This was really unique and interesting and unlike nothing I've ever read. I've never read a book set in Romania before, so this was certainly educational for me, and I really enjoyed the touches of magical realism.

I read this book in one sitting. It’s a well written flash fiction novella. I must say I was intrigued by this story.
You get the reality of oppression and persecution in communist Romania during the 1970’s blended with their traditions and adding folklore flares of magical realism like fairies and festivals and there’s also family members shrunk to fit in perfume bottles. Why? You have to read it to find out

I’m judging a 2020 fiction contest. It’d be generous to call what I’m doing upon my first cursory
glance—reading. I also don’t take this task lightly. As a fellow writer and lover of words and books, I took this position—in hopes of being a good literary citizen. My heart aches for all the writers who have a debut at this time. What I can share now is the thing that held my attention and got this book from the perspective pile into the read further pile.

Fun interesting work

The structure of this novel was really interesting, written in what the author calls "flashes" in the author's note. These flashes follow the main character, Alina, from her childhood through adulthood in Soviet-era Romania. Some of the flashes are in first person and some are in third, but they all focus on Alina and her experiences. I've read a lot of Soviet-era literature from eastern Europe and this fits in well with the sort of magical realism that I often see in literature of that time period. Ultimately, this is a sad story (rigid communist rule, fear of state agents, an unhappy marriage, strained mother/daughter relations, and an incident that is very clearly a sexual assault), but I did enjoy the quick pace of the flashes, and they came together in kind of a mosaic type of story that does end on a fairly hopeful note.

“Bottled Goods” is a short novel- or a long short story- of a newly wed couple in Soviet Romania during the Communist dictatorship of Ceausescu. Picture persecution, isolation, torture, and despair. After Alina’s brother-in-law defects to the West and Alina, a teacher, fails to report a young child in her class with an illicit comic, she is considered an “enemy of the state.” She is assigned an abusive secret service agent who stalks her at all times. Suddenly, her job is at risk, she is ostracized, she is betrayed by her Communist mother, and her marriage is collapsing. How can she possibly escape?

Although I was totally immersed in the story, I found this novel a little too close for comfort. Living in similar circumstances myself during El Salvador’s civil war during the 80’s, I identified with Alina’s claustrophobia, her helplessness,her fear. In her dreamworld Alina’s wish list consists of owning a pair of Levis bluejeans and a portable electric stove so she can cook her food instead of using the immersion heater. My wishlist during the 80’s in El Salvador was made up of M&M’s and Kit Kat’s along with a pair of Reebok sneakers which were only available n the USA. Oh! And how I longed for a popcorn maker!

Thank you so much for the opportunity to read this book. I'll be posting my review on Goodreads and Amazon

First published in the UK in 2018; published by Harper Perennial on July 28, 2020

I would not classify Bottled Goods as magical realism or absurdist fiction, although the novel has surprising elements of both. Most the novel tells a straightforward story of a Romanian woman living under the reign of Nicolae Ceaușescu. She desires freedom — from her mother, from an oppressive political system, and eventually from her husband — but comes to understand that freedom is not an automatic guarantor of happiness.

In 1967, Alina Mungio is living with her mother. Alina’s Aunt Theresa regards Alina’s mother as one of the “low people” in the family but maintains a good relationship with Alina. Theresa’s husband and sons hold significant positions in the Party, giving Theresa more opportunity and less scrutiny than is typical for those who lack her connections. Theresa believes in and practices mystic rituals that been handed down for generations. Theresa’s mother shrunk Theresa’s father to hide him from the authorities after the Communists came into power. Alina’s mother wanted nothing to do with Theresa and once threatened to reveal where her father was hidden. Suffice it to say that Alina’s mother earns little sympathy during the course of the novel and, in the minds of many, will get what she deserves.

Two years later, Alina is working as a tour guide and translator for German tourists at a luxury resort. There she meets Liviu, another German-speaking guide. Their marriage gets off to a rough start on her wedding night and goes downhill from there. Life becomes even more difficult when Liviu’s brother defects to France, a decision that taints Liviu and Alina by association.

Alina and Liviu make their own plan to defect, but during much of the novel, they are fending off interrogations and trying (not always successfully) to stay out of jail. Alina also has to worry about her mother, whose betrayal of Alina’s grandfather is a small step from betraying Alina. Much of the novel’s dramatic tension focuses on whether the couple will be allowed to cross the border into Germany on what they claim is a trip in support of Liviu’s archeology research.

The final chapters breeze through several years of Alina’s life. Most of those years take place after the fall of Ceaușescu. The chapters seem like an afterthought, although they do add a sense of symmetry to a novel that might be seen as the story of Alina’s life. The most effective scenes occur while Alina is still in Romania, as she submits to interrogation and worse to avoid imprisonment. Alina’s fear and sense of helplessness gives the novel a harsh realism that counterbalances its mystical moments.

As is true of The Tiger’s Wife and other novels that assume the reality of local mystical beliefs and rituals, the reader will need to accept the reality of magic (or something similar to magic that allows the laws of physics to be bent) to appreciate all aspects of the story. Since the story is set in a country that routinely serves as a background for vampire fiction, it isn’t difficult to accept the story’s mystical elements. They certainly don’t overwhelm the larger story of a woman’s desire for freedom and her uncertainty about what to do with it. What does freedom mean to a woman who is never really free from the unwanted attention of men, no matter where she lives? When one finally has the freedom to make choices, will life necessarily be better than it was when choices were dictated?

Sophie van Llewyn has won awards for flash fiction, a literary form that doesn’t appeal to me. The flash fiction style is evident in the book’s construction. Chapters are short, each telling a brief segment of the story before moving on. Fortunately, Bottled Goods isn’t a collection of related flash fiction stories. Each chapter builds a foundation upon which subsequent chapters rest. The chapters integrate into a solid novel about the perils of living without freedom and the competing perils of living with it.

RECOMMENDED

Flash fiction is an excellent narrative choice for a story set in 1970s Romania and during the Ceausecu Socialist regime. The urgency that likely existed in this environment is keenly reflected using flash fiction. A country and generations who include mysticism, Roman Catholic faith, political strife, poverty, and a demand for maintaining tradition in an increasingly modernizing world, imposes flash fiction on its narrators. Bottled Goods has a mysterious atmosphere plagued by surveillance, manipulation and ride-or-die approaches to compliance or the dangers of seeking freedom. Family and marriage are challenged at their core leaving one to ponder the value of either in the face of liberty. Readers are required to ear bend on work at processing language as the translation of this work regardless of who translated writer or other leans toward English as a second language. This brings authenticity and beauty to the meeting of language and story and resonates with sincerity. I love the dark quirkiness that is entirely Romanian—Transylvania, evil counts, mountains and twisty roads, forests and cottage industry. The sparseness at times allows one to experience a deeper part of their imagination and thought. Cheers to The Women’s Prize for elevating this author and her work. This book is the Exit West of its locale and I just might read it again! Thanks Netgalley!

Alina's account of coming-of-age in Nicolae Ceausescu's Romania was as chilling as it was engrossing. The landscape of Bucharest, Transylvania, and Fascism are all arresting, and the snippets about Germans are just about the funniest. The mysterious family feuds and tales of marriage woe, are interlaced with the politics of social standing, under a terrorist, Communist regime. Told in a series of short story like essays, some like long-form poetry, others infused with magical realism and witchcraft; but that all interlock in a purely satisfying combination.