Faces in the Crowd Reflection (sort of)

Hey everyone, I’m back again for my final book post. This week’s book was Faces in the Crowd by Valeria Luiselli. I don’t really have that much to say about this book. I didn’t find it very interesting, and the switching between stories within the story made it kind of difficult to follow. It didn’t really feel like there was much of a plot behind it, which made it hard for me to be interested in it (could be missing something). Coming off some very strong books the past couple weeks (in my opinion, Death with Interruptions and Money to Burn), I found the lack of action/plot development to be particularly striking. Overall, I struggled to get through this book, even though it was only 150 pages, which is saying something. I also found the main character’s obsession with a Mexican poet named Gilberto Owen to be kind of strange. Moreover, her bizarre observations of her Chinese neighbour made me feel a bit uncomfortable (p. 5). Some people might like this type of book, but I am not one of them.

Since I don’t really have that much to say about this book, I thought I’d create my own rankings for the books I read in this course:

1. Death with Interruptions by Jose Saramago – Brilliant and thought provoking
2. Money to Burn by Ricardo Piglia – Action, action, action
3. Deep Rivers by Jose Maria Arguedas – Fantastic and engaging plot
4. Agostino by Alberto Moravia – Uncomfortable, but I’ve never read anything quite like it
5. The Time of the Doves by Merce Rodoreda – Highlights tragic circumstances of war
6. Combray by Marcel Proust – Made me think of the difficulties of growing up
7. Mad Toy by Roberto Arlt – Great and deep plot, didn’t really like the ending though
8. The Hour of the Star by Clarice Lispector – Unique and fairly interesting
9. The Shrouded Womanby Maria Luisa Bombal – Interesting, but ghosts are confusing
10. The Trenchcoat by Norman Manea – Confusing to read, requires a lot of external context
11. Faces in the Crowd by Valeria Luiselli – No plot/action, didn’t understand the point

Anyway, thanks for reading my blog post. As difficult as it was to get through a book a week for the duration of the course, I think it helped me improve my reading speed significantly. I simply didn’t have the time to read as slowly as I’m used to and still have enough time to complete my readings for all my other classes.

Discussion Questions: What did you think of Faces in the Crowd? Am I missing something? Also, what was your favourite book of the course and why?