I just read “Ghostwritten” by David Mitchell, a novel told by nine narrators in nine parts, each tangentially and mysteriously linked to the others.  The danger of structuring a book like this, of course, is that one voice will dominate the others.  And, indeed, while all the stories were fine one was hallucinogenically vivid: the account of a British banker in Hong Kong whose personal and professional lives become unraveled.  One summer morning instead of boarding the ferry from Lantau, where he lives, he wanders the coastline of the island and, basically, goes insane.

Although I’ve never been to Lantau (or to Hong Kong) the story so vividly conjures the heat and sun and dust and scrub of the place that I recall it the way I recall a place I know well.  No picture I’ve found of Lantau so far matches the intensity of what I’ve imagined.