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by Tommy Wieringa
A moody, atmospheric literary thriller and "a timeless tale of migration" (The Guardian), from one of Europe's biggest-selling authors.
Despite its Biblical title - which comes from the opening lines of the Book of Exodus - award-winning novelist Tommy Wieringa has crafted perhaps his most timely book yet, as he traces two stories doomed to collide.
In one, we follow a group of starving, near-feral Eurasian refugees on a harrowing quest for survival; in the other, we follow Pontus Beg, a policeman from a small border town on the steppe, as he investigates the death of a rabbi, one of the town's two remaining Jews.
What follows is a gripping saga in which the two stories race toward each other, and Beg will be shaken to his core by what each one reveals about man's dark nature, and the possibility - or impossibility - of his own redemption. A virtual parable for our times, These Are the Names offers a suspenseful reading of a crisis that continues to dominate headlines, and simultaneously explores the enduring questions of faith, identity, and what it means to be "home."
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In an unnamed Eastern European city that has seen better days, Pontus Beg is an aging cop who passes his days accepting an occasional bribe from the town's businesspeople while trying to maintain a modicum of decency. A chance encounter with a Rabbi changes his life in profound ways and gives him renewed purpose. Beg's story alternates with that of a band of refugees who are walking across the vast tundra, hungry and miserable trying to find even a hint of civilization they can find succor in. The refugees' dark outcomes eventually cross path with Pontus Beg as he has to deal with their arrival in his city. While These are the Names is a moving and even deeply disturbing novel, most of its elements including Beg's late-life crisis and the refugee issue seem derivative. Hints of the surreal add a touch of originality but not enough to overcome the feeling that one is treading familiar (and overly worn) ground.
Other Reviews
"Starred Review. A magnum opus from a leading young writer takes on the meaning of exile, identity, faith, and the limits of endurance." - Kirkus
"Starred Review. There are echoes of John Steinbeck's intrepid dust bowl survivors, the voyeuristic allure of Franz Kafka's "The Hunger Artist," and the quiet nihilism and documentary detail of British novelist Jim Crace. Wieringa, whose longtime collaboration with translator Sam Garrett pays off again with deft, muscular prose perfectly suited to the author's harrowing vision, strips lives bare and drills to their essence." - Publishers Weekly
"Highly intelligent. Wieringa will make you think and keep you reading eagerly to the final page." - The Times Literary Supplement (UK)
"Poetic ... Wieringa's novel treads restlessly between genres, from middle-aged Bildungsroman and urban comedy to dark fairytale and Confucian parable ... A sense of timeless, elemental human battles, conjuring King Lear's unaccommodated man in the pitiless storm." - The Guardian (UK)
"There are echoes of the great J. M. Coetzee's elegant irony ... It is the prose and Wieringa's relaxed style that make this novel so good ... A bravura performance. Far closer to Joseph Conrad than one might expect." - The Irish Times
"An astonishing book ... It speaks to the mood of our times. It is a novel about violence and barbarism, the fragility of civilization and a world of people on the move, migrants desperate for a better life." - The Jewish Chronicle
"Masterful (and eerie) storytelling. These Are the Names balances the mundane and the mysterious between two seemingly inharmonious stories—the famine-swept journey of a pack of wanderers trekking thought the Eurasian wilderness and a solitary policeman's investigation into the death of a rabbi - without ever striking a discordant note." - Jewish Book Council
"An important and profoundly felt book ... Fast-paced, often humorous, and full of lyric power." - Patrick McGuinness, author of The Last Hundred Days
This information about These Are the Names was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Tommy Wieringa is one of the bestselling authors in Dutch history. His novels include Little Caesar and Joe Speedboat, which was shortlisted for the 2013 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.
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