Reviews

• 地下鉄の乗客全員の生を垣間見る実験小説

  ロンドンの地下鉄は7両編成で、それぞれの車両には席が36ずつある。その席が満遍なく埋まると、運転手を含めて253人が乗っていることになる。1995年1月11日朝、きっちり満席の地下鉄ベーカールー線の列車が、エンバンクメント駅を発車し、エレファント・アンド・キャッスル駅に向かった。その数分間に乗り合わせた人々は誰で、何を考えているのか……。253人それぞれの外観、職業その他の内部情報、車中での思索を、一人分253語ずつでつづった実験小説。 地下鉄の中という空白の時間に、その空白を満たすかのように、乗客それぞれの人生にとって今一番大きな問題が静かに頭をもたげている、そんなトーンの小説です。問題を抱えながら、それでも彼らは生きていて、その生が今どんなに辛いものであろうとも、それ!は死よりはマシなのです。生じる問題と折り合いを付けていくことが取りも直さず生きるということなのだ、というメッセージが込められているように感じました。アイディア自体も面白いのですが、乗客それぞれの描写が色彩豊かな、興味深い小説です。

• Much like the passengers, there's more here than meets the eye...

  There are 253 passengers on a seven car Tube train that is about to crash. Every person, along with their thoughts and actions on their brief train ride (and including footnotes explaining their direct and/or indirect relationships with other people on the train), is described in exactly 253 words each. While on the surface this may sound like nothing more than a mildly interesting experiment in constrained writing, the book manages to reach a deeper meaning than you would expect. Whether you read the book from beginning to or flip around to random parts at your leisure, the overall effect is the same; allowing you to freeze a moment in time and examine the lives and deaths of 253 people with more in common than they will ever truly realize. Contrasting and comparing their personalities and motivations affords the reader an almost God-like chance to examine the fantastic and mundane worlds of a train full of strangers as an intrinsic whole. But don't let that scare you away. If you rather enjoy as a distraction rather than a perceptions-enhancing experience, it easily works on that level as well. No matter how you attack 253, it remains a truly unique book in both structure and subject matter, and equally enjoyable whether read in short bursts or cover to cover.

• Fresh air in contemporary fiction

  I love this book. I love the ingenuity of it, I love the contemporariness of it, I love the symetry of it and I love that you get 253 stories in one. Each page has 253 words describing 253 characters with an end goal (one collective narrative of a train ride). As a London lass, riding the tube regularly, this book speaks to me personally as well as jovialy, this is a book for people who love the written word, love a good story and enjoy seeing an author play with his medium in a confident and new way.

• Have a go yourself - join my Facebook group

  I loved the idea of this book so much, and was so sorry to have missed seeing it on the web ([...]/) before it was published on wood pulp, that I have set up a Facebook group for people to put their own 253 word profile on. (If you have seen the book/website, you will know what I mean) The group is called "253 or tube theatre" and is open to all postings. Please join in, it's only for fun, it's an homage to Geoff Ryman's great book/website so be nice people.

• Pack your briefcase...

  This book, originally published in increments on the internet, is a fascinating look at perception and reality. 253 people on a fateful subway train ride are analyzed and exposed by each other on their way to THE END OF THE LINE. The most remarkable aspect of this book is that it is not a real novel in the traditional sense - the plot and character interaction are only revealed from the individual and separate page long mini-biographies of each passenger. This is a great, quick read - in fact, read it on the subway on the way to work...

• Sticking with it

  The further through I got in this book the more I started to like it. I Like the premise -253 passengers, a page and 253 words on each. Very clever. Easy to pick up and revisit if you’re short of time making it an easy read. Only once I started creating scenarios in my head to go along with the written synopsis did I really start to get involved with this book. I’m sticking with it to the end.

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