Tag: Doom ’94

Janis Jonevs – Doom 94 | Review

Title: Doom 94

Author: Janis Jonevs

Type: Fiction/Non-Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 258

Rating 4.5/5

 

 

This book was fantastic for two simple reasons objectively, because it’s different, and subjectively, because it reflected my own childhood. It turns out that the Latvian city of Jelgava in the mid-nineties had a lot in common with the British town of Tamworth in the mid-2000s.

As you’ve probably guessed from that, Jonevs is a Latvian, and I actually met him at a party/networking event when I was invited to Riga to learn more about Latvian literature. This book wasn’t out at the time, at least not in English, but I’d heard enough about it to think that I was going to like it. I just didn’t expect to like it this much.

It’s basically a coming of age story, following Jonevs and his fellow metalheads as they finish up at school, discover drink, drugs and cigarettes and get into the Latvian metal scene. I hadn’t heard of most of the bands, of course, but there were mentions here and there of those that I had heard of. Kurt Cobain’s suicide plays a part in the plot and there were shoutouts for bands like My Dying Bride, Mayhem and Burzum. There was even a mention for Cynic, who are probably my favourite out of all of the heavier bands that Jonevs talked about. How Could I? and Veil of Maya in particular.

The only reason for 4.5/5 and not 5/5 is that there were a few typos.

 

 

Click here to buy Doom 94.


EUPL – Nine Prize Winning Authors from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania | Review

Title: Nine Prize Winning Authors from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania

Author: EUPL

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 164

Rating: 3.5/5

 

EUPL - Nine Prize Winning Authors from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania

EUPL – Nine Prize Winning Authors from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania

 

This collection brings together nine different authors from The Baltics including a few Latvian authors that I heard about during my visit to the country. On top of that, I’d already read Breathing into Marble by Laura Sintija Cerniauskaite, a Lithuanian author, and so at least part of this was a re-read for me.

The only real problem with this book is from the format itself, because it only contains excerpts of longer works. That said, it’s made me want to look into some more of them, including Doom ’94 by Janis Jonevs, who I was lucky enough to meet in Riga.

I also liked that each of the stories was accompanied by the initial, untranslated text of the excerpt. It was fascinating to see the languages differing from English and each other.

 

EUPL

EUPL

 

Click here to buy Nine Prize Winning Authors from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.