Eric
FYI this is a short-story collection, not a novel; the character cameos that bleed through a couple stories are so marginal they don't mean anything.
The first story ("The Feminist") was good, the second ("Pics") was okay but ended a little flat. I will say the texting dialogue in "Pics" is hilarious and pitch-perfect; it's actually the first page I flipped to in the bookstore and made me want to read the full book.
Each successive story in this collection is less impressive and more cringe than the last. The book is obviously supposed to be cringe, but I was cringing at the author's writing choices more than the characters' thoughts and actions.
"Our Dope Future" is a terrible cartoon version of a hustle-culture alpha male. This archetype should be so easy to critique, yet this story is just dumb.
The insane video-request description at the end of "Ahegao" was so long and over the top that it killed any honest reflection about how ruined Kant's sexuality had gotten from porn, instead making him sound like a fake 13 year old edgelord instead of anyone actually in his mid-30s.
And ending with a fake rejection letter from a fake publisher about the book itself is such a silly attempt to be cleverly meta and proactively self-criticizing: "You can't accuse me of sucking, because I'm admitting to it! In fact, maybe I was even trying to suck!" It's a scaredy-cat, have-it-both-ways defense tactic that insecure people deploy.
Starts to feel like a college-level creative writing assignment overall. Weird that this was longlisted for the National Book Award. If this even barely resembles how young people feel about relationships and sexuality in the 2020s, I feel sorry for them, they're doomed.
FYI this is a short-story collection, not a novel; the character cameos that bleed through a couple stories are so marginal they don't mean anything.
The first story ("The Feminist") was good, the second ("Pics") was okay but ended a little flat. I will say the texting dialogue in "Pics" is hilarious and pitch-perfect; it's actually the first page I flipped to in the bookstore and made me want to read the full book.
Each successive story in this collection is less impressive and more cringe than the last. The book is obviously supposed to be cringe, but I was cringing at the author's writing choices more than the characters' thoughts and actions.
"Our Dope Future" is a terrible cartoon version of a hustle-culture alpha male. This archetype should be so easy to critique, yet this story is just dumb.
The insane video-request description at the end of "Ahegao" was so long and over the top that it killed any honest reflection about how ruined Kant's sexuality had gotten from porn, instead making him sound like a fake 13 year old edgelord instead of anyone actually in his mid-30s.
And ending with a fake rejection letter from a fake publisher about the book itself is such a silly attempt to be cleverly meta and proactively self-criticizing: "You can't accuse me of sucking, because I'm admitting to it! In fact, maybe I was even trying to suck!" It's a scaredy-cat, have-it-both-ways defense tactic that insecure people deploy.
Starts to feel like a college-level creative writing assignment overall. Weird that this was longlisted for the National Book Award. If this even barely resembles how young people feel about relationships and sexuality in the 2020s, I feel sorry for them, they're doomed.
Really loved the setup of this novel, its incredibly well-imagined setting and its characters (at least all the non-rich ones), and the early depictions of summer camp life. The writing is intentionally suspenseful, with chapters ending on cliffhangers and the next chapter jumping to a different timeline and character’s point of view, making the book compulsive to keep reading. Because of all the timelines and perspectives, the story also feels very deep, lived-in and cinematic.
But once the girl’s disappearance and the (overlong) backstory of Alice and Peter are established across Parts I and II, the story becomes more than anything a police procedural, spending a lot of time with Judyta as she puts together the pieces of both the “current” case, of a missing 13-year-old girl, and the now-cold case of her older brother’s disappearance over a decade earlier.
It is also a stinging critique of “old money” families and how terrible they are in so many ways. On this theme I think the author is a little too heavy-handed (the rich men are, every one of them, emotionless blocks of wood); I think it would be a bit more effective if they weren’t such caricatures.
But I very much enjoyed all the more subtle ways the author gives real, nuanced empowerment to the various women in the story more than the men: Almost all of the book’s shifting perspectives are from women characters, despite plenty of men being part of the story, and the way the author imbues them all with unique examples of strength and unapologetic self-reliance is applaudable.
Takeaway line: ”The Hewitts don’t need to rely on anyone but themselves. / It’s the Van Laars, and families like them, who have always depended on others.” (453)
Really loved the setup of this novel, its incredibly well-imagined setting and its characters (at least all the non-rich ones), and the early depictions of summer camp life. The writing is intentionally suspenseful, with chapters ending on cliffhangers and the next chapter jumping to a different timeline and character’s point of view, making the book compulsive to keep reading. Because of all the timelines and perspectives, the story also feels very deep, lived-in and cinematic.
But once the girl’s disappearance and the (overlong) backstory of Alice and Peter are established across Parts I and II, the story becomes more than anything a police procedural, spending a lot of time with Judyta as she puts together the pieces of both the “current” case, of a missing 13-year-old girl, and the now-cold case of her older brother’s disappearance over a decade earlier.
It is also a stinging critique of “old money” families and how terrible they are in so many ways. On this theme I think the author is a little too heavy-handed (the rich men are, every one of them, emotionless blocks of wood); I think it would be a bit more effective if they weren’t such caricatures.
But I very much enjoyed all the more subtle ways the author gives real, nuanced empowerment to the various women in the story more than the men: Almost all of the book’s shifting perspectives are from women characters, despite plenty of men being part of the story, and the way the author imbues them all with unique examples of strength and unapologetic self-reliance is applaudable.
Takeaway line: ”The Hewitts don’t need to rely on anyone but themselves. / It’s the Van Laars, and families like them, who have always depended on others.” (453)
Really loved the setup of this novel, its incredibly well-imagined setting and its characters (at least all the non-rich ones), and the early depictions of summer camp life. The writing is intentionally suspenseful, with chapters ending on cliffhangers and the next chapter jumping to a different timeline and character’s point of view, making the book compulsive to keep reading. Because of all the timelines and perspectives, the story also feels very deep, lived-in and cinematic.
But once the girl’s disappearance and the (overlong) backstory of Alice and Peter are established across Parts I and II, the story becomes more than anything a police procedural, spending a lot of time with Judyta as she puts together the pieces of both the “current” case, of a missing 13-year-old girl, and the now-cold case of her younger brother’s disappearance over a decade earlier.
It is also a stinging critique of “old money” families and how terrible they are in so many ways. On this theme I think the author is a little too heavy-handed (the rich men are, every one of them, emotionless blocks of wood); I think it would be a bit more effective if they weren’t such caricatures.
But I very much enjoyed all the more subtle ways the author gives real, nuanced empowerment to the various women in the story more than the men: Almost all of the book’s shifting perspectives are from women characters, despite plenty of men being part of the story, and the way the author imbues them all with unique examples of strength and unapologetic self-reliance is applaudable.
Takeaway line: ”The Hewitts don’t need to rely on anyone but themselves. / It’s the Van Laars, and families like them, who have always depended on others.” (453)
Really loved the setup of this novel, its incredibly well-imagined setting and its characters (at least all the non-rich ones), and the early depictions of summer camp life. The writing is intentionally suspenseful, with chapters ending on cliffhangers and the next chapter jumping to a different timeline and character’s point of view, making the book compulsive to keep reading. Because of all the timelines and perspectives, the story also feels very deep, lived-in and cinematic.
But once the girl’s disappearance and the (overlong) backstory of Alice and Peter are established across Parts I and II, the story becomes more than anything a police procedural, spending a lot of time with Judyta as she puts together the pieces of both the “current” case, of a missing 13-year-old girl, and the now-cold case of her younger brother’s disappearance over a decade earlier.
It is also a stinging critique of “old money” families and how terrible they are in so many ways. On this theme I think the author is a little too heavy-handed (the rich men are, every one of them, emotionless blocks of wood); I think it would be a bit more effective if they weren’t such caricatures.
But I very much enjoyed all the more subtle ways the author gives real, nuanced empowerment to the various women in the story more than the men: Almost all of the book’s shifting perspectives are from women characters, despite plenty of men being part of the story, and the way the author imbues them all with unique examples of strength and unapologetic self-reliance is applaudable.
Takeaway line: ”The Hewitts don’t need to rely on anyone but themselves. / It’s the Van Laars, and families like them, who have always depended on others.” (453)
It's rare that a book has me actually crying, but this book is just heartbreaking. Layer upon layer of family members quietly neglecting the simplest showings of care and recognition in each other, who are starved for the smallest gesture of empathy. It is lovingly written and worth reading. My heart breaks for Hannah most of all. What guts you is how true it feels to families you've known in life.
It's rare that a book has me actually crying, but this book is just heartbreaking. Layer upon layer of family members quietly neglecting the simplest showings of care and recognition in each other, who are starved for the smallest gesture of empathy. It is lovingly written and worth reading. My heart breaks for Hannah most of all. What guts you is how true it feels to families you've known in life.
