New Yorker Tim, a wealthy law firm partner, walks. Rather, his legs walk uncontrollably, sending Tim away from his work and his wife and daughter, walking nonstop until he collapses into narcoleptic sleep. Intelligent, proud, tough, he joins battle with his unheard-of affliction.
The Unnamed, by sophomore novelist Joshua Ferris, is Tim’s weird, undulating tale. Ferris is a fearsome talent, constantly surprising the reader with plot twists and startling, fresh scenes. Although the walking compulsion seems inexorable, the inner battle between it and Tim’s mind or soul or whatever you want to call it builds into an epic. Ferris captures perfectly the terrible toll exacted upon Tim’s wife and child. What elevates The Unnamed from a good book idea plus skilful execution is Ferris’s superb, poetic style. Standing slightly aside from his characters, he paints modern America in brilliant, fierce prose.
The passage of the walker of course illuminates the landscape. In this luminous, uncomfortable novel we see the modern industrial world in all its glory and sickness. Somehow I found myself reminded of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, somehow the world I lived in seemed apocalyptic, as if diseased and stark.
A standout novel in 2010, a reminder of why we read. 4 stars.