Audio Book Review: My Struggle (book 1) by Kari Ove Knausgaard

Release Date: February 6, 2018
Publisher: Recorded books
Format: Audio
Length: 16 hours 10 minutes
Narrator: Edoardo Ballerini
Genre: Biographical Literary Fiction
Buy: Audible | Kindle 

Synopsis: 

My Struggle: Book 1 introduces American readers to the audacious, addictive, and profoundly surprising international literary sensation that is the provocative and brilliant six-volume autobiographical novel by Karl Ove Knausgaard. It has already been anointed a Proustian masterpiece and is the rare work of dazzling literary originality that is intensely, irresistibly readable. Unafraid of the big issues—death, love, art, fear—and yet committed to the intimate details of life as it is lived, My Struggle is an essential work of contemporary literature.

Review:

There has been a lot said about the title of this book since it translates to Min Kamp which turns many people away but after reading the first book in this mammoth 6 book fictionalized autobiography it fits. This is his struggle with life, death, love etc. This is a strange book to read, it seems to ramble and drift from one topic to another without much seeming to connect it until later when you realize it all comes down to death. The book opens with interesting observations on death and ends with the death of his father what happens in between seems to be his way of trying to come to terms with this. To try to figure out who his father is and how his father affected him.

As soon as I started listening to this I understood the fascination with these books. Knausgaard has been compared to Proust and I often find myself yawning with some of these "literary masterpieces" but this one touched something in me.  Even though it roved all over the place and I found myself confused sometimes it all came back together, in a brilliantly confused entertaining way. Its almost difficult to write a review about it since it is so different from anything I have ever read. I think I'm going to let this one digest for a while but I will definitely be reading books 2-6.