How long does it take to read The Life of Insects?
The Life of Insects by Victor Pelevin takes about 3 hours 17 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.
About 3 hours 17 minutes
A weekend read
First published 1996. 179 pages, about 49,225 words.
7 days at 30 minutes a day
Estimate based on 275 words per page.
At other speeds
| Slow, 150 words a minute | 5 hours 28 minutes |
| Average, 250 words a minute | 3 hours 17 minutes |
| Fast, 400 words a minute | 2 hours 3 minutes |
The page count is the median across 9 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.
About the book
Set in a crumbling resort hotel on the Black Sea, the novel follows the misadventures of the Russian duo Arnold and Arthur and the khaki-clad Sam, a visiting American. The twist is that these characters are depicted alternately as human beings and as insects: now they are humans with buggy qualities; now they are insects that walk and talk. As they forage, quarrel, joke, and suck blood in the squalid rooms of the old hotel - and on the bodies of their hosts - they invariably get into trouble. In one chapter, a couple of hemp bugs suddenly find themselves being smoked in somebody else's pipe; in another, two moths flitting around a streetlight discuss the meaning of life in Beckett-like dialogue.
Subjects: Insects, Punk culture, Russia, Fiction, Fiction, general, Fiction, fantasy, contemporary
