Although the different points of view structure was original and the writing was good, I’m afraid this novel didn’t grab me except in some fragments.

Jacob is hallucinating and goes to the hospital emergency room in San Francisco for assistance. As he waits, he recalls events and impressions from his life, in a voice which is alternately lyrical, ironic, flamboyant and understated.

There are a number of strands to the narrative: there is Jacob now, in the hospital, Jacob as a child in the Middle East, Jacob as an adult in the US, living through the loss of his partner and their friends from AIDS. There are also chapters where Satan, Death and the saints argue over his story, extracts from Jacob’s journal and occasional short stories he has written. The narrative also moves backwards and forwards in time within the different strands.

Parts of the story are haunting, particularly his childhood in a Cairo brothel, the love he felt from the women there, and the quiet sadness that permeates his memories of his mother. I felt at times there were too many disparate elements in the story (the Satan parts in particular felt like exposition and the messages of the ‘stories’ a little laboured). The fragments of memory would have been more involving if there were fewer competing elements. However I loved the energy and emotion of the author’s voice.

http://www.themodernnovel.org/asia/arab/lebanon/rabih-alameddine/the-angel-of-history/

My rating – 3.75/5 stars

I requested Angel of History from Netgalley because I read An Unnecessary Woman in 2014 and it was one of my favourite reads of the year. It was a book that I thought about long after I finished reading it and one that I can still remember well to this day.

Angel is a satirical novel drawing inspiration from The Master and Margarita by Bulgakov which I also read in 2014 and very much enjoyed.

The book centres around Jacob, who checked into a mental health facility because of his delusions following the death of his lover. The book takes place during the 1980s wherein a lot of gay men were dying of AIDS and very little was known about the disease at the time.

Love and death are central themes in the book (and sometimes literal characters).

Though I enjoyed the book, I thought it was a bit too disjointed. I know that it was narratively experimental on purpose but it didn’t always work for me.

I read this in December 2016 but if you’re doing the Book Riot Read Harder challenge then this one is a good pic for a few categories (LGTBQ+ romance, character of colour goes on a spiritual journey, book with central immigrant experience).