Parasol Against the Axe is the latest book by Helen Oyeyemi, author of Boy, Snow, Bird. Oyeyemi is without a doubt a brilliant and original writer, a voice like no other. However, I liked this book even less than the last one. I keep wanting to love her novels, but I just don’t.

This book is set in Prague, a sort of love story to the city. Within this book there is another book central to the story that each character in the book reads, yet is totally different depending on whose reading it. Hero, in Prague for a bachelorette weekend with her estranged friend Sofie, is the protagonist of the story, maybe. The story takes so many mind-bending, kaleidoscopic turns, I just couldn’t keep up with it.

Not for the faint of heart.