Ballerina by Patrick Modiano

Name: Patrick Modiano

Year Won: 2014

Read: Ballerina

Original Language: French

Reason: "for the art of memory with which he has evoked the most ungraspable human destinies and uncovered the life-world of the Occupation"

About: Ballerina/i> is a story about a ballerina. So like, duh, but that's sort of what it is. A hazy, dreamy recollection of the life of a ballerina.

What I liked: There is a poetic, dreamy quality to this novel which is fun to become engrossed in.

What I Disliked: There isn't much of a plot to this book. It seems more like a vibe than anything else. A pretty vibe, but a vibe.

Should it have won a Nobel: I would have liked a bit more substance to this. It probably was there, but so obscured that I took almost nothing from it. So IMO, no, but this is the kind of thing the Nobel committee likes and this almost certainly isn't the only thing Modiana has written.

Next Up: "Voices from Chernobyl" by Svetlana Aleksievich