Disturbances: Inside and Out
August 29th, 2008 bhenricksenAtmospheric Disturbances, a first novel by Rivka Galchen, is filled with fun and promise. Her narrator is a psychiatrist named Leo, who is certain that the woman who came home one day was not his wife but rather a perfect, or near perfect, simulacrum. It’s a promising start for readers who enjoy the bizarre. Leo sets out in search of his true wife and of a patient who has also disappeared. The patient had seemed to have delusions about working for the Royal Academy of Meteorology on a secret project with military implications. A rival group known as the 49 is out to foil things. Have they kidnapped his wife?
As he proceeds on his quest, which takes him to Argentina, Leo consistently psychoanalyzes himself and others in an effort to remain convinced of his own sanity, and Galchen seems to have a firm grasp of the shop talk. But is he really mad, or are all the strange happenings not just in his mind? For much of the novel we tend to opt for the former explanation, but then things start to confirm his “delusions.” Read the rest of this entry »
