Swallow

Thomas (The White Hotel) calls this an ""improvisational novel.'' It is set at a fictional Olympiad in Finland, where competitors spontaneously narrate long, intricate tales that are judged for artistic quality. PW gave Swallow sevens and eights, remarking, ``The sometimes slight fictions cannot always support the controlling intention, but the ambitious enterprise is refreshingly imaginative, a nimble exercise in literary levitation.'' December