three or four stars... this is very earnest. No levity is a tough one for me.

All the same, it's sporadically rich in its imagery, world-building and fantastical risk-taking. The incessant doubling and triangulation adds a coherence to Erickson's cinematic headiness.

The characterisation is often tedious and earnest - but then the often dream logic intensity of the action is impressive.

Only my misguided prohibition against abandoning a book stopped me from giving up on this.

The last book I finished in 2020 was one I'd had on the shelf more than 20 years. I've read a couple of other Erickson novels in that time but had failed to find my way to this one. Even when I did, I set it aside for a few months to make way for various library priorities.

That hiatus didn't help when I dug back in, given the density of ... well, the density, full stop. Not in the Russian-novel sense. There isn't a diffuse array of characters to keep track of. The geography, too, is limited. But the interconnectedness of these figures, some of it seemingly imagined or spectral, fans out as the pages unfold. And for every odd neatening of a plot point (a lost artifact appears with almost forehead-slapping convenience) comes a cruel comeuppance that verifies the cruelty lurking behind any kismet, fictional or real.

This is one I'll need to read again, not soon but before 20 years go by again.

Thomas Pynchon on DAYS BETWEEN STATIONS (1986):

Daring, haunting, sensual...Steve Erickson has that rare and luminous gift for reporting back from the nocturnal side of reality, along with an engagingly romantic attitude and the fierce imaginative energy of a born storyteller. It is good news when any of these qualities appear in a writer--to find them all together in a first novelist is reason to break out the champagne and hors-d'oeuvres.

Sepand of the duo Days Between Stations recommend this book and gifted me a copy in 2007. Here is from an email I sent including my thoughts on the book:

Hi Sepand

...

I agree with you about DBS coming in and out of focus. I prefer now to think of it as vignettes that can be taken in isolation, even though I know them to be related. That is, I am drinking my pleasure from each chapter as if it were an isolated dish, though the theme and presentation of the buffet may elude me on this reading. Some research shows me many songs, albums, etc. have referred to this work - so I really appreciate you turning me on to it!

...

Tom

this book felt weirdly like a cross between a murakami book + the goldfinch + another strange element. very surreal and engaging and made my brain feel thick and hazy, and made me wonder.
one thing that kept me from loving it was how much I disliked lauren, which made it difficult to care about the love triangle angle. another was how disjointed the middle third of this book was in comparison to the first and last thirds. some parts were so grounded and some were so dreamlike that it was always hard to get a sense of what was supposed to be happening and where the story was going (but to an almost overwhelming degree, not in a good way).
but overall, really interesting and haunting and would recommend.

This book was fine. As others have said, lovely imagery, unrealistic characters.

In addition to the imagery, I get a feeling that Erickson's obscurity might be what some of his evangelists like about him. Luckily for the obscurity fans, then, their five star ratings will always be tempered by the folks like me who were sucker enough to believe them, and this book, obscurity intact, will not rocket to Goodreads fame and glory.

A modern masterpiece. Just esoterically weird enough to drag you in rather than push you away. Beautifully conceptualised, executed, written. Can't wait to read more of his work, as this was his first I have read.

Realmente me encantó la cualidad surreal, onírica, de este libro. Las personas aparecen y desaparecen y se manifiestan, viven fuera del lugar y del tiempo, son varios y ninguno a la vez. Lo enmarcaría sin problemas en el realismo mágico (la naturalidad de lo sobrenatural, la alienación de la sociedad humana y el incesto como manifestación de aquelll, el énfasis en los lugares y sus historias, la obsesión, todas cosas que me recuerdan a clásicos del género) pero curiosamente lejos de la latinoamericanidad.

Me pareció fascinante la forma del sexo en esta novela. Es algo inevitable, no necesariamente deseado pero no por eso sufrido, una aceptación de lo inaceptable que a la vez naturaliza la violencia. Lo estoy diciendo como el orto pero de verdad me pareció fascinante, la exploración de lo humano como animal. Creo que sería un error condenarlo en esos aspectos; la perspectiva femenina es comprensiva y compasiva. Si esperás encontrar una deshumanización en esa igualación frecuente del sexo y la violación, en mi opinión no la hay. Las decisiones y las emociones de Lauren son casi las únicas que conducen el relato.

Se pueden decir mil cosas. No es para todo el mundo, de más está decir. A mí me transportó, en ese universo de destrucción en donde lo único que importa en última instancia son las personas. Me va a dar vueltas en la cabeza por un buen tiempo. Aunque el final un poco precipitado, diré.

When you're reading a book like this, you start looking at strangers on the street as if they harbor a secret that they need you to uncover. More so than usual.

This book came out in 1986 and I remember really wanting to like it (I was in my mid-20s, in the midst of an inevitable Thomas Pynchon fanboy stage; Pynchon had come out of hiding to blurb this book), but not quite getting there. It was unabashedly romantic and grandiose, written in this florid language, in stark contrast to the minimalist social realism practiced by other writers (Raymond Carver, Richard Ford, Mona Simpson) on the Vintage Contemporaries imprint.

Well. flash forward 35 years and this book has found its time and place. The world it describes is a world that forgets its past every day; events have become uncoupled from meaning, everything (except love) has lost its context. Los Angeles fills with sand; Paris fills with ice; the canals of Venice empty and the oceans retreat; a single train trip might take a lifetime; identities become interchangeable; everything eventually goes dark. Hardly anyone notices; everyone turns inward, consumed by obscure obsessions. Days Between Stations predicts, with eerie accuracy, the world we're living in now.

Giorni tra le stazioni

“Momenti perduti” è il romanzo d’esordio di Steve Erickson e già vi si riconoscono il suo stile e le sue ricorrenti ossessioni: il cinema e Hollywood, la sessualità e le travolgenti passioni d’amore, la sensazione di disastro incombente e il degrado inarrestabile dell’ambiente, l’intreccio temporale con vicende che saltano da un’epoca e da una generazione all’altra rimescolando e confondendo ripetutamente le carte.

Non è un libro facile: si potrebbe pensare che l’autore non sia ancora padrone dei troppi temi che mette giù apparentemente alla rinfusa, in un racconto che più volte durante il suo svolgimento sembra ripartire da zero costringendo il lettore a vertiginose e frammentarie ricostruzioni, ma non è così. Si tratta proprio della tecnica che Erickson è solito adottare, trascinando una trama concreta in una scia surreale di situazioni che prese singolarmente coinvolgono e si concretizzano, ma il cui assemblaggio è contraddittorio e sfuggente.

Al centro, o in uno dei centri, della narrazione si colloca “il più grande film di tutti i tempi” che un regista ossessionato dalla perfezione non è mai riuscito a completare e di cui cinefili altrettanto ossessionati sono da decenni alla ricerca febbrile della scena o del fotogramma mancante. Dall’altra parte dello specchio c’è una storia d’amore, triangolare ma tutt’altro che convenzionale, finché si produce uno scambio fra la pellicola con la scena del film e la ripresa amatoriale di una sequenza che racchiude il passato dell’amnesico Adrien/Michel (neanche i nomi hanno un valore univoco in questa storia!) e il mistero della sua infanzia.

E poi ci sono tanti viaggi, in treno ma non solo, poiché il titolo originale del romanzo (sacrificato nella traduzione italiana) è “Days Between Stations”, fra la California e Parigi, fra il villaggio immaginario di Wyndeaux sulla costa atlantica francese e Venezia, attraverso una geografia improbabile sia perché ricostruita in modo allucinato, sia perché il territorio sta progressivamente subendo una mutazione.

Benché la stesura del libro risalga agli anni ’80, un elemento che pervade l’atmosfera del racconto è l’incombente collasso del pianeta che i personaggi del romanzo vivono con rassegnato fatalismo, attraverso ripetuti e prolungati black-out, tempeste di sabbia, maree che si ritirano a perdita d’occhio lasciando paesaggi irreali, metropolitane ferme da mesi fra quel che resta di fatiscenti agglomerati urbani.

Il tema che spicca maggiormente in “Momenti perduti”, e in generale nella bibliografia dell’autore a partire da “Zeroville” il suo romanzo più noto e più riuscito, rimane la cinefilia nel mito di Hollywood ma anche del cinema francese di inizio ‘900, una fabbrica di sogni che per il visionario Erickson rappresenta la metafora della leggenda contemporanea che continua a generare allucinati mitomani, come buona parte dei personaggi di questo libro fra i quali certo non sfigurerebbe Vikar, l’ineffabile protagonista di Zeroville, l’uomo che porta tatuati sul cranio rasato Liz Taylor e Monty Clift in un’immagine di ”A Place in the Sun”.