![]() ![]() unwieldy and untidy like the mercurial Shift, it forever changes form and refuses to be pinned down. There’s so much to observe and to consider and to enjoy, yet Knox lets vital characters languish offstage for hundreds of pages and, more importantly, abandons intriguing themes. This surfeit of stories, this melding of modes and mixing of genres, is The Absolute Book’s greatest strength, but also the source of its occasional frustrations. At various points, The Absolute Book resembles a book about books, a psychological crime novel, a romance, a portal fantasy, a technothriller, a historical fantasy, and an allegory. it’s easy to imagine that Knox intends 'absolute' in its sense of 'all-encompassing,' because it seems as if she’s trying to squeeze every genre of fiction between two covers. It keeps us grounded in Knox’s human concerns even as the narrative races us past the descending angels and the rising demons, through the roots of Yggdrasil and under the stars of another sky. ![]() The prose of The Absolute Book is solid and direct, neither succumbing to flashiness nor aspiring to poetry. ![]()
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