Senlin Ascends

I look at my own life and all I see is ambivalence and confusion. Nothing dramatic happens, at least not suddenly. In real life, nothing happens quickly. Everything just erodes. And it's confusing and frustrating and dull. God, can it be dull. But then you have the Parlor, and everything has a point. Yes, it's simple. Yes, it's stupid. But there is a plot. A week ago, I would've given anything for a life with a plot. Now, I say, bring on the dullness.

A third of the way into this book, I was nervous. I was nervous that I thought it was going to be a slog. It had opened strongly, but it was so bizarre and seemingly directionless, that I thought it had been overhyped and would disappoint me. Thankfully, I was wrong.

Thomas Senlin, a headmaster from a small village, has dreamed of going to the Tower of Babel his whole life. For his honeymoon, he decides to take his new bride to his dream location. However, the Tower is not at all what he expected. Within minutes of arriving, his wife Marya is separated from him, and he must find her. The Tower, however, is a microcosm of activity that Senlin doesn't anticipate. He must resist the influences and trials within in level of the Tower in order to be reunited with Marya.

“You've made it impossible for me to read a book in peace. When you're not here, I just gaze at the words until they tumble off the page into a puddle in my lap. Instead of reading, I sit there and review the hours of the day I spent in your company, and I am more charmed by that story than anything the author has scribbled down. I have never been lonely in my life, but you have made me lonely. When you are gone, I am a moping ruin. I thought I understood the world fairly well. But you have made it all mysterious again. And it's unnerving and frightening and wonderful, and I want it to continue. I want all your mysteries. And if I could, I would give you a hundred pianos.”

Tom, as a superior student of the Tower, keep after your wife. It is easier to accept who you've become than to recollect who you were. Go after her.

Because, see, by the time they get this deep into the Tower, most have had the character beaten out of them. They are willing to say anything to get what they want. You can't reason with them or trust them. To know a person, to understand their character, you must know who they were before the Tower shook them to their roots. If you do not know how they changed, you do not know who they became.

“I hope it hasn't come to that. We shouldn't have to go around congratulating each other for behaving with basic human dignity.”

I'm going to feel very weak, and you're going to feel very dumb. But that's how it always is in the beginning. Learning starts with failure.”