Solenoid is definitely one of the rare masterworks that feels like witchcraft. It feels like something a human cannot be capable of. It is somehow mercurially funny, deeply touching and ignominiously entertaining while also somehow balancing intellectual rigor with beautiful writing that stays immensely readable.
Solenoid is about a man facing himself and feeling claustrophobically trapped by even the widest restraints of human existence. In a kind of internalized Dante's inferno, this unnamed narrator weaves a tale in his journal about the difficulties of a child suffering weak health and a healthy fear of dentistry, all the way up to present struggles as he spends his lonely midlife years teaching grade school in a fantastical Bucharest. From surreal, sentient machinery, to break room drama, to coworkers who bust their students' heads with rings the size of bowling balls, all the while, dusted with interesting and encyclopedic musings, the reader is constantly being entertained while shown the tight restraints of a human life. From a couple hundred pages onward, we are introduced to the picketists, a group of people who rebel against the injustices and anti-ethical principles of existence.
Along the way, we are whisked along a careening adventure: a search for the 5 Solenoids hidden around town which present a possible means of material escape from 3D matter as we know it. After a barrel of laughs, a pint of tears and a lifetimes worth of dream language communicated to the readers subconscious, one is left with an overall message of compassion very reminiscent of the bodhisattva vow of Mahayana Buddhism. The ending is a grand finale of a display and an emotional celebration of the dignity of life
Everyone must read Solenoid.
5 ⭐
by AuthorJosephAsh
2 Comments
Beautifully said — *Solenoid* really does feel like something beyond human reach, doesn’t it? I had the same reaction when I finished it — that strange mix of awe, melancholy, and quiet enlightenment. It’s one of those books that rewires the way you perceive existence itself.
I remember closing it and just sitting there, realizing how rare it is for a story to feel *alive*, to make you feel both trapped and free at the same time. It reminded me a lot of why I started writing in the first place — to explore that same tension between reality and transcendence.
It’s incredible how some books don’t just tell a story — they *become* an experience that stays in your bloodstream.
Feel like I’ve thought about the search for the kids through the big factory, the giant statue that tramples people, and the day to day school life in that book at least once a week since I read it in April. Haven’t really read anything like it since.
Very tempted to try Nostalgia soon.