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wynne_ronareads's review against another edition
2.0
What a SLOG. I wish there was a nicer way to put this. Mostly because Amelia Gray can write. She's chosen an interesting subject, an interesting time period, a fascinating tragedy. But I have like sixty pages left and I don't know that I'm honestly going to read them.
Gray's novel centers around the famed dancer, Isadora Duncan, who lost both her children right before the first World War when they drowned in an accident. Duncan was a woman ahead of her time, who essentially redefined modern dance. Her children were fathered by two different men, one of whom was Paris Singer, son of Isaac (the sewing machine magnate.) Both of them feature in this novel. Her sister ran a dance school in a rural-ish city in Germany, sometimes resentful of living in her sister's shadow (with a foot disability of all things) but still remained Isadora's fiercest protector and advocate. What a cast of characters!
Isadora Duncan had a serious career in dance, but her sexual conquests and "free-spiritedness" often seem to overshadow that legacy. She's a sort of Zelda Fitzgerald, if you will, a decade before Zelda took the world by storm.
SOUNDS AMAZING RIGHT?! Especially coupled with the fact that Gray has shown herself a young writer more than capable, with ethereal, layered prose and an eye for complex characters. In "Isadora" she's found said characters, even though there isn't a one of them very likable. Certainly she attempts to give us a little background for why each of them has their prickles. But ultimately it seems like they're just spoiled, narcissistic artist types with no sense of responsibility. And I've said it before but I'll say it again, I do not need my characters to be likable. I only need them to be complex and well written. Gray achieves that!
So what gives? For starters, her prose is plodding and indirect. The accident happens right from the jump, and through several well-drawn scenes you get a sense of your characters. So what if you're not exactly sure what the author is talking about or who is who yet, you've got a general grasp, you'll figure it out the more you read.
No. You won't. And what's worse, the accident is the only thing happening. I wish Isadora's steady mental decline and narcissistic antics were enough to keep me engaged, but they're not. The book plods along, giving dreamy, artsy-lit type sentences for hundreds and hundreds of pages. When I don't feel rooted to the story, because there isn't really a story AND none of the characters are likable, things start to feel tedious.
AnD THEn. Sally Sue presses her fingertips against a cold window pane, instead of, Sally Sue looked out the window. Billy Bob drank from the glass full of golden liquid, instead of, Billy Bob drank the lemonade.
It's relentless guys. I'm sorry. The Emperor has no clothes. About two hundred pages in I began to ask myself, WHY DOES THIS FEEL LIKE SUCH A CHORE? Then it hit me, especially at the end of her short chapters--Gray peppers us with out of control allusions and misty, dreamy like moments that are supposed to be Isadora's grief and failing mental state. But I ALREAdY don't know where she is and who she's with. I'm bored now. Bored and frustrated. And carrying a 350-page hardcover on the train.
At this point in my life I have little to no patience for a book that I can't read on the subway. I'm on the subway more than two hours a day every day. I should be able to read a frickin book. But over and over again I found myself getting drawn into a paragraph or two of "Isadora" only to moments later read entire pages unsure of what was happening. One of my most esteemed writing teachers used to always ask us during critiques, "It's pretty, but what does it mean?"
I'd say that question pretty much sums it up.
Gray's novel centers around the famed dancer, Isadora Duncan, who lost both her children right before the first World War when they drowned in an accident. Duncan was a woman ahead of her time, who essentially redefined modern dance. Her children were fathered by two different men, one of whom was Paris Singer, son of Isaac (the sewing machine magnate.) Both of them feature in this novel. Her sister ran a dance school in a rural-ish city in Germany, sometimes resentful of living in her sister's shadow (with a foot disability of all things) but still remained Isadora's fiercest protector and advocate. What a cast of characters!
Isadora Duncan had a serious career in dance, but her sexual conquests and "free-spiritedness" often seem to overshadow that legacy. She's a sort of Zelda Fitzgerald, if you will, a decade before Zelda took the world by storm.
SOUNDS AMAZING RIGHT?! Especially coupled with the fact that Gray has shown herself a young writer more than capable, with ethereal, layered prose and an eye for complex characters. In "Isadora" she's found said characters, even though there isn't a one of them very likable. Certainly she attempts to give us a little background for why each of them has their prickles. But ultimately it seems like they're just spoiled, narcissistic artist types with no sense of responsibility. And I've said it before but I'll say it again, I do not need my characters to be likable. I only need them to be complex and well written. Gray achieves that!
So what gives? For starters, her prose is plodding and indirect. The accident happens right from the jump, and through several well-drawn scenes you get a sense of your characters. So what if you're not exactly sure what the author is talking about or who is who yet, you've got a general grasp, you'll figure it out the more you read.
No. You won't. And what's worse, the accident is the only thing happening. I wish Isadora's steady mental decline and narcissistic antics were enough to keep me engaged, but they're not. The book plods along, giving dreamy, artsy-lit type sentences for hundreds and hundreds of pages. When I don't feel rooted to the story, because there isn't really a story AND none of the characters are likable, things start to feel tedious.
AnD THEn. Sally Sue presses her fingertips against a cold window pane, instead of, Sally Sue looked out the window. Billy Bob drank from the glass full of golden liquid, instead of, Billy Bob drank the lemonade.
It's relentless guys. I'm sorry. The Emperor has no clothes. About two hundred pages in I began to ask myself, WHY DOES THIS FEEL LIKE SUCH A CHORE? Then it hit me, especially at the end of her short chapters--Gray peppers us with out of control allusions and misty, dreamy like moments that are supposed to be Isadora's grief and failing mental state. But I ALREAdY don't know where she is and who she's with. I'm bored now. Bored and frustrated. And carrying a 350-page hardcover on the train.
At this point in my life I have little to no patience for a book that I can't read on the subway. I'm on the subway more than two hours a day every day. I should be able to read a frickin book. But over and over again I found myself getting drawn into a paragraph or two of "Isadora" only to moments later read entire pages unsure of what was happening. One of my most esteemed writing teachers used to always ask us during critiques, "It's pretty, but what does it mean?"
I'd say that question pretty much sums it up.
elizabethrichey's review against another edition
3.0
A very slow, very beautifully written, devastatingly sad character study of Isadora Duncan.
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