Book Review: Last Impressions by Joseph Kertes

If you’re unfamiliar with the word sonder, it’s the realization that every passerby has an entire life filled with experiences as varied and complex as your own. It’s a profound concept and the first word that sprang to mind when I finished Last Impressions by Joseph Kertes.

Alternating between Nazi-occupied Hungary during the Second World War and present-day Toronto, Last Impressions simultaneously peers into the traumatic past of Zoltan Beck while navigating the last few months of his life as interpreted through the eyes of his son, Ben.

Zoltan Beck, patriarch and widower, craves nothing more than a simple life. In fact, the less thinking there is to do about anything, the better. As we’re taken along on the journey through his heart-wrenching experiences in a Hungarian work-camp during the Second World War, it becomes clear why a simple life is exactly what he wishes for. 

Kertes’ character descriptions are where the humour of this book springs to life. Against a tragic backdrop he paints a host of characters with delightfully specific eccentricities and mannerisms. Kertes’ ability to home in on the idiosyncrasies of both main and incidental characters creates the kind of vivid world in which readers can stretch their legs and walk around.

As I read Last Impressions, I felt a visceral awareness of the notion that one can never wholly know how the people in our lives, especially our parents, become the people we know and (sometimes reluctantly) love. As Ben views his father through his own, often frustrated eyes, he is unable to perceive the intricate past that created the stubborn man before him. As readers, we’re given the keys to the castle: a glimpse into Zoltan’s past, and the pieces of the puzzle that Ben may never truly know. Last Impressions deftly captures the profundity of the fact that when a person’s life ends, what remains is our own impression of who we knew them to be.

If you’re in the mood for a book that will gently place a thumb print on your heart, pick up Last Impressions by Joseph Kertes.