Amatka

In a dystopian colony people are controlled by bureaucracy, rules and language. Family life, work choices and all social activities are organised by the government. No one dares fall out of line or question why certain events of the past are hushed up.

I feel conflicted about this novel, because I loved the idea it is toying with, and also appreciated the ending, but I was too lulled into boredom by the rather austere and dry narration of most of the slow buildup.

Words are dangerous
they give people ideas
then the melting starts.

Amatka est un roman de l'écrivaine suédoise Katrin Tidbeck, traduit en français par Luvan pour La Volte, un éditeur dont j'apprécie souvent les publications et que j'ai découvert à travers celles d'Alain Damasio.

Un roman déroutant qui se présente presque comme une fable, mais une fable politique dans une ambiance étrange.

Le roman met en scène une femme prénommée Vanja, enquêtrice pour une compagnie de produits d'hygiène et qui vient mener une étude de marché à Amatka, une cité que la quatrième de couverture présente fort justement comme « une austère colonie antarctique aux ambiances post-soviétiques ». Vanja rencontre les habitants d'Amatka, sympathise avec certains, s'intègre peu à peu à la vie de la cité, et s'interroge progressivement sur la société dans laquelle elle vit, sur ses règles, ses non-dits voire ses secrets.

Comme je le disais en introduction, l'ambiance est étrange mais prenante, avec une bureaucratie qui vire à l'absurde et des objets qu'il faut marquer par des étiquettes ou nommer à haute voix régulièrement pour qu'ils gardent leur forme et éviter qu'ils ne se désagrègent en une crème pâteuse désagréable. On pense parfois à 1984 de George Orwell, pour la satire de la société moderne et ses aspects dystopiques.

Le récit est parfois lent, cependant à la fin de chaque chapitre j'ai eu envie de découvrir la suite. Il n'y a pas de grandes scènes d'action qui viennent bouleverser le récit mais plutôt une lente progression dans un mouvement qui semble presque inéluctable.

La conclusion m'a peut-être laissé sur ma faim, mais l'ensemble du livre est plaisant à lire et donne à réfléchir. Sans atteindre évidemment le sublime des oeuvres de Ursula K. Le Guin mais dans la lignée de ses romans comme The Left Hand of Darkness ou The Dispossessed, Katrin Tidbeck nous offre un bon roman d'anticipation, de la SF où les sciences mises en action sont plus les sciences sociales que les sciences dures.

3.5 stars
This review can also be found on my blog.

Amatka is quite creative as far as dystopian novels go. The world we're dropped into is a strange place where everything must be labeled and referred to with its proper name (CHAIR, TABLE, etc.) or else it turns into a pile of goo. Language is vital for keeping the world together here. Our main character, Vanja, has traveled to the city of Amatka for a research project assigned to her by her employer. As is typical in most dystopian novels, things are not quite as they appear and some deep secrets are uncovered.

I had a lot of mixed feelings about some aspects of the novel. As is indicated in the blurb, Vanja falls in love with her housemate Nina. Interestingly, absolutely no ado is made about this and it's clear that same-sex relationships are treated just as any others. The issue really is that there is no clear reason for Vanja and Nina's relationship. We don't see much besides lust develop between the two and while it's obvious Vanja's former life left much to be desired, it seemed bizarre of her to drop everything to stay. I will say Vanja's relationships with others are similar: they exist only for the sake of the plot and don't develop much otherwise.

The pace of the plot was quite good, as was the way things were gradually revealed. The reader is forced to pick apart clues along with Vanja and watch as she must decide whether it's more important to fit in or to discover the truth. As is typical in this genre, things build slowly but steadily until they reach a frantic climax that is impossible to look away from. I had some mixed feelings about the ending itself, which I can't discuss without touching on spoilers. I'll just say that I didn't love the way things were left and found the last bit of the novel to be a bit too frantic to take in easily.

Overall, though, this was a really neat book that I'm glad I picked up. I had no idea what to expect going in and I'm not sure how it even ended up on my TBR but I'm glad it did. I'll probably be picking up some more of Karin Tidbeck's works to see what else she's been able to come up with.

A very engaging piece of speculative fiction about a world where every object holds it's shape thanks to the correct (and regular!) marking of what it is. A pencil has to be marked as a pencil, otherwise it'll turn into goo.

I loved the atmosphere of the book. The world our protagonist lives in is bleak and grey with a slight Soviet vibe, but underneath it all hides a mystery that the book slowly unwraps, as we get to explore the history and society of this strange new world.

Somewhere towards the middle it suddenly gets some Jeff VanderMeer vibes, which I feel ambivalent about. I love Jeff VanderMeer's work, yet I feel like Karin Tidbeck can't use these devices (for instance - the dream-like feel of the surroundings) as effectively.

I also find the ending rather unsatisfying. Again, it tries to be VanderMeerian (by leaving a lot for the reader to infer), but it doesn't work that well because figuring it out becomes the main hook of the story (at least for me).

Overall, this is a book definitely worth reading and I think I'd like to re-read it at some point in the future.

There were some repeated phrases that I feel shouldn't be repeated. I've put them under SPOILER in case you don't care about stuff like that.

1. "There was a sour taste... (2 times)... at the back of Vanja's throat."... on her [Vanja's] tongue."Both refer to unpleasant situations and are essentially the same expression. 2. "roof of her mouth" (4 times)- three of these refer to food being stuck to the roof of Vanja's mouth. 3. "though her nose" (2 times)- once Nina exhaled through her nose, and the other time she inhaled. Maybe the repetition signifies something (since it happens only twice, to the same character, and the opposite way), but I still found the repetition a bit distracting.

Amazing.