Henk van Straten

Put on the market as the Dutch Knausgard without the endless descriptions. Well... So far for the marketeers. Occasionally Henk van Straten displays a sensitivity and acuteness that delivers a nugget. But mostly it is the usual ego-centric, melodramatic, ‘look at me being so self-conscious and brilliant’ post-modern blabber. Reading the book while having undergone a similar process of divorce made me realize I could have done worse. Much worse. What a nasty piece of work is this Henk van Straten. The tattoos already made me suspect he was a phoney – for some people tattoos just won’t do. They lack the personality to wear them. This is what I suspect is the case with Henk. I saw him first at DWDD tv, always a bad sign - case of ‘know who over know how’. Henk’s morals are at best half-baked. He is a guy that goes through the motions most of the time, it seems. Only rarely does he stop and engage with a deeper thought – Voila! Another column. I do however appreciate that he re-prints the most vicious comments on his columns. Why is it I hate this type of writing and appreciate Knausgard so much? Perhaps it is that Knausgard writes about his darker sides in a way that is not oriented at gaining a favour or becoming attractive to some fuckable woman out there. The latter is the dominant feeling when reading van Straten. It seems all written to yield his next fuck. That’s what makes it so pathetic, at times.… (más)

I'm gaving mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand strange ut interesting enough to keep reading. On the other hand very annoying, especially because of the style of writing.

Like the blurp already says, it is a real life soap in writing. Since I mostly dislike soaps, it's not a surprise that that form doesn't attract here at all.

The story talks about an old man, mentally limited, street artist, wanna be stand up comedian. No need to state the obvious and say that nothing much happens in the book. The main character gets all upset about futile things...
I kept reading to, curious as I was to find out whether the old man's death would be the end of the book or.... I won't tell here. You'll just have to read it and find out for yourself.
(Mentally limited is a literal translation from my mother tongue since I don't know the English term for it, apologies if it's not correct or offending. Please send me a message with the right term and I'll correct it.)… (más)