2012; 388 pages. Book 1 (out of 2) in the series “The Hundred-Year-Old
Man”. New Author? : Yes. Genres: Satire; Swedish Literature &
Fiction; Humorous Fiction. Overall
Rating : 8*/10.
Allan Karlsson turns 100 years old today. The Old Folks’ Home where he lives has
planned a party to celebrate this and it starts in an hour.
Allan has lived a full and exciting
life, although he rarely talks about it.
No one at the rest home would believe him anyway.
Allan’s not looking forward
to the party. That bad-tempered old
Director Alice most likely won’t allow him to drink any vodka. So he decides to go on one last adventure
before he dies. He stuffs what little
money he still has into his pocket, and like the title says, climbs out the
window and walks away. He’ll catch a bus
at the nearby station and disappear by going as far as his cash will take
him. Which admittedly isn’t very far.
Director Alice will be
livid. When she catches up to him, I’d hate to be in Allan’s shoes. Well, in his
slippers, actually. Allan didn’t do much planning for this escape.
What’s To Like...
The
Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared was
published in September 2009. It was
Jonas Jonasson’s debut novel, became a bestseller in Sweden in 2010, and by
2012 had sold three million copies worldwide.
The original language is Swedish of course, and it was translated into
English in 2012 by Rod Bradbury. The
story chronicles both Allan’s current escapade, and the various adventures he'd experienced
over the course of his long life.
This is a “humorous satire” novel, with most of the funniness being of a “gentle” kind,
despite several deaths occurring along the way.
In a nutshell, if you liked Forrest Gump,
you’ll like this book. The present-day
tale begins in a small Swedish village called Malmkoping,
which really exists (population: 1,977 in 2010),
with Allan’s past history interspersed throughout the story as a series of flashbacks. You’ll also spend some time in a town with the
bizarre name of Yxhult, also real, and which
thankfully has a phonetic pronunciation.
Allan apparently had a lifelong knack
for crossing paths with world leaders. His
name-dropping list includes Mao Tse-Tung, Josef Stalin, Generalissimo Franco,
Charles de Gaulle, and US presidents Harry Truman, Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon. All these luminaries remember
him fondly and will put in a good word or do him a favor if asked. Like Forrest Gump, Allan offers some keen
insights along the way on topics such as world politics, religion, U.S. foreign
policy, and the Korean War. Bear in mind
that Sweden historically is a neutral country, and Allan’s viewpoints often reflect
this.
Allan’s did a lot of
globetrotting in his life, so the reader is treated to bits and pieces of a
bunch of languages. You’ll learn
to cuss in both Farsi (“Khafe sho!”)
and Spanish (Vete a la mierda!”), as
well as the Balinese word for frog (“kodok”),
a Russian maxim about not combining smoking and football, plus several Indonesian
words for ordering food in a restaurant.
You’ll even hear Stalin give a Swedish toast (“Helam
gar, sjung hopp federallan lallan lej!”).
On a more practical level, you’ll learn how
to brew vodka from goats’ milk, and the secret recipe for making the tastiest
watermelons in the world. Trivia buffs
will enjoy learning about Sonya Hedenbratt and Georgy Flyorov (both real people), the early 20th-century
practice of forced castration of those deemed “mentally infirm” (also real, even in the US!), and the
mysterious World War 2 disappearance of Glenn Miller. And spiritually, you’ll find out how to get kicked out of both Jehovah Witnesses and Pentecostal
congregations.
The book closes with Allan’s “past”
storyline finally catching up to his “present” one. In true Forrest-Gumpian style, all turns out
well for Allan and his chums, including Buster and Sonya (who?), and except for the fox and the
kitten. Incredibly, given that Allan is
a centenarian, there is a 2018 sequel to this story: The
Accidental Further Adventures of the Hundred-Year-Old Man.
Kewlest New Word ...
Dab Hand (n., phrase) : a person who is an expert
at a particular activity (a Britishism).
Ratings…
Amazon: 4.3*/5, based on 19,198
ratings and 14,787 reviews.
Goodreads: 3.81*/5,
based on 242,371 ratings and 24,749 reviews.
Excerpts...
Allan said that he wasn’t dead, and if the
Popov couple wanted to make sure he didn’t freeze to death it would be best if
they immediately lead him to a restaurant where he could get some vodka and
perhaps a bite to eat.
“It really is you…” Yuri finally managed to
exclaim. “But … you speak Russian…?”
“Yes.
I went on a five-year course in your country’s language shortly after we
last met,” said Allan. “The school was
called Gulag. What about the vodka?” (loc. 4879)
“What do you want me to help you with if I
may ask?” said Allan. “There are only
two things I can do better than most people.
One of them is to make vodka from goats’ milk, and the other is to put
together an atom bomb.”
“That’s exactly what we’re interested in,”
said the man.
“The goats’ milk?”
“No,” said the man. “Not the goats’ milk.” (loc. 5362)
Kindle Details…
The
Hundred-Year-Old Man Who … Disappeared currently sells for $9.99 at Amazon. Its sequel, The Accidental Further Adventures of the Hundred-Year-Old
Man, is priced at $11.99. Jonas Jonasson has one other e-book in
English: The Girl Who Saved the King of
Sweden, and it goes for a mere $1.99 right now. You can also pre-order his next novel, Sweet Sweet Revenge, for $14.99,
which is due to be released May 31, 2022.
“Father Ferguson
wasn’t a man who took a no for a no.” (loc.
2173)
The quibbles are minor. There’s a small amount of cussing: 17
instances in the first 20%, including one use of the f-bomb. One wonders what those words are in the
original Swedish tongue. Also, although I
wouldn’t call our protagonist a flawed character, he is capable of larceny,
lying, and accidental manslaughter.
The template for
handling dialogue was annoyingly awkward. No
quotation marks are used; instead it starts the talking with
an “em dash”, then lets you guess where
it ends and where the next bit of conversation resumes. And yes, I reformatted the conversations in
the two excerpts given above into the standard style for dialogue. It appeased my OCD.
8 Stars. I enjoyed The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who … Disappeared, which says something since I wasn’t wowed by Forrest Gump. The translating felt smooth, the wit was my kind of humor, Allan was my kind of hero, even the baddies had some redeeming qualities, and the storyline had lots of over-the-top antics. It kept my interest throughout and I’m looking forward to reading the sequel.
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