´Es ist immer so schön mit dir´

 

I hate to write about books I didn´t like/despised. Not because I believe all books I read should be insightful, beautiful and worth further recommending. But because books I don´t like steal my time. Time of my life.

Es ist immer so schön mit dir - my translation: It is always beautiful being with you - by musician and writer Heinz Strunk, longlisted for Deutscher Buchpreis 2021 is well written. This is the main reason why I kept reading it, although I figured out from the first quarter of the book that there is nothing I may eventually love about it. Not even like it.

The book though: An unnamed storyteller, man, going through a midlife crisis, is leaving his longtime girlfriend for obsessively pursuing a third hand actress taking mostly hostess assignments. Himself - the unnamed storyteller - is a failure as well: a former musician, now he owns a studio where he sets up and edits various musical setups. 

At first, two failures together may be fine, happily ever after and the story ends. But no, far from it. Their relationship evolves, she apparently has a serious eating disorder, was also victim of sexual assault, he likes her, she is getting more and more banana. They are two adults, but behave like two adults, unable to figure out their sexual life and emotional limitations and anything, in general. The relationship is becoming more and more psychotic, he sleeps with his ex-girlfriend, then she disappear again; they break up, or rather she is ghosting him shortly after he asked her hand. Suddenly he is going through a new crisis, going every Wednesday to Sunday evening out, with a lot of booze and one night stands. And she reappears again.

It´s exhausting, indeed, and you not even read some of their dialogues. And it does not make any sense, in general, except that they are living the best of their looser life and we are supposed to be part of their story. 

With all due respect to the honorable jurors of the Deutsche Buchpreis 2021, I bet there are much much better books in German around. As for me, I promise to explore more titles in German in the coming days and weeks. The list is ready and it looks much much better than ´Es ist immer so schön mit dir´. Versprochen.

Rating: 2 stars