At Night We Walk in Circles
A breathtaking, suspenseful story of one man’s obsessive search to find the truth of another man’s downfall, from the author of The King Is Always Above the People, which was longlisted for the 2017 National Book Award for Fiction. Nelson’s life is not turning out the way he hoped. His girlfriend is sleeping with another man, his brother has left their South American country, leaving Nelson to care for their widowed mother, and his acting career can’t seem to get off the ground. That is, until he lands a starring role in a touring revival of The Idiot President, a legendary play by Nelson’s hero, Henry Nunez, leader of the storied guerrilla theater troupe Diciembre. And that’s when the real trouble begins. The tour takes Nelson out of the shelter of the city and across a landscape he’s never seen, which still bears the scars of the civil war. With each performance, Nelson grows closer to his fellow actors, becoming hopelessly entangled in their complicated lives, until, during one memorable performance, a long-buried betrayal surfaces to force the troupe into chaos. Nelson’s fate is slowly revealed through the investigation of the narrator, a young man obsessed with Nelson’s story—and perhaps closer to it than he lets on. In sharp, vivid, and beautiful prose, Alarcón delivers a compulsively readable narrative and a provocative meditation on fate, identity, and the large consequences that can result from even our smallest choices.
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While I was reading At Night We Walk In Circles, I caught my ten year old staring at the book cover. “What?” I asked. “That's a weird title,” he said. “Why is it weird?” I asked. He said he didn't know, that it just was. I brushed it off. The next day, while I was reading, my wife interrupted me: “At Night We Walk In Circles—that's an odd title.” “What's so odd about it?” I demanded. She had no answer, but then turned the unanswerable question around on me. “What's the relevance of the title?” she asked. I responded I didn't know yet, but that I was sure I would by the end of the book.
Well, I reached the end; and truthfully, I have no idea what the title means. Likely I'm missing something obvious, but it doesn't matter. I wasn't as bugged by the title as they were.
At Night We Walk In Circles is a wonderfully written story that took me down roads I hadn't expected. As the blurb says, this is a novel about Nelson, a young actor, who lands a role in the revival of the controversial play, The Idiot President. The summary promises suspense and antics, but really, what can you expect from a book about a play? But Alarcón has here written a novel that really entertains. The story is fresh. The language is crisp. At no point during the story did I find myself losing interest.
For much of the novel, I thought I was looking at a truly groundbreaking novel, a prize winner that brought to mind other contemporary novels such as Middlesex and The Orphan Master's Son. It comes close, but there are a couple elements that keep me from thinking this book will reach those heights. First, the story is plot and language focused. That's great, and it really moved the book, but I never got a great sense of who these characters were. Second, and perhaps more significant, was the narrative voice. It worked as well, but I couldn't help but wonder if the narrative choice could've been done differently. As our narrator becomes more prominent toward the end of the novel, I found my affection for the novel greatly diminishing. It was an interesting choice, possibly the right one, but it added some disconnect for me as a reader.
Do I recommend you read it? Absolutely, if for no other reason than you can share your ideas about the significance of the title. My family waits with bated breath.
