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    The Quiet Girl: A Novel
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    The Quiet Girl: A Novel
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    The Quiet Girl: A Novel
    Audiobook14 hours

    The Quiet Girl: A Novel

    Written by Peter Høeg

    Narrated by James Gale

    3/5

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    About this audiobook

    Set in Denmark in the here and now, The Quiet Girl centers around Kaspar Krone, a world-renowned circus clown with a deep love for the music of Johann Sebastian Bach, and an even deeper gambling debt. Wanted for tax evasion and on the verge of extradition, Krone is drafted into the service of a mysterious order of nuns who promise him reprieve from the international authorities in return for his help safeguarding a group of children with mystical abilities—abilities that Krone shares. When one of the children goes missing, Krone sets off to find the young girl and bring her back, making a shocking series of discoveries along the way about her identity and the true intentions of his young wards. The result is a fast-paced, philosophical thriller blending social realism with the literary fantastic and pitting art and spirituality against corporate interests and nothing less than the will to war by the industrialized world. The Quiet Girl is a masterful, inventive novel that marks the triumphal return of one of the great writers of the international literary world.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMacmillan Audio
    TranslatorNadia Christensen
    Release dateOct 30, 2007
    ISBN9781427202178
    Author

    Peter Høeg

    Peter Høeg, born in 1957 in Denmark, pursued various interests—dancer, actor, sailor, fencer, and mountaineer—before turning seriously to writing. His work has been published in 33 countries. The Quiet Girl is his fifth novel. Høeg writes prose that is both changeable and as deep-fathomed as poetry...[It] demands to be read aloud and savored.—The New Yorker on Smilla’s Sense of Snow

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    Reviews for The Quiet Girl

    3/5

    206 ratings18 reviews

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    • 1/5
      I only got halfway through, and that's only because I kept hoping it would get better so forced myself to keep reading. The idea of the story was a good one, but it wasn't executed well because it dragged on too much about unnecessary things.
    • 4/5
      I came upon this fascinating book by accident (if there is such a thing). In Copenhagen, secret undercover works, forces and speculation are happening. Our hero is a circus clown, a profession that is dramatically elevated in this story. Kaspar Krone is something of mystic genius, or maybe it is just his huge ego on display for the reader. He is always encountering mysterious, wise, and talented females, whilst accompanied by an inner soundtrack of classical music, in fact every situation, place and character suggests to Kaspar a passage of music, often J.S.Bach, but also Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven. Kaspar has skills, he can pass any barrier or guard, usually by trickery, subterfuge, acting, impersonation. Also his other major skill is his acute hearing, which is so refined that he can 'hear' the difference in colour of playing cards! Or he can find locations by identifying the background noise in a phone call. And there are many ex-circus contacts on hand to support him in almost any way. The plot revolves around some missing children (also with special abilities) and for the most part it is convoluted and confusing. Most of Kaspar's acquaintances know more than they're letting on, and it becomes increasingly difficult to know for sure which side anyone is on, right up to the final page! Apart from these difficulties, there are some interesting philosophical ideas floated, such as the suggestion that we are all simply repeating the same scenarios in our life, endlessly, only with different characters and settings. And that our perception of reality is only a thin veneer, which hides a vast consciousness. There is a nice depth to the whole thing, which appeals to me anyway.Overall, it was a memorable read, if a bit confusing and frustrating. Certainly it contains some sparks of real genius. Now I want to read more of this interesting author.
    • 5/5
      I thoroughly enjoyed this complex book, so much that I'm listening to it again on CD, which is what I did the first time. I want to soak up details I missed or may not have understood the first time. The main character is a man whose profession is a clown. He has a sharp, understated sense of humor and weaves wondrous stories to get himself or someone else in or out of places or situations. The story is full of action and layers of people and events, weaving together with classical music, which is vital to the story, and a special kind of clairvoyance some of the characters possess. The clown is a happy gambler and gets himself in trouble for tax evasion in several countries, or is that bit really real? Hmmm... he meets a young girl early on in the story and recognizes in her the same kind of musical clairvoyance he has, and she says she has been kidnapped. He spends most of the story trying to find her and stay out of trouble, but gets into plenty of it. He doesn't know all the forces at work using him to find the girl. It's a wonderfully detailed book, giving pictures of scenes easily. The clown's father is another wonderful character.

      The book may not be for everyone -- people who like simpler, straightforward books may not like it, and it's a bit on the literary side. I loved it and recommend it to those who love an intriguing, sophisticated yarn. I will read the book, too. I can't say that listening to it is better than reading it, as the reader didn't do various voices well as some readers do. I obviously enjoyed it, though, as I'm listening again. The author from Denmark, so the book has been translated.
    • 1/5
      Didn't finish it! Looking at the reviews I get the feeling you either love it or hate it. I am in the second group. The most annoying thing is that there is no proper timeline. And sometimes no indication at all if you are in the past or present. I had the feeling the time of the action changes even in one paragraph. Note: " I had the feeling" because you can not be sure. This book annoyed me mostly and made me nervous. I had to force myself to not throw it in a corner. I think only the fact at it is a library copy prevented me damaging it.
      I guess this is some sort of modern art. Like an art installation you don't really get.
    • 3/5
      Deserves more than 3 stars - very nearly four. I read the book in short bursts but not leaving too long between readings - just right as it is a bit repetitive. More head than heart but intriguing, mystic and ultimately inconclusive - which I like. Another reviewer called it "brittle intellectualism and dreamy philosophy" and that's a great description.
    • 5/5
      Some adepts can see people's auras, Kasper Krone hears people's musical keys. Kasper, a celebrity clown, who owns a Stradivarius, but is drowning in debt and back taxes, is drawn into complex situation involving the kidnapping of children with extra sensory powers, an earthquake in Copenhagen, and his own pending extradition to a prison in Spain for tax evasion. The twisted plot is complex and sometimes difficult to follow, but fascinating and threaded with philosophical disquisitions on music (many of which were beyond me -- I have rather a tin ear). Intriguing characters people the novel -- from KlaraMaria, a nine-year old who manages to present an entirely quiet aura to Kasper, to Franz Fieber, a paraplegic taxi driver who has lost his legs in a racing car accident, to Stina, Kasper's enigmatic lost love who rose out of the sea, to Kain, a real estate magnate and developer of spas and sanatoriums. Kasper uses his aural gifts and circus skills to ferret out the secrets.I found The Quiet Girl a wonderful tease and thoroughly enjoyable read.
    • 2/5
      I am comforted that I wasn't the only reviewer that struggled with this book. Finishing it was a personal triumph. I was sorely tempted to pack it in 100 pages in, but I gritted my teeth and around page 200 I started feeling like I had a glimpse of plot to follow. Frankly, I never felt like I knew exactly what was happening, but the language was beautiful and Kasper was just intriguing enough with his weird sense of hearing the musical key of the people and places around him that I persevered. Very glad to have finished it, though. I've always wanted to read Smilla's Sense of Snow...now, I'm not so sure.
    • 5/5
      weird but wonderful, clowns, science fiction, mystery the works
    • 1/5
      Abandonded p150I really wanted to enjoy this as it came highly recommended by a friend whose opinions I usually respect. But I could not seem penetrate the storyline, I never really felt that I understood what was going on.Kasper Krone is (was?) a circus clown, seemingly quite famous, and also a talented violinist. At some point he has made enough money that the Inland Revenue is after him for tax evasion. He seems to be constantly just ahead of them, just out of reach, thanks to the help of various random people who he phones out of the blue, and a lot of luck.There is also the Quiet Girl of the title, KlaraMaria, 9 years old, who drifts in and out of his life on some random chronology that I was unable to fathom. He is drawn to her because she has extrasensory abilities. She seems to be living with nuns, has apparently been kidnapped, yet is able to suddenly appear in his caravan, unaccompanied.Kasper also has the ability to garner all sorts of information about people and places by their musical note, something that I found overused, well beyond the boundaries of believability. On top of this Kasper seems to have this amazing power over women by just flattering them - when actually, as a character he really has no appeal at all.I'm really not at all clear what is going on, it's like reading a book through a haze. The coincidences are just piling up and my tolerance is failing. Enough is enough, I'm on to my next book!
    • 1/5
      This books is stunningly bad. It's as if someone took a lyrical thriller set in Denmark with a misanthropic, glamorous hero and then savaged the book afterward to make it unreadable. The book skips around in a way that does not make it more suspenseful but rather eviscerates the reader of any sense of understanding. Whole paragraphs seem to be plain missing from the text. Pronouns are used perhaps to seem sentimental, mysterious, or romantic but actually they attach to nothing and leave no clarity about even the most basic relationship to the story. This is all overlaid on a series of implausible premises which have no political, moral, or other value as metaphors or symbols. It seems the writer has talent, which makes the whole thing worse--one can't put the book down as 'bad writing'. More likely it's a combination of bad translation, bad storytelling, narcissism, and failed attempts to create some wistful mystique wrapped around superhuman hearing (that's right, super-human auditory prowess) and deep insights into metaphysical wisdom beyond human understanding suddenly found in a magical child.
    • 4/5
      Wow. Every time I thought the hero was down, he got up again. He was so deep under cover, I thought he might be imagining the whole thing. And all for a little girl who played the piano.
    • 1/5
      The first page was promising, but I really didn't like this book at all. Actually I found it quite annoying, like a low quality action movie. I gave it to my dad when I had finally finished it, and I certainly don't want it back!
    • 1/5
      Kasper Krone's God is a woman. "She Almighty had tuned each person in a musical key and Kasper could hear it." The world hums around Kasper. Some people emanate harmony, others a sense of confusion. Kasper's perceptions are inundated by orchestral imagery, keys and tones. Kasper works with damaged children, those who have retreated into themselves. He treats them by accessing their "accoustic essence".Kasper's father Maximilian, now dying in a hospice, was a circus clown. He took Kasper into the ring with him, and circus imagery has always been part of Kasper's life. Maximilian decided when Kasper was in his teens to leave the circus life so that Kasper could have higher education and a secure income. Kasper though had the circus in his blood and never forgave Maximilian, returning to the circus at times throughout his life.One of Kasper's patients is a nine year old girl called KlaraMaria. In her he can sense great pain, and he suspects that she has been abused, perhaps sexually. Days after he had first met KlaraMaria those who brought her to Kasper paid him off, sending a message that they no longer required his services. A year later KlaraMaria has disappeared from the children's home she lives in and Kasper fears for her life.At this point I must confess that I have not finished reading this book. It is most unusual for me to abandon a book in mid stream. I am nearly 200 pages in, and have only a sketchy idea of what is going on. It is not for want of trying. After the first sixty pages I started again, but I feel as if I am swimming in treacle. I think the story is swinging through a number of time frames. It switches from the past to the present, from Kasper's childhood to his friendship with a young woman called Stina who disappeared, from reality to illusion. So confused am I that I don't even feel as if I can trust my perceptions of what the book is about. I think, but I am not sure, that some of the conversations that Kasper has with KlaraMaria are in his mind. Certainly Kasper has preserved Stina's tone and vibration in his mind so that he can imagine that she is with him.The writing style in this book is fairly dry and minimalist. The reader is left to draw the images and make the connections from scanty clues. I can't tell whether this is the effects of poor translation or not. I've checked out what other readers who record their reactions on Library Thing thought, and most of them appear to share my bewilderment. I'm disappointed because I read and enjoyed his earlier novel MISS SMILLA'S FEELING FOR SNOW.So there it is, my first rating of 0 since I began this blog, in fact my first zero for a number of years. I feel defeated!
    • 3/5
      Peter Hoeg must be bored of hearing the refrain, "It wasn't as good as Miss Smilla". However boring this sentiment might be, in this case it's entirely justified.The Quiet Girl is a Romantic novel with excellent, thought provoking dialogue - the reader emerges with a fuller sense of the absurdity and beauty of life.I just wish I understood the plot.There is a child who is kidnapped - but sort-of isn't: there is an earthquake the children predicted - but sort of not really; there is a father who dies - but kind of doesn't; there is an order of Nuns who are on the clown's side - but kind of not.Hoeg toys mercilessly with the narrative, blending the past with the present, the present with the possible.This kind of narrative device has a long and distinguished tradition in fiction - but the line between intriuging and incomprehensible is a fine one."Tirra Lirra by the River" by Jessica Anderson and "The Time Traveller's Wife" by Audrey Niffenberger are examples of how effective this device can be: "The Quiet Girl" is unfortunately not.
    • 3/5
      I found this a provocative, intriguing, and confusing read. I kept thinking that some of the perspective might be better understood and shared by my meditation teacher, and I also rather liked reading something with that perspective and world view.
    • 3/5
      Imagine a man who relates to his surroundings thorough hearing. But what he hears is not just the mundane noise of modern society, but the underlying symphonies of sound that our relationships and decisions create. I read the first half of this book in a great rush. Special children have been kidnapped. Our hero, evading the law for tax evasion, takes it upon himself to find them and save them. Reading this book is like eating rich vanilla ice cream with small shots of jalapeño peppers. The writing is elaborate and many of the descriptions are brilliant. But the plot is nonstop. Our protagonist jumps from danger to danger and eventually I just got tired and confused by all the rushing around, both physically and temporally. In fact, this book is written as a spiral. Similar characters appear and reappear. Similar situations occur and reoccur. The main problem is just that. Almost all of the characters except the protagonist and the young girl of the title are indistinguishable. None of them are memorable, even the antagonist. Since Hoeg's Smilla's Sense of Snow is one of my favorite books, I was really hoping for an experience like that. The writing is just as dazzling, but the characters and plotlines are twisted and thin. What a disappointment!
    • 1/5
      The effort required to figure out the sequence of events just wasn't worth it to me. A fractal of an abstract is how it seemed; I loved Absalom!Absalom! and 100 Years of Solitude, but this eluded me. It also felt like the translation was lacking, but I couldn't tell for sure.
    • 1/5
      Muddled and abstruse writing greatly mars the fascinating premise of this book. Frustrating to read, I eventually gave up on it.