Music,In A Foreign Language (Original Fiction in Paperback)

You can't accuse Andrew Crumey of playing it safe with his first novel. It's sprawling, intricate, moody, crazed, philosophical, and oddly introspective. Despite a wealth of plot lines--among them the confused lineage of Duncan Waters, the love affairs of physicist Charles King, and a story of beautiful strangers on a train--the book also finds time to develop a discussion of Italian surrealist writer Alfredo Galli, who may or may not have created many of the plot lines attributed to the narrator. Ultimately, Music in a Foreign Language becomes a work of metafiction as it attempts to unravel the mystery of what exactly a novel is. A challenging and entertaining read.