You can watch the video recording of this episode on and while you’re there, subscribe to the and stayed tuned for the –Tuesday, September 4th at 10am–which will feature Ryan Chapman (author ofÌęÌęand several other ventures) and will cover the final section of the novel.

As always, Fox (and all the previous Two Month Review titles) is available for 20% off through our Just use the code 2MONTH at checkout.

Feel free to comment on this episode—or on the book in general—either on this post, or at the official

Follow ÌęÌęand for more thoughts and information about upcoming guests.

And you can find all the Two Month Review posts by clicking here. And be sure to It really helps people to discover the podcast.

This week’s intro music is “We Don’t Have a Sail but We Have a Rudder” by El Ten Eleven, with the theme music ofÌęLife with MikeyÌęserving as the outro track. (Please check out for this Michael J. Fox movie. It’s . . . unsettling. The early 90s were a time.)

Part I, “A Story about How Stories Come to Be Written,” opens with a historical and philosophical dive into a series of stories interrelated through real and fictional figures and events regarding the creation a particular story and stories that sprout off from it. Ultimately, this opening creates a formal model for the rest of the chapter, as Ugresic complicates the stories from the opening through the narrator’s doctorate research, the stories of her mother aligned against the wife, and the stories of the children and partners of all the authors involved. As the section closed each addition that Ugresic made built upon that initial weaving of stories in both content and form. Into the second section of Dubravka Ugresic’s Fox a rhythm of formality coalesces.

In “Literature and Geography,” the opening section of Part II, the narrator sits and talks with a man on a train about his favorite books which all happen to be thriller novels that take place in what he describes as ‘exotic locations’ comprised of South Asian and East Asian locations. He argues that good thrillers can’t take place in nature, for a reason I haven’t been able to construct yet (help me out here folks). The narrator then begins a meta discussion with the reader on the relationship between location, topography, geography and plot:

But I was skeptical as to how meaningful topography (and geography) could be for a plot as it unfolds; how essential is it to the story? How much do the two elements—plot and topography—work in tandem and how much are they at odds? Will any link between them occur to the readers only later, in their interpretation? I wondered then what role chance plays in all this, and whether an “urban scenography” helps the story or hurts it. Because if the plot locality is a “strong place” (one that is, at the same time, a cultural text) while the event is “weak,” our entire literary effort could end up as some sort of fictionalized travel guide. If, on the other hand, the event is “strong” and the place “weak,” the reader might rightfully wonder what point there was to insisting on the topography. I hadn’t given this much thought before. Now, when these two things, the event and the place where the event occurs, are bouncing and colliding in front of my nose like balls in the hands of a slipshod juggler, I am thinking about it. I feel sure they are essentially irreconcilable, that between them—between my place and my events—there rules a thematic and stylistic incompatibility. Linking a fictional literary text and its geography is most often “artistically” risky. One is tempted to do so by the hope—supported by nothing—that these “partners” will conform to one another and join in a harmonious marriage, like orange juice and the ice cube.

But as this section ends and “The Hotel” begins Ugresic changes her style to mirror the thematic model established in the opening of “Literature and Geography.” While she previously focused on weaving stories within stories and establishing a tight relationship between the creation of literature and personal experience–which she still does through borrowing the Widow’s stories–this new approach highlights an obsession with the layouts and histories of the places she visits and her narrator’s relationship to it as established through the conversation with the man on the train and the series of thoughts afterwards. Her narrator is obsessed with architecture and physical history of space as she traverses the Grand Hotel Santa Lucia, or Pompeii, or the Gran Caffe Gambrinus. Further building this momentum from the opening section, the conference that she attends addresses the intersection of place, politics, and individual narratives in regards to the immigrant populations that are being expelled from one place and being rejected by another and through the frequency by which sections in this chapter are named after places.

In many ways, Ugresic answered the rhetorical questions posed by the narrator following the conversation on the train. The topography (and geography) became essential to the story through the narrator’s obsession with it. We readers respect the beauty, history, and layout because she indulged herself in it so much. At the most rudimentary, plot and topography worked in tandem at times as her decision to visit Naples–a whim at first–presented the narrator with an opportunity to meet and meld with the Widow. As highlighted by Ellen during last week’s podcast, some of the most insightful and intense moments of this section are their interactions at the conference and throughout Naples and if the narrator decided not go to Naples she would have never crossed paths with the Widow. Plot and place are (possibly) at odds because these places don’t immediately lend anything to what happens to the narrator–the plot and topography worked because Ugresic made it work. For example, Pompeii’s history never overshadowed the narrator’s wit nor Ugresic’s prose, but neither overshadowed its historical importance. The relationship between plot and topography created an opportunity for Ugresic to shift her stylistic frame and explore different ideas in different ways.

What is a Fox?

Living up to its reputation, the ‘fox’ inÌęFox spans a number of uses and interpretations, from age-old Japanese myths regarding fox spirits, to fables, to cultural attitudes, and, what Ugresic is potentially addressing, the fox-y ways of writers. As she weaves story into story we fall upon Russian writer Boris Pilnyak in Japan, who writes: “The fox is the totem of cunning and betrayal; if the spirit of the fox enters a person, then that person’s tribe is accursed.”

Barely a full page into the novel and we encounter our titular creature, mentioned in an aside of an author in an account by an author. Her introduction to what I assumed was a key thematic element surprised me for a bit as I’ve been still coming down from our reviews of Georgi Gospodinov’sÌęThe Physics of Sorrow and it’s up-front use of Minotaur imagery, and was expecting more from the titular animal’s arrival. But I quickly started to see the shape of the fox develop in a beautifully dark way.

As Ugresic guides us through–in no actual order–Pilnyak’s writing of “A Story About How Stories Come to Be Written,” Tagaki’s voyeuristic piece of his Russian wife, research into the possible actual author and work that inspired Pilnyak’s work, the narrator’s–who I presume is Urgresic–experiences conducting research on Pilnyak, the experiences of the narrator’s mother, and Japanese author Yuriko Miyamoto’s story of Pilnyak’s attempted rape these stories are all woven so tightly and effortlessly that she’s guided us into the relationship between all these layers on a quantum level to a point where it becomes difficult to find where we started, where we end, and what exactly we traversed.

In many ways, it comes back to the fox. In between the story weaving, Ugresic returns to the fox, stating, coldly, that “The fox is the writer’s totem[,]” and she goes into more detail of what this means:

In mythology and folklore the fox’s symbolic semantic field presupposes cunning, betrayal, wile, sycophancy, deceit, mendacity, hypocrisy, duplicity, selfishness, sneakiness, arrogance, avarice, corruption, carnality, vindictiveness, and reclusiveness. In myth and folktale the fox is most often associated with a “lowdown” enterprise. The fox meets frequently with affliction, and is thus consigned to loserdom, its personal attributes preventing contiguity with higher mythological beings. In any symbolic reading, the fox is situated among the lowly mythological kin [. . .] In both western and eastern imaginations the fox is invariably a trickster, a shyster, yet also appears as a demon, a witch, an “evil bride” or—as in Chinese mythology—the animal form of a deceased human soul [. . .] the fox is a master of transformation and the art of illusion, a symbol of the death-dealing female Eros, a female demon.

Beautifully, Ugresic develops this clear understanding of the fox before throwing us into the interwoven mess of writers writing about writers and stories and experiences. In the mess, especially as the narrator goes into details about her mother’s relationship, I forgot how I arrived to that point but had the lingering feeling like there was something I needed to keep an eye on–which was, inevitably, the fox and it’s place in the story. And in returning to the fox, Ugresic gave me the high of that ‘a-ha’ reading moment. “A Story About How Stories Come to Be,” the Pilnyak short story, is a story by a fox (about foxes). Tanizaki’sÌęNaomi–the speculated inspiration to Pilnyak’s work–is a story by a fox. Miyamoto’sÌęMileposts is a collection by a fox.

Foxes, through Ugresic’s eyes, are those deceitful, voyeuristic scavengers of the world around them and who better to be possessed by the fox spirit (and bring disaster to their tribes) than authors. While Chad’s students may have expressed doubts into the pervasiveness of the fox throughout the work, I believe that Ugresic is laying the foundation for a piece that explores the literary world through individual moments and draws on the fox to address the nature of writing–all through lush prose and insightful research. So, to answer the question: yes, Fox is fox-y enough.

This week, as we read “A Balancing Art,” I’ll be looking more into the formal qualities of Ugresic’s work as she explores Italy, conferences, and impostor syndrome.

You can watch the video recording of this episode on and while you’re there, subscribe to the and stop by at 9pm Eastern to discuss the first half of Part II ofÌęFox, “A Balancing Art,” pages 46-75.

As always, Fox (and all the previous Two Month Review titles) is available for 20% off through our Just use the code 2MONTH at checkout.

Feel free to comment on this episode—or on the book in general—either on this post, or at the official

Follow ÌęandÌę for more thoughts and information about upcoming guests. You can also find and on Twitter. If you’re in the Chicagoland area, please visit on Milwaukee and tell them that the Two Month Review sent you. (Or order a book from them online.)

And you can find all the Two Month Review posts by clicking here. And be sure to It really helps people to discover the podcast.

There are two bits of music on this episode–the first is “What Does the Fox Say?,” which was Tom’s “brilliant” suggestion. The outro music is more Michael J. Fox gold, this time fromÌęThe Secret of My Success.Ìę

You can watch the video recording of this episode on and while you’re there, subscribe to the and stop by next Monday, June 18th at 9pm Eastern to discuss Part I ofÌęFox, pages 1-45. (If you want to read “A Story About How Stories Come to Be Written” by Pilnyak, just email me.)

As always, Fox (and all the previous Two Month Review titles) is available for 20% off through our Just use the code 2MONTH at checkout.

Feel free to comment on this episode—or on the book in general—either on this post, or at the official

Follow and for more thoughts and information about upcoming guests.

And you can find all the Two Month Review posts by clicking here. And be sure to It really helps people to discover the podcast.

There are two bits of music on this episode–the first is , which was recommended by long-time listener (and guest!) Caitlin Luce Baker, and the second is inspired by Brian’s comment about Michael J. Fox.

. . .

. . .

. . .

For whatever reason, I can’t get this video to embed. Either I’m an idiot (ding! ding! ding!) or the new website is fighting against embedded videos. (Probably an idiot.) Regardless, you can watch it all .

We got some solid feedback for this episode–people thought we were having almost too much fun–and I’ve been getting a lot of requests for the Pilnyak story. Feel free to email me if you’d like to read that before next week’s episode, which will cover Part I (pages 1-45) of Ugresic’sÌę.Ìę

And if you need a copy, your local bookstore will likely have one, or you can order from us directly and use the code 2MONTH at checkout for 20% off.

UPDATE: I figured it out!

Another tricky treasure from an internationally renowned author.

Ugresic has been in exile from her native Croatia since the region emerged as a country after the breakup of Yugoslavia. A vocal critic of nationalism, she was, she says, branded a “whore, a witch, and a traitor.” It’s that second slur that is most intriguing when it comes to reading the author’s work. InÌęBaba Yaga Laid an EggÌę(2010), she used a magical crone from Slavic folklore as a lens through which to view contemporary women’s lives. Here, she takes inspiration in the vulpine creature who gives this new book its name. As a mythic figure, the fox takes on and sheds attributes as he—or she—travels across cultures, but one characteristic seems to remain constant: The fox is an ambivalent type. By making the fox a sort of mascot to the first part of her novel, a section called “A Story about How Stories Come to Be Written,” Ugresic is creating an affinity between the writer and the trickster. Even at her most straightforward, Ugresic is a sly storyteller, and here she is using every trick in the postmodernist playbook. Indeed, there are moments when it seems like she’s pulling a fast one even when she isn’t. For example, a reader who isn’t knowledgeable about early-20th-century Russian literature might be forgiven for thinkingÌęOkay! An American NovelÌęby Boris Pilnyak is an invention simply because that title is just too perfect. IfÌęOkay!Ìęis Ugresic’s creation, it’s a clever one. But the reader who bothers to Google is in for the delightful discovery that both Pilnyak and his “American novel” are real. Then we’re left to wonder what true and false mean in fiction anyway, a question Ugresic complicates by using a first-person narrator and autobiographical detail. The translators deserves special mention, too. “The fox meets frequently with affliction, and is thus consigned to loserdom, its personal attributes preventing contiguity with higher mythological beings.” The juxtaposition of “loserdom” and “contiguity” is not only funny; it also captures the high-low essence of Ugresic’s style.

Brilliant and laugh-out-loud funny.

As with the last season, we’ll be broadcasting these first live on YouTube. That way, if you’re reading along and want to get in on the conversation, you can post comments and questions, which we’ll reply to live. (One facet of this project is the idea that it’s a sort of Internet-enabled book club.) I’ll post these recordings here on Three Percent every Tuesday, and then, on Thursday, we’ll release the podcast version. So, you can watch live, watch later, or listen whenever!

Just so you have all the details, here’s the main , which you can subscribe to, here’s where will take place, and here’s the like to the .

Given the structure ofÌęFox, this should be a great season to dip in and out of. The novel is a singularÌęnovel, but each of the sections could theoretically stand alone. So if you’re not caught up, you can still tune in for our jokes and stories and observations.

Also, you can get 20% off ofÌęFoxÌęby ordering and using the code 2MONTH at checkout.

Here’s the full schedule with the YouTube dates, podcast dates, and section of the book being covered. Hope you can join it and follow along!

6/11 (6/14): Introduction

6/18 (6/21): Part I (pgs 1-45)

6/25 (6/28): Part II (46-75)

7/2 (7/5): Part II (75-109)

7/9 (7/12): Part III (110-144)

7/16 (7/19): Part III (145-183)

7/23 (7/25): Part IV (184-235)

7/30 (8/2): Part V (236-257)

8/6 (8/9): Part VI (258-308)

Plus, if you join us tonight (or listen on Thursday), you’ll find out what book we’ll be covering this fall. It’s the first non-Open Letter title, and one that’s big, intimidating, and incredibly beloved. Enjoy the podcast, and be sure and get a copy ofÌęFox!