Title: Vollmann's Best Yet...
Product review: Vollmann was always long on both pages and talent, but in his other works he often lost a reader's focus by over-investing in an image or metaphor that wasn't worth its weight, rendering his prose less satisfying than it should have been. In short, he needed to take the art of revision seriously, as someone like Tolstoy did. With Europe Central, he's done just that. By cutting some of the denser moments in the prose, Vollmann has crafted a novel that is, if not sparse, clean and clear in its lushness. Vollmann creates some beautiful moments and is capable of startlingly apt and original metaphors and images, but he does not overindulge in them as he did in the past, which largely accounts for the success of this novel. Bravo! Well deserving of the NBE and a wonderful example of anti-minimalism coming back into vogue (this reviewer hopes).
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