4.5 stars
Another first read from the author for me and i don't exactly know how i feel about this story.
It's very compelling, there are a lot of questions that i felt like i got only half-answers, it might be just me and my lack of knowledge about the time period and how people were travelling and living in those years.

The first half of the book it's good but the second part it's definitely great and i couldn't stop reading. I loved the writing and it felt like flowing throughout the pages and chapters.
The characters are very intriguing and i liked the differences between them, i liked how the author mixed the multicultural main character with a strong background and how he wanted to try and find himself, see himself in the mirror as of who he really is and what he wants from his life.
As for the mixing up the events from his past, i really enjoyed the way the author has written them as in real life we often see that our mind can always play tricks on us when a situation like that occurs.

Thanks to the publisher, author and NetGalley for my review copy.

I'll start by simply saying that The Man Who Saw Everything, Levy's seventh novel, is nothing short of a tour de force and wholeheartedly deserves its place on the Booker Longlist. Despite exploring times that are decades apart Levy creates a shapeshifting space where past and present coexist and the narrative slips effortlessly and seamlessly between the year before the fall of the Berlin Wall/German reunification in 1988 and 2016 post-Brexit England. Although this is a literary masterpiece it remains accessible and completely engaging even for the casual reader and there is plenty of imaginative and highly creative ideas built into the story. The author often refers to the fragments of one's past and the process of building those pieces into a coherent whole in order to make sense of a life lived; our protagonist Saul attempts this but it is not easy as one thinks.

Written in Levy's exquisite, mesmerising prose we are taken on a journey through history and an exploration of some weighty topics with scalpel-sharp observation. It is a book about seeing and being seen and how different our interpretations can be on the same subject matter. It demands us to hold a mirror up to our European past and take a long, hard look at ourselves. It's an extraordinary jigsaw-like novel with pieces scattered left and right for readers to put together and is a challenging, unsettling read but one that is profoundly rewarding provided you put the effort in. All in all, this is a vividly-imagined, atmospheric and highly ambitious novel; I think it's high time Levy shuffled right to the podium in terms of the Booker prize. If you enjoy stories that are not afraid to shy away from the norm this comes highly recommended. Many thanks to Hamish Hamilton for an ARC.

An oddball story that meanders from timeline to timeline but keeps the reader guessing at every page turn. When the end comes the beginning becomes easier to understand. That is what keeps us in Abbey Road and East Germany as well as the hospital ward in which we discoveer the final truth. I greatly enjoyed the book, rooting for our hero all the way through.

The Man Who Saw Everything is compulsive reading; it makes you want to read on.
The characters are complex and well devised.
Saul is a haunted man and the twist in the second half of the book is heartbreaking and beautifully illustrated at the same time.
A tale of love, paranoia and grief.
The historical context that it is written in is very well detailed and even if you do not have any knowledge on the history of Germany you are able to follow it.
The theme of the iconic album cover of "Abbey Road' by The Beatles also offers another dimension that flows throughout the book.
A well crafted and addictive read.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing reading in return for review.

Absolutely incredible and mind opening. I couldn’t stop reading. Extraordinary insight into the mind of the narrator and the other characters. The way that the time lapses show a deepening understanding of the effects one person can have on another without realising is very interesting, and that juxtaposed with a deteriorating understanding of the narrator of himself over time is profoundly touching.

A real literary puzzler which kept me fascinated

Levy has a way of serving up a story that manages to defy literary conventions whilst staying true to her straightforward narrative.

Amongst the detritus of Saul Adler's life there are moments lived with authenticity, selfishness and an openness for love. It's hard to like Saul but also hard to not care. Levy's portrayal is endearing yet puzzling, just like her writing.

I read Deborah Levy’s previous Booker nominated novel (Hot Milk) and was really very impressed – it was certainly unlike most novels I read and was an interesting perspective and idea for a novel. We obviously cannot expect (or indeed want) a ‘rerun’ of that novel but I must say that The Man Who Saw Everything is a very different beast entirely.

From the opening lines of the book I found the forced, affected word-play and narrator’s naive voice and repetition of phrases intensely irritating. In another situation I may have considered this as resonant or reflective and illuminating but this just had me squirming from the very first paragraph of ‘The Man Who Saw Everything’.
From the beginning we understand that this is not a straightforward plot-driven, linear novel but the ‘clues’ as to the meaning of the story provided by an unreliable narrator just added to the irritation for me. This level of irritation was to continue throughout the entire first section of the novel; almost half of the book. I was persuaded to continue simply because it is a very short book and so didn’t feel like a slog.

In the second half/section of the novel a little more clarity is provided as to the reason behind this form and style of writing and so as the interest increases, the irritation drops somewhat. But half of a very short novel not being irritating doesn’t make for a great book.

There are however gems contained within this book and the last chapter is truly beautiful. Deborah Levy is without doubt an immensely gifted author and I’ll certainly come back to her writing again, but as for this novel, my feeling is that it is a step too far towards the realm of the Emperor’s new manuscript.

The publisher was kind enough to provide me with an advance copy of this book via NetGalley in return for an honest review. They may not be as keen on that deal now…

For once, I actually have it together to review a book on the day it comes out! As a bonus, it’s by one of my favourite living authors, Deborah Levy. The Man Who Saw Everything is the Booker Prize shortlisted story of Saul Adler, who is run over on Abbey Road (yes, that one) twice. Immediately this has become one of my favourite books of the year. As ever, Levy is creative, almost unsettlingly so if the reader seeks resolution or rhythm, and exposes truths of human relationships in the execution of her storytelling. We first accompany Saul following the initial crash to see his girlfriend, Jennifer, a photographer, to whom he proposes and this prompts her to break up with him. He then travels to East Berlin before the fall of the wall, where he falls in love with his translator, Walter. From here we follow him back and forth to the present day, after he is knocked down for a second time on Abbey Road. The book is entirely from Saul’s perspective - and he is unreliable and somewhat narcissistic. In many books, this is their downfall as it is hard to engage with the primary character but Saul himself and his life are fascinating. The personal embraces the political throughout, present bleeds into the past and corrupts it - to the extent where a lesser writer would lose the reader, but Levy is more than up to the task. It’s hard to write more without spoiling the novel so - read it!

#gifted I recieved a copy of this via @netgalley from Hamish Hamilton / @penguinbooks publishers, but as ever this remains my honest review.

The Beatles iconic “Abbey Road” photograph was taken on 8 August 1969. It is 50 years ago and this novel is in small part a homage to that iconic shot and their music. As the book opens a person of indeterminate sex – someone with dark locks, a pearl necklace and striking blue eyes – is knocked over on that very same crossing in 1988. It turns out that the victim is Saul Adler. The driver Wolfgang, in a smart car, brushed past him in his car and caused him to topple. Saul hurt his hip and bloodied his clothes.

Saul lives in London and as a researcher of the GDR (German Democratic Republic), with a specialism in the psychopathy of male tyrants, and he is just about to head off to East Berlin. As a present to his host and translator, Walter Müller, he gets his then girlfriend and photographer Jennifer Moreau (not to be confused with actress Jeanne Moreau) to take his photo on the crossing in the manner of the Beatles. The blood from his injury will be encapsulated forever. He will take a copy of the photograph with him as a gift for Walter’s sister Luna (who is a great Beatles fan). He also intends to take a can of tinned pineapple (in syrup), only he forgets to buy it. A shame, really, because his host family has set much store by this acquisition (an impossible commodity to buy in the East at that time).

He arrives in East Berlin and lodges with Walter’s mother and sister and gets on with carrying out his researches at the University.

Saul has a German heritage and his father was a life long Communist, so there is also the question of where to bury a matchbox with just a token of his father’s ashes. It would be appropriate, he feels, to bury them on Communist, German soil, so he forever has an eye out for a suitable location.

That summarises the first half of the book.

Moving forward to June 2016, just after the UK voted to leave the EU, the second half of the book is a reflection on both past and present It is a meditation on confusion, lunacy and mis-remembering. Characters from then pop up in the here and now but in the wrong setting.

It is as if Saul is looking through the lens of a camera, trying to make sense of his place in the world both then and now, but there is a veil of narcotics and madness through which he must understand his place. He ponders his spontaneous sexual encounters (which I felt came out the blue, but which establish him as bisexual) and what love means to him. He is plagued by the thought of Stasi surveillance, fancying he is their target both on East German soil and in London. That in itself is enough to drive anyone to mad and confused thoughts.

The author captures the sense of East Berlin behind the Wall. Luna is keen to flee to Liverpool to be nearer to the Beatles legacy. Rainer, whom Saul meets in 1988 seems to be a fixer and spy and later comes to Saul in another guise. Food shortages (no bananas), brown coal, Trabis and Wartburgs all slide into this extremely well written and stylish novel. The storyline toys with psychological theories – black and white / division and separation, sexual identity, the effect of surveillance, parenthood and politics. I am guessing that the author is making a statement about Brexit and that, like her story, very important elements have been thrown into a blender, mixed arbitrarily together and left to the whim of circumstance and those in power, producing a rather unfortunate and mad-making outcome. A novel to be read with authoritarian politics in mind, for here lies madness, no doubt.

The Independent quite rightly calls this a Rubik’s Cube of a book.

I’ve always been really interested in the DDR (Stasiland by Anna Funder is my top tip on that topic - it’s heartbreaking) and so this strange novel, following a historian’s trip to East Germany in the late eighties, was just fascinating. It wasn’t like anything of Levy’s that I’ve read before but at the same time it was because of the sheer oddity.

My thanks to Penguin Books U.K./Hamish Hamilton for an eARC via NetGalley of Deborah Levy’s ‘The Man Who Saw Everything’ in exchange for an honest review.

I am reluctant to say anything about the plot of this novel as it is one that I would suggest is best read ‘cold’ and without prior expectations. Actually nothing could have prepared me for the incredible journey that I took in the company of its narrator, Saul Adler.

Although clearly a literary novel, I found it a very accessible and engaging read. It manages to pack into its short length a dazzling array of themes, imagery, symbolism, and so much more.

One newspaper reviewer described it as a “Rubik’s Cube of a book” and I loved that description as it reflects how in its pages past, present and future are mixed. My own experience was that Levy has presented a kaleidoscopic view of one man’s life that also branched out to reflect a cultural and political history of the past thirty years.

I felt it was very fitting given that Abbey Road as a setting and the iconic Beatles cover is so important to the plot that it is being released a few weeks ahead of the 50th Anniversary of ‘Abbey Road’’s original release.

Frankly my words feel inadequate as I am in awe of what Deborah Levy has done in this novel. I feel that it certainly deserves a place on the 2019 Booker Prize shortlist and perhaps will prove to be third time the charm for this gifted author.

Very highly recommended.

Inventive and compelling - this book does a lot in its c.200 pages. We're very lucky to have Deborah Levy.

I can’t make my mind up about ‘The Man Who Saw everything’ by Deborah Levy. I have always enjoyed her books but this one was a bit different. I enjoyed the swapping between time frames and the whole premise of the book but I just didn’t like the characters. I will endeavour to re read the book.

In 1988 Saul Adler has a near miss with a Jaguar on the famous Abbey Road. The same road his soon-to-be ex-girlfriend photographs him crossing. Shortly afterwards, and two months before the Berlin wall comes down, Saul leaves to undertake a study in communist East Berlin. Once there he slides into a sexual liaison with his translator and his translator’s sister. It is a strange time where neighbours spy on neighbour. Where you have no idea who you can trust. But there are even stranger times afoot years later when the near miss may have been something far more serious and Saul languishes in a hospital bed. For the first time in his self-indulgent life Saul is forced to come face to face with who he really is amidst a mind bending world that has him slipping between time zones and realities.
Saul Adler is a most unappealing character. A screaming narcissist of the kind who is thrust upon you at a party and forevermore you are prepared to take the most inconvenient of detours to avoid, even if it means arriving late for an important appointment. However, Deborah Levy clearly delights in leaving the reader no option but to indulge Saul by reading about him, while seemingly driving the whole story off the edge, then yanking it back at the last second.
The first part of the book, in 1988, moves along in a logical fashion, providing an intriguing glimpse into how life might have been in East Berlin, before the wall came down. The second half of the book is where Saul’s life appears to come off its rails, dragging his time in Berlin into the present in strange and unusual ways.
The Man Who Saw Everything is a challenging read due to its complexity and that past and present seem to be colliding into this man’s life in a way that makes the reader wonder whether this is a case of an unreliable narrator, whether it is actually happening, or both. Should we really be considering this story in terms of the past or present? Which one is he really in? What really happened on the crossing when he encountered the Jaguar?
In other words, be prepared to have your head well and truly messed with in a very interesting way. It’s the type of novel you have to go back into again to fully grasp, but that’s all part of the fun of the author never once allowing you, the reader, to become complacent.

I was sent a copy of The Man Who Saw Everything by Deborah Levy to read and review by NetGalley.
What a beautiful book! A beautiful story, beautifully written – I’m not surprized that it was longlisted for the 2019 Booker Prize. This is the first novel by Deborah Levy that I have read, and I will definitely be searching out her other titles as I think her writing is…. well… beautiful!

Disclaimer: Received from NetGalley and the publisher, Penguin, in exchange for an honest review.

There are some novels which flow fluidly like a river. Others are curved and twisted. Others are very linear taking a route from inciting incident to resolution without a deviation. Others are shaped like a tree, branching and dividing but never losing sight of the central trunk. The Man Who Saw Everything didn’t fall into any of these shapes – was it Vonnegut who talked about the shapes of stories? The Man Who Saw Everything was jagged and fragmented, like a child’s kaleidoscope, reflecting and repeating slivers of narrative.

Now, I’m not saying the above as a judgment at all, just my attempt at a description of this slippery little novel. And echoing images from the novel itself. Our main character is an historian focusing on the psychology of tyrants, Saul Adler. He is photographed repeatedly by his girlfriend Jennifer and those photographs are fragmented and reconstituted to be displayed as A Man in Pieces in an exhibition at one point; at another point, following a car accident when crossing the Abbey Road possibly recreating the cover of the Beatles’ Abbey Road album cover – or maybe not – Saul tells us that the

wing mirror, from which he had glimpsed the man in pieces crossing the road, had shattered. A thousand and one slivers of glass were floating inside my head.

And this car accident is the central moment in the novel. It occurs in 1988 immediately prior to Saul’s departure for East Germany just before the Berlin Wall fell, causing minor abrasions; it also occurs in 2016, just after Britain had voted for Brexit, with catastrophic outcomes.

In 1988, Saul walks away from the accident, has somewhat vigorous sex with Jennifer before being dumped by her, and heads to the GDR. Once there, he falls in love with his translator, Walter, having a passionate and intense affair; has sex with Luna, Walter’s sister; betrays them both to the Stasi by ineptly and clumsily trying to arrange for Walter to flee the GDR with him. Or perhaps he didn’t. Or already had. Or will. Or, maybe, won’t.

Saul’s unreliability as a narrator is hinted at in the first half of the book as he tells Walter and Luna when and how the Berlin Wall will fall as if it were – as it is – an historical event. By the time we reach the second half, set in 2016, it becomes explicit and disorienting: the repetition of the Abbey Road accident, the recurring motifs of toy trains and pineapple, the slipping into the present of Rainer and Wolf or Wolfgang, as well as Walter – characters we had met in the 1988 narrative – and Saul’s inability to separate the two time frames. The 1988 narrative was, surely, at least in part a delusional, morphine-fuelled, twisted, dreamlike reconstruction – or was it? Memory, like time, becomes a slippery affair for Saul and, therefore the reader, as we learn that some deaths which had been central to our understanding had not actually occurred, and some tragedies of immense import have been forgotten. Some places are still rooted, but the person with whom Saul is sharing them shifts.

For a novel entitled The Man Who Saw Everything, seeing and overseeing and spying and camera lenses and watching abound through it, and yet the impossibility of seeing anything seems at the heart of the novel.

It is one of those novels where you feel compelled to add “Or was it?” at the end of every statement about it, because nothing is ever fully resolved or reconnected. There is no reliable point of view – and by the end of the novel, you wonder whether it matters: the world within Saul’s head, jagged and disorienting as it is, has a lyricism to it which you’d fear the tedium of the mundane world would burst.

Levy’s writing is taut and economical here, and Saul is apparently forbidden from mentioning physical descriptions of Jennifer, although his own long hair and freakish beauty are referenced repeatedly.

Whilst I applaud the control and the depth of the novel, I find it hard to give this a five star rating. It appealed to be intellectually rather than emotionally (although the final chapters did get there) or sensually; Saul was a little too much like a cipher rather than a character for certainly the first half of the novel.

As a longlisted book for the Man Booker, I wouldn’t be convinced that it would progress to the shortlist, save for the weight of the name of the author, Deborah Levy.

Ratings:

Overall: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Characters: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Plot / Pace: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Language: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Publisher: Penguin

Date: 29th August 2019

Available: Amazon

In 1988 and again in 2016 Saul is hit by a car on the famous Abbey Road zebra crossing in London. The first time he survives, the second time he is seriously hurt. As he lies in hospital he is visited, or not, by people and family he has know throughout his life, some of whom are dead.

Book-ended between these two incidents Saul tries to construct and make sense of the fragments of his life and stitch it into a meaningful whole as his past and present blur, and he faces the end.

The Man who Saw Everything cleverly and impressionistically examines themes of patriarchy, love, sex, war and history and what happens when we try to (re)write history by what we think we saw or know or what happened or did not happen. This book is a stark reminder of what is happening in 21st century where history is being disregarded or rewritten and facts are no longer seen as such. Highly recommended. 5 stars.

Thanks to #NetGalley for early eARC.

#TheManWhoSawEverything #NetGalley

The book starts in September 1988 when a twenty-three-year-old man called Saul Adler is run over on the immortalised pedestrian crossing outside Abbey Lane Studios. The car driver introduces himself as Wolfgang. Saul is not apparently harmed and waits for his girlfriend Jennifer Moreau to arrive to take a definitive photograph of him on the crossing. Afterwards, she makes love to him energetically and then dumps him.

He is shocked and upset but also busy preparing to visit East Germany on a visit as part of his academic studies. The narrative goes a bit dreamlike at this point. He struggles to buy some pineapple chunks for his German hosts, there is a fire in a block of flats and then he is in East Berlin with Walter Muller his German host and Walter's sister, Luna. Things aren't right in this section of the story. Somehow, Saul knows about the forthcoming dismantling of the Berlin wall and there are other discordant events. There are spectres, the odd mention of jaguars, Walter seems to be getting a bit confused with Wolfgang and Saul is still obsessing over Jennifer. At one point, Saul's father turns up as well. To cut a longer story short, Saul has lingering affectionate sex with Walter and something wilder with Luna after listening to the Abbey Road album. You can follow the narrative but it doesn't quite make sense.

Then, we are back in Abbey Road again but this time it is 2016 and Saul gets run over again or perhaps not! He is clearly seriously injured and in some kind of hospital with delirium where the doctor is interchangeable with an East German, Jennifer seems to have had some kind of longer relationship with him and other people come in and out. There's more about the tragic death of Saul's mother as well and the ghosts of Luna and Saul's father circle the bed as the narrative struggles to catch up from 1988. It isn't really a surprise when we end up back on the Abbey Road crossing with Luna waiting on the other side...

Even if not much else is, it is clear that Deborah Levy is playing a lot of tricks. The bald narrative suggests that Saul is run over twice but that doesn't quite hold together. As the book develops it seems more likely that he is run over once - in 2016. His spleen is punctured and is in hospital with serious injuries and at the end he dies as he walks towards Luna. So, what to make of the rest?

One way to read it is to see the first half of the book as an account of some unfinished business. Saul might have liberated either Walter or Luna from East Germany and paid a contact to do that but, in practice, landed them up in more trouble. In 2016, on his extended deathbed he revisits these events or is revisited by the spectres of those involved and there is a kind of attempt to put things right. The same is true of his relationship with his father, his brother and Jennifer. It's a kind of mix of Christmas Carol and Pincher Martin!

Throughout the novel, symbols and images (spectres, Jaguars, the Beatles) crop up as the writer throws out clues, opens cul-de-sacs and plays tricks with the narrative. The Native American origin of the word jaguar means he who kills with one blow. The name Saul is close to Paul and everyone knows the theories about Paul McCartney being dead and the clues being provided on the album cover. When Jennifer’s pictures of Saul crossing the road turn up he is barefoot as well so maybe that’s another clue, or another blind alley!

Having said all that, the book is a great read and manages to hold itself together while leading the reader in circles. You don't have the feeling that you're being played some kind of literary trick on either! It's a book to make you think as well as enjoy and these days there's nothing wrong with that!

The style of Deborah Levy's work is incredibly distinctive and her latest novel, The Man Who Saw Everything is no exception.

It's 1988, the year before the fall of the Berlin Wall. Twenty-three year old academic Saul is hit by a car on Abbey Road on his way to meet his girlfriend Jennifer, before he leaves for a research trip in Berlin in three days time. While he is only superficially injured, the incident precipitates a major shift in the trajectory of his life. He then travels to East Berlin, forming relationships with his tour guide Walter and his sister Luna. What follows will utterly throw you and is beyond simple explanation.

To fully immerse yourself in this book you have to be prepared to deal with uncertainty because this is not a straightforward story with a beginning, middle and end - which seems to be Levy's take on history itself. Instead you will be faced with uncertainty and a complex, self-reflexive exploration of how we perceive the world around us. Levy crams a significant amount into what is practically a novella, using historical European totalitarianism to reflect current times back at us, exploring human connection and relationship through a vibrant cast of characters, and highlighting the unreliability of our perspective's and memories. Levy has a haunting, prescient way of tapping into what concerns us, or should concern us most in our current moment.

This is the kind of novel that you cannot expect to fully understand, but the more you dwell on it the more it will reveal to you. It is highly intellectual and isn't a particularly easy read but it is a rewarding one. This is certainly a strong candidate for the Booker prize and is the kind of novel which is sure to become a classic of its time in future years.

While Levy’s book is initially very difficult to adjust to, the payoff is spectacular. You put down this novel truly believing you’ve read something of a modern masterpiece – regardless of whether you trust your own mental capacities in deciphering exactly why. It is remarkably inventive and undeniably absorbing, even at its most obscure. It is pertinent, powerful and singularly poetic, a gorgeous morphine-mess of a story. It is, at the very least, a book to feel: a jumbled picture of human relationships; of the love and tragedy of life; of losses and divisions and yearnings – a coherent disorder, nonsensical but wondrous.

Full review here: https://brightstarbookblog.wordpress.com/2019/08/21/the-man-who-saw-everything-review/