The Circus

Starred review from December 16, 2019
Karlsson (The Invoice) delivers a pithy and sagacious jaunt into an uncanny reality in his riveting third novel. In modern-day Sweden, the unnamed narrator, a placid, middle-aged loner, has moved on from the bullying and isolation of his adolescence to enjoy a reasonably tolerable existence. He meticulously organizes his record collection, works at a bakery, and occasionally hangs out with a few friends. But his life is disrupted while visiting a circus: his childhood friend, Magnus, volunteers to participate in a disappearing act and then actually vanishes. Unnerved and annoyed, the narrator attempts to solve the mystery of Magnus’s disappearance, only to discover that the parameters of his own existence are starting to blur after he starts receiving phone calls in which a mysterious person plays him music, asks him questions, and dredges up long-forgotten memories. He waits outside Magnus’s apartment, seems to see the magician from the circus around every corner, and entertains the irrational advice of his psuedotherapist friend Jallo. As the narrator’s confusion increases, he gradually begins to examine his friendship with Magnus and confronts the nagging suspicion that he is somehow responsible for Magnus’s fate. Karlsson’s knack for Kafkaesque surrealism and suspense is wonderfully paired with sardonic humor and a deeply sympathetic protagonist. This excellent, clever yarn is Karlsson’s best yet. Agent: Niclas Salomonsson, Salomonsson Agency.

February 1, 2020
Karlsson (The Room, 2014), an actor and playwright in his native Sweden, has produced a delightfully unusual second novel. The narrator, a quiet man of distinct habits, works in a bakery by day, shops for records most nights, and when at home, thinks of new and exciting ways to reorganize his huge vinyl collection. Out of the blue, an old friend, Magnus?a man who shares his deep love of music?invites him to go to the circus. When Magnus volunteers to go on stage, the magician makes Magnus disappear. Bizarrely, he seems to have vanished permanently. As the protagonist tracks down clues to Magnus's whereabouts, he begins to reconsider his own life, his difficult experiences in school, and the central importance of music to his life. Similar in tone to Joseph Scapellato's The Made-Up Man (2019), Karlsson's dreamlike, surreal, Gogolian novel explores the importance of escape, the imagination, and the impossibility of ever truly knowing how others see us. This is a light, absurdist, but deeply enjoyable story, and one that inspires deep empathy for the narrator's life.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)