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Walker on Water
by
Kristiina Ehin
general information | our review | links | about the author
| Title: | Walker on Water |
| Author: | Kristiina Ehin |
| Genre: | Stories |
| Written: | (Eng. 2014) |
| Length: | 80 pages |
| Original in: | Estonian |
| Availability: | Walker on Water - US |
| Walker on Water - UK | |
| Walker on Water - Canada | |
| Walker on Water - India |
- Translated by Ilmar Lehtpere
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Our Assessment:
B : tight, sharp, surprising little stories
See our review for fuller assessment.
The complete review's Review:
Author Kristiina Ehin is also a poet, and the compact, image-rich stories of Walker on Water have a similarly tightly composed feel, turning quickly and often surprisingly, as poems often do from line to line.
There's a neat and clean precision to the language in Ilmar Lehtpere's translation, too -- and the overall feel is of appealing nuggets or neat morsels, rather than larger fleshed-out fictions.
Ehin's invention can be dazzling -- beginning with the water-walking narrator of the title story.
The mix of surreal and prosaic is especially effective, as in this section from 'Walker on Water':
These are stories of multiple husbands -- some who lose their arms, the memory of others maintained in a collection of dried apricots --, three-headed daughters, and attention-seeking refrigerators -- all treated as if they were the most natural things in the world. There are some recurring characters, and types, and names -- the Surrealist's daughter, men named Jaan -- while the final story, for example, describes an exchange between Happiness Formula and Life Story.2
Lately I've discovered that my husband's head opens at the back. I hadn't noticed that before. There's a hatch there. When Jaan comes home after a tiring day at work, he opens the hatch and takes his brains out. They steam on the table, but Jaan stretches his legs out on the sofa and looks at me with his happy, drwosy eyes.
3
I wanted an intelligent and educated man, but what I got was a brainless oaf.
Short, with an agreeably bizarre edge to many of them, but also a crisp, clear presentation, the stories collected in Walker on Water are enjoyable treats, Ehin is a talented writer, and they're finely crafted little pieces -- a collection that's fun to dip into.
- M.A.Orthofer, 16 December 2014
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Walker on Water:
- Unnamed Press publicity page
- Excerpt
- Official site
- Kristiina Ehin at ELIC
- See Index of literature from Russia and countries of the former Soviet Union
- See Index of Eastern European literature
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Estonian author Kristiina Ehin was born in 1977.
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© 2014-2021 the complete review
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