#BookReview: Less - Andrew Sean Greer

Rating:

4/5 Book Emojis!

 

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Format Used: 

Paperback

Publisher - Hachette India 

Pages - 264

*Note: The views below are unbiased and solely my own. Thanks to the publisher (Hachette India) for providing me a copy for an honest review. Part of #HachettePride campaign.

Review:

“Where was he? Somewhere in there he lost the first phase of youth, like the first phase of a rocket; it had fallen, depleted, behind him. And here was the second. And last. He swore he would not give it to anyone; he would enjoy it. He would enjoy it alone. But: how to live alone and yet not be alone?” 

Less by Andrew Sean Greer is a book about a 49-year-old American writer who goes on a journey across the world in order to avoid his ex-boyfriend's wedding, while making the most of his life before stepping into his 50s. Written in third person, this book is narrated by an observer of the protagonist Arthur Less, in a wonderfully hilarious tone that subtly jolts your heart with poignant undertones.

I started this book on a light-hearted note, based on reviews from others, and laughed with every page until I reached half-way. This was when the book started gaining content mass and intensity: with vigor and passionate writing facaded as humor. As a queer man who reads between the lines and [unfortunately] is known to feel too deeply, I found the character of Arthur very endearing and most definitely resonating with his unspoken existential crisis that lurks unconsciously inside the psyche of a middle-aged gay man and my personal quarter-life crisis.

The story will make a casual reader enjoy the book thoroughly while making the sensitive absorb the deep emotions that lay within the writer's mind. As from what I've learnt from his interviews, the author wrote the main character based off of his personal traits, but ended up quite independent. However, the writing never fails to reveal the deepest anxieties and the low-lying fear of dying alone that Arthur thinks about but never mentions in the book. All the events, the places, the countries and characters in the book feel extremely real which is why they strike so strongly throughout the book, making it an empathetic journey that we take in each airport and hotel room with the clueless but innocently pure Less. After every few pages, I couldn't help but associate each new character with a person, a feeling and a moment from personal experience I've had in life, so it took me more than a couple of days to fully immerse myself in this otherwise "easy-read," while looking at my old photos and sobbing over them (!).

With a stone to my heart, I'll take off one star from a perfect rating for the minor inconsistency of narration in a few dozen pages that even though is the narrator's personal character development, feels like a very slight prick for this innocent genius of a novel. The ending of the book is so perfect and magnificent that I think no one could've ever imagined being deceived by an innocent and cute cover, that bad.

Conclusion: This book should be a movie. It's for all ages and it will be a contemporary classic must-watch tear-jerker rom-com for the pure soul's sombre pleasure. Definitely recommend to everyone.

#BookReview: Sing Unburied Sing - Jesmyn Ward

Rating:

2.75/5 Book Emojis!

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Format Used: 

Paperback

Publisher - Bloomsbury India 

Pages - 292

*Note: The views below are unbiased and solely my own.

Review:

“Sorrow is food swallowed too quickly, caught in the throat, making it nearly impossible to breathe.” 

Sing, Unburied, Sing is the story of a young black boy named Jojo, in rural Mississippi with his meth addict mother Leonie, his Mam and Pop, and his younger sister Michaela whose lives get further complicated after they set on a ride to receive their father Michael from the Parchman prison. As we go through the book, we come across every character's story associated to the place.

Honestly, I don't understand how this book won the National Book Award for fiction as it was such a waste of idea. The concept was so magnificent but to see the author drag it through the sewers was painful through the course of these 292 pages. The first two chapters struck such a wonderful note that I hoped would resonate throughout, which ended up being my own wailing for it to be over. Jojo and Pop's story was the only one worth my attention but the author decided to run us over with the bumpy car ride and about a 100 pages of a little girl puking.

Ward fails to deliver a power tale with her inconsistent writing and overcompensating for the low points in the story with poor poetic prose (can't believe I'm wording it like that). The moment the reader thinks this story can be saved, the author decides to introduce paranormal content by the final few chapters, baffling my last ounce of sanity I had gathered to finish the book. The third last chapter brings hyperboles and dramatic exploration of death with paranormal devices, written fairly well. However, it was so inconsistently given way in the story that I wondered if she commissioned someone else to finish the book for her, as it was highly misrepresentative of the overall tone of the book.

By the end of the story, I was amused, yet disappointed at Jesmyn for playing so loosely with important characters and stories like these with inconsistent highs and lows.

Conclusion: This book is written as if Tayari Jones had Bipolar Disorder. If you're into that, I wouldn't stop you without saying that you can rather read the stable and real Tayari Jones instead of putting yourself through this (unless your standards are circling the drain and you liked this book already).

#BookReview: Adults - Emma Jane Unsworth

Rating:

5/5 Book Emojis!

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Format Used: 

Paperback

Publisher - HarperCollins India 

Pages - 345

*Note: I received an Advance Review Copy (ARC) of this book from the publisher HarperCollins India, for an honest review. The views below are unbiased and solely my own.

Review:

"“Oh, my darling," she says, into my hair. "At least I only had to try to look like Twiggy. You've got to sing and dance and fuck and work and mother and sparkle and equalize and not complain and be beautiful and love your imperfections and stay strong and show your vulnerability and bake and box and pull fucking port. It's much too much.” ”

Adults is simply a story about just a dirty, pervy, neurotic woman named Jenny McLaine in her 30s who is so oblivious to stick to the expected "lady-like" version of herself. What makes this book a true ingenious work of hilarious contemporary fiction, is the the clever wit, snarky observations and the relatable uncertainty that adulthood brings about.

Jenny has no clue about life and that's what draws the reader to her. How a woman navigates through the time of her life when she's expected to be married with a bunch of kids running about, as a free-willed and unfiltered trainwreck. Jenny is neurotically attached to an Instagram influencer because, according to my perspective as a psychologist, she thinks being followed by someone as known as her, adds a little more meaning and flavour to her life. It's actually something a lot of us [unhealthily] dealing with the struggles in our lives can relate to: putting out an inflated and exaggerated version of our lives on social media just to seem likeable and desired. To look like our lives are just as fun and interesting as anyone with a wider following.

But, that's not the only reason why I think this book is a genius work of a (and I say this in the most admiring way possible) mad mad woman is how this book is steered wherever life takes Jenny and we are just as clueless as she is, making this book highly entertaining and an excellent journey of interesting humour. All of this is to the point where I honestly want to sit down with Jenny, pounding red wine, and laugh my worries away. Not only does she seek validation through physical comfort and sex (well, mood) she doesn't understand how her life can slowly implode as a result of her reckless impulsivity. And that, is a journey Emma takes us through, for which I'm so grateful.


Conclusion: If you like the show Fleabag and movies like Frances Ha(2012), Amélie(2001), Trainwreck(2015) you will absolutely adore this book just as much as me. This book is hilarious and witty enough that I read it all in Phoebe Waller Bridge's accent in my head and laughed hysterically in the metro with no fucks to give. This is also a must read for every true feminist who empathises with the madness of adulthood, and simply for everyone who has at least once in their lives said "you know what? fuck it."

PS, I really think the negative reviews are from people who're conservatively stepped over by the mindset that a woman should be lady-like and well mannered. Trust me, if Jenny were a man, this book would be a movie by now.