
This Census-Taker
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Narrated by:
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Matthew Frow
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By:
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China Miéville
For readers of George Saunders, Kelly Link, David Mitchell, and Karen Russell, This Census-Taker is a stunning, uncanny, and profoundly moving novella from multiple-award-winning and best-selling author China Miéville.
In a remote house on a hilltop, a lonely boy witnesses a profoundly traumatic event. He tries - and fails - to flee. Left alone with his increasingly deranged parent, he dreams of safety, of joining the other children in the town below, of escape.
When at last a stranger knocks at his door, the boy senses that his days of isolation might be over.
But by what authority does this man keep the meticulous records he carries? What is the purpose behind his questions? Is he friend? Enemy? Or something else altogether?
Filled with beauty, terror, and strangeness, This Census-Taker is a poignant and riveting exploration of memory and identity.
©2016 China Mieville (P)2016 Random House AudioListeners also enjoyed...




















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There are a number of darkly fantastical aspects to the narrator's childhood and figuring out exactly what they all mean for the narrator then and now is a big part of the pull of the narrative. From the start it's made very clear that we cannot trust the narrator, as there is confusion over the events in an innocent but haunting manner. It was well-wrought mix of the gothic and magical realism.
The point-of-view of This Census-Taker actually reminded me of the beginning third of Embassytown (Mieville's best in my opinion), in that Avice, the narrator in Embassytown, also felt innocent and confused and untrustworthy. However, there is certainly much more clarity that is revealed toward the end of Embassytown. This Census-Taker doesn't do that end reveal stuff. There's a reveal, sure, but it only presents further questions.
So yeah, if you need answers and trustworthy narrators, this is probably not for you.. If you love fathomless questions and mystery, give this two listens or more.
The narration for the audio was an excellent match.
Absorbing fog-wrapped dark fairytale
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A bit wandering, but surprisingly haunting and engaging
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-- China Miéville, This Census-Taker
"LORD, if you were to record iniquities, Lord, who could remain standing?"
-- Psalms 130:3 (International Standard Version)
I would probably consider this to be a bridge novella, spanning the gap somewhere between the shores of novel and novella; a scandal with gravity, perhaps. It weighs-in at just a quinternion over 200 pages in a 5.75" x 7.5" format. For Miéville this book is a surprise (as much as any thing new with Miéville) is ever REALLY a surprise. It has the tone and feel of his earlier novels, but this is Spartan and reserved. A couple stories in 'Three Moments of an Explosion' hinted at this style.
Miéville has really dialed back his normal complexity, his labyrinthian plots and prose. This is a guy who knows he can dervish, dance, and dive with his prose, and now KNOWS you know, but is comfortable just sitting there, like a jaguar, all potential energy, ready to pounce. You can feel that confidence and almost relaxed alertness in his prose and in this story. Anyway, I expect I will be pointing to this novel in the future and saying this marks the beginning of a more mature Miéville. He isn't content to just dazzle us with his brain and unleashed torrents. He's good now. He will now slowly unsettle us with his art, his craft, the fog at the edge of our field of view, and the cracks in caves that hold dark stories.
I think part of this is due to time spent at the MacDowell colony reading John Hawkes and perhaps, hanging with Denis Johnson.
Only Feeding the Darkness
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Fortunately, this is the style of China Miéville. In most of his books, he likes to leave the reader guessing. Maybe that is why he wrote "This Census-Taker" as a novella, to make us read it more than once and come to a different conclusion each time.
No Definite Answer
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Impossible to overcome distracting sound of narrator
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Not impressed.
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