By Title: The Nix
Author: Nathan Hill
Publication Date: 2016
Publishing House: Alfred A. Knopf
The Nix has been on my to read list for almost a year. Keltin got a copy from the library and said that I should add it to my list. In a fit of sass I bought a copy at a used book store then the book sat on my shelf.
From the synopsis:
A Nix can take many forms. In Norwegian folklore it is a spirit who sometimes appears as a white horse that steals children away. In Nathan Hill’s remarkable first novel, a Nix is anything you love that one day disappears, taking with it a piece of your heart.”
The Nix, 2016
For Samuel his mother is his Nix and has been since she disappeared when he was a child and returns to his life in an absurd manner. This book is about life and secrets and discovering those secrets about loved ones but also about yourself. Intertwined with life and relationships there are some politics in this book. Hill weaves them through the narrative, protest and violence and things beyond ones control.
This is a well written book but like Friday Night Lights there were parts where I wanted to just shake the characters and ask them what they were thinking. A lesson from this book is that there is not always a simple answer for things and people don’t always have one reason for doing the things that they do.
I recommend this book for fans contemporary fiction, people who don’t mind some riots, and those that want to understand people a bit more. A good book but a long book.
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