The attractions of each new ring are methodically peeled back to reveal an unsavoury, dangerous underbelly. The story has a bit of the feel of Dante’s Inferno, as each ring up gets progressively worse. When he finally does come across a solid lead on Marya’s whereabouts, he gets involved in a crime caper that doesn’t turn out well. Senlin is a bit of a stuffy Don Quixote figure, his naivete slowly chipped away by the people and experiences he encounters. What follows is a classic quest narrative, as Senlin must work his way up the rings to find his wife.His search is further complicated by the fact that he doesn’t have enough money to get back home, and that he and Marya planned to find a hotel when they arrived and so hadn’t made any reservations or plans about meeting spots. Unfortunately, Senlin loses sight of Marya at the ground level, and as he discovers from other travellers, groups that are separated in the Tower rarely find each other again. Their destination is the third ring, which is purported to have hotels and resorts and basically everything needed for a vacationer’s paradise.

Senlin has a tattered, dog-eared copy of the guidebook in his pocket and has spoken often to his students of the many wonders of its various “ring-doms.” Wealthy tourists can take an airship to an upper level and enjoy the view more frugal travellers like Senlin and Marya must start at the bottom and make their way up. In Senlin Ascends, mild-mannered schoolteacher Thomas Senlin takes his young wife Marya on the trip of a lifetime for their honeymoon: the much-acclaimed Tower of Babel. Senlin Ascends isn’t a book for everyone - but based on the reviews, for the right kind of reader, it is an unexpected, brilliant delight. The cover of my advance reading copy of Senlin Ascends includes a Goodreads review from a reader named Paul: “You need to read this! Don’t read the blurb, dive in blind.” I took his advice and dove in blind, but managed to read as far as I did only because I ended up reading a few of the glowing reviews mid-way through.

The books of babel by josiah bancroft