A circling, static, aphoristic, poetic, theatrical, intentionally disarticulated meditation on loss and memory, with a skeletal crew of characters ('William the Silent,' 'Bluebottle,' two dogs, a ghostly sister). All that is like Beckett, as reviewers say. But it is also densely installed with austere lyric fragments, as if it is one long lyric poem. (At random: 'Outside the stars were shards in the rotating vault above the house. I watched the sky. A star did shoot. I prayed for old age.')

This is a very particular kind of lyric, pared down and non-narrative; it comes from Hoelderlin and Novalis by way of Trakl, George, and Rilke, in turn by way of Snyder and Merwin. It is a late romantic metaphysical nature lyric, and that is the problem: it does not belong with Beckett's mid-century existential paralysis. Beckett is founded on many rejections, and this is one of them. It's as if 'Ill Seen Ill Said,' which is also about a solitary person and surrounding woods and rivers, were to be sweetened with honey, salt, and vinegar images of the lonely natural world.

The two modes just do not fit together: the lyric continuously tries to heal the hurt of the existentialist voice, while the existentialist voice seems inaudible to the characters who experience nothing by lyric rapture. What is missing is a voice than can bridge the two, other than by implying that every lyric nature trope is existential, or by hinting that every moment of the realization of the impossibility of action -- every moment that recalls Beckett -- is somehow embodied in a falling star. Curran might ask himself: why did Beckett avoid nature lyric? 'Mopus' is mistaken in its understanding of those historical currents. ( )

Ostensibly, "Mopus" is William Bluebottle’s 24-hour romp through shifting times, places, and points of view in pursuit of his lost dog and ghost sister. Curran’s masterful work of concise metafiction is cinematic and dreamlike, but it is also understated and lyrical. Like Kelly Link’s stories, the telling is matter-of-fact, but there is something eerie about the world it is set in. Some other works that come to mind are: Danielewski’s "Only Revolutions," Mitchell’s "Cloud Atlas," and Winterson’s "Art and Lies."

This book blew my mind, and you won’t find it in a chain store or the NY Times Book Review. Such a pity… ( )