? Here we have the literary equivalent, a conundrum created by the author presented in 8 octaves, 64 chapters, 888 pages. It is a play on ideas and language, weaving the plot and many subplots in delirious directions. It tells a tale in what may be no particular order or a concealed and well practised plan. It is clever, perhaps too clever. It required feats of concentration that at times I struggled to muster.

The observations on Němec’s life are shown through a lens that suggest much of what is happening may be delusional. There is legend, history, science, philosophy, multiple references to modern culture. All are subjected to mockery, none more so than the text being read.

“The whole thing smacked of some heterocomical contrivance”

There is a bleakness pervading Němec’s life yet the narrative refuses to take anything too seriously. Certain ramblings were reminiscent of the overly embellished descriptions of art gallery exhibits in highbrow magazines; these would often contain a footnote agreeing with such a perspective. It becomes clear that much of what is going on is happening only within Němec’s head. What is more difficult to work out is which events are real enough to advance the main plot, which moves are cunning feint and which strategy required for the endgame. Of course, all are part of the whole. Within each obfuscation lie nuggets of backstory.

The writing offers a very male perspective. It also presents man in a notably unpleasant light. There are continual references to gobs of phlegm, congealed foodstuffs, drifting dandruff, stale piss and vomit, filaments of snot swallowed down or picked and examined. Sex is pornographic with oedipal references. Women are objectified and, more than once, raped.

“An actress merely exists to give flesh to men’s fantasies”

Němec writes his own screenplay featuring the people he sees, or imagines he sees. His life is filled with dead time, suffocating in his endless introspection, self medicated and delusional yet convinced that there is a grain of truth to be sought. What he is searching for a key, a solution, a mind map for his life.

“Everything’s just how you decide to think about it”

I have no doubt that this book will be considered a must read by those who enjoy challenging, clever writing. It is an astonishing creation, a literary journey that I am glad to have experienced. Having said that, it took effort and dogged persistence at times to circumvent the quantity of words and ideas. It demands time, so much time, and attention.

“People have been known to believe all sorts of things”

I wonder what interpretation others who choose to peruse this tome will take from it. As the publisher so enticingly invites: your move, reader.

My copy of this book was provided gratis by the publisher, Equus Press.

[Kibuki Gurl · Rating 5 out of 5]

After reading this monster of a book I decided that it deserved a 5 star rating, despite the fact that it took a long time to read and was quite physically difficult at times. It will not only challenge your idea of what a novel is but of how a novel should be presented. Personally, I think that reading The Combinations is as much about the process as the outcome. There is no way to really describe it other than to say it is one of the stranger reading experiences I've had, and I’ve read many a strange book, but this one is up there with some of the strangest. But I am glad I read it. It made me think, and it was absolutely gorgeous. The writing is beautiful, at times very descriptive, but also unique and memorable. I see this on so many people’s to-read list. Good. Everyone ought to read it.

[Pavel Zakov · Rating 4 out of 5]

At first I did not like this book. While I found many parts of it to be interesting and amusing, I felt that Armand was trying to present the alienation of his characters through the ironic filter of alienating his reader. Like Borges's metafictions, reading "The Combinations" is a labyrinthine experience. Layers of stories within stories within stories. Faux-academic, hyper-analytic with an avalanche of footnotes. The massive 900-something page novel offers an insane amount of detail. The story line is incredibly complex but, in the end, also highly imaginative and engaging. Not for everyone, but then nothing is.

[Brent Hayward · Rating 5 out of 5]

Unreliable narrator escapes from orphanage, mental institution, and suicide. Drinks and pops pills as he buttles around the seedy haunts, landmarks, and dilapidated apartments of Prague, trying to resolve an issue he might have imagined. All the while haunted by ghosts and hallucinations. Plenty of digressions, some relevant, some incomprehensible. Pictures and icons and footnotes. Tied together with chess moves. Maybe. Really great.

[Rees · Rating 5 out of 5]

An ultimate conspiracy; if Pynchon’s THE CRYING OF LOT 49 instilled even a chill of paranoia to run through your mind or body, and kept that ability for something as long as his 21st century ‘magnum opus,’ AGAINST THE DAY—well, Armand will leave you taking the blue and white pills his neurotic, deformed, Mr. I Am Curious (if Yellow was white and blue Black, protagonist Nemeč would be thinking Grey) seems dependent upon throughout.

Highly recommended with Google Translate on standby, and possibly a nice companion for William H. Gass’s THE TUNNEL: this reader doesn’t know—he hasn’t read THE TUNNEL yet: he can only guess.

[Jackson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Combinations is a very complex book to explain, ranging across historical periods, from Ripellinoesque "Magic Prague" to the post-communist experiment in market capitalism. It is a book of disparate parts that also form a convincing whole, centered around the main character Nemec, who is the novel's "idiot savant" protagonist. A unique reading experience, definitely "experimental literature." I was recommended this book during a trip to Prague and was immediately mesmerized by the depictions of the city and by the sheer monumentality of the book itself. What more fitting tribute to the home of Franz Kafka and Edward Kelly than this encyclopedic mining (literally) of its mythic fabric? What impressed me most about this book, though, was its aversion to cliche: none of the story unfolded predictably, it was as far from the standard literary tourist fare as you can expect to get. It also managed to explore much the same territory as Umberto Eco's Prague Cemetery without becoming a self-parody, avoiding all taint of glib occultism. I would say it is more in the vein of Candide, a modern Candide unique to its time and place, which is a good thing and has much to recommend it.

[Joan Crate · Rating 5 out of 5]

I felt changed after reading this, which is something I can say of few books. It was like living through the Invasion of the Body Snatchers: there were times when I put it down after reading a dozen pages and just stared at a mirror and started hissing like Donald Sutherland at the end of the film, after the alien plants have duplicated his body and metabolized his brain. Most books don't do this and perhaps The Combinations should come with a warning printed on the cover, above the weird photomontage of a couple of Charlie Chaplins in concentration camp garb. This may sound funny to some, but really this novel is deeply disturbing.

[Jeronym · Rating 5 out of 5]

On 888 pages, in 64 chapters & 8 octaves comes this chess-obsessed narrative, whose great stage--Prague across the 20th century--encompasses the infinite potential richness of an empty chessboard, and whose characters--lost souls, conmen, führers, femmes fatales, camp survivors, political prisoners, ex-convicts, convicts-to-be & men without qualities--may just as well turn out to form a black&white army of pawns in some larger game...

[The Droll Prince · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF

Respect to Armand. Always happy to see books like this being written. And that they find a receptive audience. Glad to support both author and publisher with a purchased copy on my shelf. However, the kindest words I can summon is that it wasn't for me. There are some books that are characterized on good reads as 'could have been a good book if it had been edited down'. I think Mark de Silva's The Logos would fit into that category. However, honestly, The Combinations feels DOA. I'm not sure any amount of editing would have improved this experience for me. So, through that lens, you might as well let it rip and clock up the run time to 888 pages.

As far as I can tell 20 pages in, there really isn't much of a narrative at all. So you are either drawn in by Armand's 'virtuosic' prose or the ideas developed therein. From page one, I found the prose ham-fisted and clunky. So, without a strong story or strong stylistic narration, there wasn't any good will built into the novel for me to care about any of the ideas that might have developed throughout the book.

[Kay · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have to admit to only skim reading this book. It is incredibly clever and incorporates a huge breadth of material, but ultimately I wasn't engaged by it. I admire the writer for his imagination and skill, but trying to read this novel was just a slog.

[Slavomira · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has impacted me in ways which I've only provisionally understood. One of those rare "difficult" and long novels that produces rewards for the reader determined enough to penetrate the impenetrable. Overlong? Possibly. Grandiose? Maybe. Brilliant? Most definitely. Hilarious, too. This is not a book that you would expect to pick up and casually read - it demands work of the reader: however erudite or well read you are you will not get all the references because they are so varied BUT none of this actually gets in the way of reading. In places it reminded me of Mark Z Danielewski's House of Leaves, about which one reviewer said that it is "totally pretentious, pretty much pointless and draws endless spiel on things that go nowhere," which is the kind of thing I can imagine some people saying about The Combinations, too, and which is exactly the reason I totally dig both of them.

[Davin Gregg · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Combinations is a profound tale about all sorts of child’s fears. Bereft of a father and mother who have been disappeared by the secret police, the book’s protagonist Nemec finds himself standing on the threshold of the hostile, inimical and indifferent world of post-revolution Czechoslovakia. Taken under the wing by the ever-sardonic ‘Bugman’ and introduced into the mysteries of 'Golem City' by a retired bibliophile living in an alchemist’s tower, Nemec becomes the unlikely author of his own (pyrrhic) triumph over the forces of dehumanization. Accessible and well written, a sort of urban-poetic mural of artistic perception and spiritual survival.

[Kaleidograph]

This book proves it beyond a doubt: I'm a huge judge-a-book-by-a-riffle, head-over-heels kind of colossal book dork. This brick-sized tome was delivered only a few minutes ago. I haven't even read a single page, and yet, just from hefting it, flicking through it, poking my nose in here and there, I am on a natural romantic-crush-equivalent high like you wouldn't believe. I love this book already! It just emanates intricacy and erudite playfulness. Can't wait to get into it!

[Dav Jorgensen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had to take some time to ponder just where I would place this. It's a book with big ideas, and so I look past the shortcomings where possible. It’s not like anything else I’ve read, except the obvious/usual suspects, but also not derivative in the way that a lot of experimental so-called fiction is nowadays. A Dantesque epic of existential satire that speaks very much to the times.