I had never heard of this Polish author the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2018 as well as a past winner of the Booker Prize when a friend recommended this book.

It’s a strange and haunting story about a woman of unstated age living on a relatively deserted plateau near the Polish/Czech border at some indeterminate time, though clearly after WWII.  We learn about Jenina Duszejko in a very realistic way, slowly detail by detail provided in the ‘matter of fact’ way that we learn about people in real life.  It’s a very effective technique for keeping the action moving and the reader interested.  Over the course of the book and its four murders, we learn that Duszejko is an avid and accomplished astrologer, a former structural bridge engineer, a lover of animals especially her long lost dogs who she calls her Girls, a caretaker for her few neighbors’ houses on the plateau, a teacher.  We also learn that she has good friends—a Manchurian owner of a used clothing store who she has named Good News, a former student with whom she translates the poetry of William Blake (the origin of the unusual title of this book) who she has named Dizzy, her next door neighbor who she has named OddBall.  During the course of the book, five men in this small rural area are found dead and likely murdered.  As Duszejko narrates the book, we learn how these deaths are all connected and who the murderer is.  No spoiler here!

Is this a Nobel Prize winning book?  I don’t think so, but I haven’t read the other 8 novels she’s written, so I’m not the right judge.  If you want to read a literary, well constructed novel that rises above the typical murder mystery, this is a good one.