This is the story of Max. We first meet Max sitting on the edge of a roof, contemplating suicide. Lady F appears to talk to him. It isn't clear who or what Lady F is: a hallucination, a guardian angel, a ghost. She seems to magically appear when Max needs her. She gives him some cryptic advice that always help him, if he can decipher it.
His friend Viktor is a photographer. His friends Mutt, Linda, Torte, and Tanya are all street artists. They have some very philosophical and thought-provoking conversations.
It seems that the story is about nothing inparticular until about the last 200 pages. That is when things come together. And if you look back you realize that everything was leading you to this conclusion. I thoroughly enjoyed this novel and recommend it to everyone. ( )

I got this as part of the Early Reviewers program and found it so unremarkable I didn't remember to write a review at the time. That should tell you most of what you need to know about it. I don't remember disliking it, especially, but I did think there was probably something missing in translation. Some sensibility that a westerner just might not be keyed into. It was kinda lost on me. ( )

I got an early readers copy of this book.
Although I had a hard time in the beginning, I ended up really liking it. To me it was less about the plot and more about the characters, their perception of the world and their place in it.
I could trace some similarities of the characters to people/artists I know
Really liked the writing style, it is a bit slow, but pretty original and not formulaic, philosophical at times.
Would definitely recommend this book to others. If you find it hard to stick with the book in the beginning, give it a go a couple of times, you'll enjoy it. ( )

This book did not interest me at all, and I found the writing style very tedious. I plodded along hoping to become interested in what was happening with the characters but it was unable to grab me. I wonder if this was in part due to something not coming across in the translation. ( )

I ended up not completing this gentle amiable story of the development of a young man's aesthetic sensibility in the greyness of an eastern European city. I didn't care about the protagonists and the book did not sustain my interest just with the aesthetics. ( )