Blomqvist [Kindle Edition]

Michael Hickins (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Set in 11th Century Europe, Blomqvist is narrated by the protagonist’s devoted amanuensis, faithful standard-bearer, and unrequited lover, Axel Oxensteirna.

Axel tells us the story of Blomqvist’s search for his betrothed, but in the telling, he also bares his own struggle to find his spiritual footing in a confusing and shifting world.

Part historical fiction, part mystical meditation, this Mediterranean odyssey traces the course of human history in matters that are relevant to this day.

About the Author

Michael Hickins is the author of The Actual Adventures of Michael Missing, a collection of stories published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1991. Michael lives in New York City with his wife Molly and daughter Nora. His son Catfish lives and plays rugby in Villegusien, France.

Product Details

• Format: Kindle Edition
• File Size: 446 KB
• Publisher: mynameisbooks; 2 edition (December 27, 2011)
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services
• Language: English
• ASIN: B006QZHA92
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• Lending: Enabled
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #576,994 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

More About the Author

Michael Hickins is the author of the critically acclaimed short story collection, The Actual Adventures of Michael Missing (Alfred A. Knopf, 1991, iUniverse 2000). His own subsequent adventures include helping his wife run an American eatery in La Rochelle, France, and becoming an editor at The Wall Street Journal. His writing includes an essay on foot fetishism in Dirty Words: A Literary Encyclopedia of Sex (Bloomsbury, 2009) and the novel Blomqvist (iUniverse, 2007). Excerpts from The What Do You Know Contest have previously been published in semi-obscure literary magazines, MonkeyBicycle, issue #8, and Sententia 3 (Fall 2011). An excerpt of Blomqvist has also appeared in New Dead Families.
Hickins lives with his family in New York City.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Underground Classic, January 16, 2012

By 

Rick Whitaker (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Blomqvist (Kindle Edition)

I love this novel, which is one of the great underground classics of our time, a book whose author, Michael Hickins, published an amazing book of stories at Knopf (Gordon Lish was the editor) and who is now an editor at the Wall St Journal. Super smart and super literary: and this book proves it. A beautiful unlikely love story between two men (Hickins himself appears not to be gay, married with kids), a love story in the wildest, randiest sense. Here's the narrator with Blomqvist, his heroic master:
" 'When you were injured. When you realized you were bleeding and hurt. Were you afraid then?' I asked him.
I wondered if he had finally succumbed to that which he would have called an illness of the spirit, some kind of leaning towards the supernatural, the irrational, the spiritual and invisible forces that uphold us, one way or another.
He laughed."

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A medieval existentialist epic, January 25, 2012

By 

M. Woodmacher (Elmhurst, New York USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Blomqvist (Kindle Edition)

Blood sprays and bones splinter as Blomqvist and his enthralled, proto-neurotic vassal Axel hack their way through Europe at the pre-dawn of modernity. Stops along the way include Bruges, Venice, Constantinople and beyond as the Viking warrior pursues a dogged quest to retrieve his kidnapped beloved. Enjoy the valiant, violent ride, but don't be surprised when with a quick and subtle stroke, Hickins places you face first, trembling, staring into the beautiful, terrifying abyss. Mortality is a killer.

When you are done and craving more, read Hickins' collection, Michael Missing.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Historical Picaresque!, January 22, 2012

By 

Samba53 "samba53" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Blomqvist (Paperback)

Blomqvist looks and feels, at least at first, like a historical novel with perhaps a bit more down-to-earth realism than most. But when you peel back the armor, it turns out to be concerned with very contemporary problems of religion, the clash of cultures, tolerance (or lack thereof) mixed with personal ambition and love. It looks, at first blush, simply like a protagonist's quest for a woman, narrated by his servant and standard-bearer, but turns out to be at least as much about the standard-bearer's quest for faith and meaning. The author challenges the reader in a number of ways: by intentionally writing in an archaic "picaresque" style (fitting beautifully into that great tradition); by prodding us to distinguish between historical fact and fiction; and by gently forcing us to question our assumptions about religion and God.