169 Books: Albania

The Palace of Dreams Ismail Kadare

For those that are a little rusty on their geography, Albania is here:

• I'll also assume that fewer people have read this book than the last one I did, so here's the synopsis: The mysterious Palace of Dreams stands at the heart of a vast but fragile Balkan empire. Inside, workers assiduously sift, sort, classify, and ultimately interpret the dreams of the empire's citizens. The workers search out Master-Dreams that will provide clues to the destiny of the empire and its Sultan.
  Mark-Alem, scion of a noble family that has provided viziers to the Sultan from time immemorial, and whose power the Sultan distrusts, is recruited into the Palace of Dreams at the humblest level. He immediately feels the terrible pressure that drives his coworkers, the dread of overlooking a crucial dream whose capture and interpretation might avert political disaster.
  But he rapidly rises through the hierarchy--only barely finding his bearings in one section of the Palace's labyrinthine passages that represent the entire empire's consciousness before he is promoted to another. And the pressure only increases as he becomes familiar with the fates of subversive dreamers and personally responsible for the sort of dreams that might ruin an entire family. A family like his own. 
  • Kind of a slow start. We'll see.
  • The guy just shows up out of nowhere to this super secret government agency and they're all like "yeah you work here now." Must be nice.  
  • Interesting idea: that all thought, good or bad, begins in dreams. Discuss.
  • I'm getting a pretty big sense of Big Brother a la 1984.
  • The word "shan't" should make a comeback.
  • I'm still as confused as the main character is.
  • Hmm...apparently this isn't actually set in Albania, but I can't figure out where it is set. Apparently some made up empire. Wait, no, it's the Balkan area...but I can't decide if they still recognize the separate countries. I'm also not entirely sure when this is. 
  • OH. I'm dumb. I think you're supposed to be that confused so it ties you to the main character.
  • Shit just got real. It's going down, Mark-Alem is yelling timber.
  Okay, I tried not to give away as much as I did with the last book, because I think many people have already read that one. 
  Anyway, I liked this book overall. It started out a bit slowly; as I already mentioned, though, I think you were supposed to feel the confusion and that did help to transfer you into the book. Actually, because of the descriptions, I kind of imagined the Palace as the Ministry of Magic from Harry Potter. 
  Anyway the excitement did pick up toward the end, although the confusion stayed there. And, despite the slowness to the beginning, I did like it. I very much felt the sense of an oppressive society where even your subconscious thoughts aren't safe. It was a little eerie. Admittedly, I haven't read 1984 since high school, but I was reminded of it, minus all the techy stuff that I think I remember from that one. But I might be making that up. Anyway, this was a good one. 
  
  
  Next up is Algeria, but I'm going to take a break for a couple weeks. I'm going to LA next week and I don't feel like taking any physical books. Wah, wah, I know.