A Christmas gift that I've already finished, maybe because it is secretly a page-turner, or maybe I'm just at my parents' house with nothing else to do. I liked...
The encyclopedic feeling of switching from topic to topic, which kept my easily-distracted brain engaged.
The slightly dogmatic use of first-person narration, so that Sebald slips seamlessly into the voice of whoever's story he is telling, only occasionally reminding us it is someone else with a "...writes X," or "so Y says." This was actually mildly frustrating at first, when the brief biographies of various colorful character's blended into Sebald's own story, but by the end I was really enjoying how the different people, stories, dreams twirled together.
The many moments where a thread of thought you almost forgot about, maybe from 100 pages back, rises naturally to the surface again, in a wonderful imitation of having come back to mind organically that doubtless took very careful planning and editing.
I found this more than mildly frustrating, but it was a long time ago. I haven't bothered with another Sebald; do you know if his other stuff is like this?
No idea... Vertigo looks pretty similar paging through it, but the Emigrants seems different and a little more like a novel in that it follows characters' lives. But I haven't read those
Yeah I should probably have a gander at Emigrants… thinking back, this was probably where I first heard of Browne’s Urne Burial, which I finally read last year and definitely recommend.