Review by Snowsbride -- The Stealer of Memories

[Snowsbride]

[Following is a volunteer review of "The Stealer of Memories" by Mois Benarroch.]

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2 out of 4 stars

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The Stealer of Memories

by Mois Benarroch

Translation by William C

Review by Kim Williams


The Stealer of Memories is a clash between Faulkner and Inception, mixing stream of consciousness with eery memories embedded inside memories. The narrator weaves in and out of memories that belong to other people, and while flashing in and out of these memories, the speaker tries to decipher whether these memories are his own thoughts, other people's memories, or, a story he is creating. I think the title is great and it made me very interested in learning more. I truly loved the concept of the story, however, the story is choppy and the point of view changes quite frequently without signal, making it even more difficult to put the story together.

There are five parts in the story; in Part One, an image causes the speaker to faint, and once he comes to, he begins to realize that the image resurrected a memory. The speaker seems to be quite sure of himself; he's perceptive, clever and self-aware, and wants the audience to know it, making a reference to his high IQ but downplaying it, stating he simply has a "better sense of smell" than others. There is one bit in which the speaker is walking through the streets and pointing out historical places and events that took place at these specific locations. At this point I think a setting would have been helpful, such as the time and place. I think it's Jerusalem or Israel, but I'm just not sure. The narrator then begins to sense that the memory was about the cashier at the cafe and asks to speak with her. Soon enough, the story begins to develop around the cashiers friend, Raquel.

Part Two was sort of weird for my taste. It starts off with the narrator documenting birth from memory, remembering "the look on my father after leaving the uterus". We're then introduced to a shoe klepto and then we learn more about Raquel. I believe this part is full of memories being told in the perspective of the original memory holder, however, it is hard to tell whose point of view the story is being told from because there is no clear change or distinction for when the point of view changes. Part Three introduces a letter that the narrator receives, commissioning him to write a novel. The rest of the story unveils the novel that the narrator is commissioned to write and in the end, the audience is forced to decide if the narrator is super smart and talented, or simply a writer with a vivid imagination.

I like the playful tone of this story and the dreamlike Russian memory box state that I was in while I was reading. I really loved the concept of the story and I would have like to have been introduced to more memories I think. However, I did not enjoy the actual flow of the story and the several subtle point of view changes. Not knowing who was speaking at all times really shifted my experience. Also, there were spacing and grammatical issues that made it extremely frustrating to read and even more difficult to enjoy the story. I'm not sure if it is a formatting issue or an editing issue but fixing those errors would drastically improve readability and enhance the readers experience.

Overall, the story is kind of a fun and mind-bending game with a witty narrator trying to outwit the audience. I think that this story would appeal to thinkers, fans of the bizarre, sci-fi fanatics, problem solvers, puzzle fanatics, and maybe even historians. I rate this story 2 out of 4 stars. Although I did enjoy the actual concept of the story, it does take a lot to put the story together and to try and decipher who is speaking at certain points in the story. Also, because of spacing issues and sentence structure errors, it took much longer than expected, to read and analyze.

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The Stealer of Memories
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