Reviews tagging 'Incest'

An interesting story and beautiful writing, but it didn’t really do much for me. I think part of the issue is that I just finished last year’s Booker prize island book, The Colony, right before this one, and the former is simply so much stronger. I found myself (perhaps unfairly) comparing the two, and I didn’t think This Other Eden had anything new to say, lacking the finesse and layered nuance I loved in The Colony. Maybe this book could have been structured differently? I enjoyed the paragraphs where we’d explore “an artifact” or piece of art with 50-100 years distance from the action of the novels, I feel like the author could have used that more. I leave this feeling underwhelmed, I understand why this made it onto the Booker longlist but don’t think it has that “edge” or groundbreaking vision that most nominated books have.

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serendipitysbooks's review against another edition

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emotional reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

This Other Eden tells the story of a community on Apple Island and its eventual destruction. It is inspired by actual events. In 1792 a formerly enslaved man and his Irish born wife set up home on a small island just off the coast of Maine, and begin to establish an apple orchard. Over a hundred years later their descendants remain, along with some newer arrivals, ekeing out a subsistence living. They are poor but seemingly happy. Eventually their community attracts attention from the mainland, initially a well-meaning missionary with a white saviour complex. Racism combines with the eugenics movement and self-interest, and the state evicts the residents from the island committing some of them to insane asylums.

I expected to like this book a lot more than I did. The author focuses on the community as a whole so we meet a lot of characters, but don’t necessarily spend much time with any of them. This and the fact that the story is told from a third-person perspective meant I didn’t form an emotional connection with any of the characters, and I missed that. The book is structured in three parts. The first part is the story of the island and its inhabitants. Next we follow Ethan, a young boy who can pass for white and has a talent for art, who has been selected for an opportunity on the mainland. Then we return to the island to witness the destruction of the community. I felt Ethan’s section wasn’t well integrated. I would have loved to have seen more of Ethan and to have heard from him directly. And then there is the lack of resolution. Since Harding is focussed on the community once it is disestablished the novel essentially ends. But I was craving more and would have loved to know what happened to at least some of the residents, to have followed them on their post-island life.

I did like the fact that this novel shines a light on a little known event in American history. I appreciated the empathetic way the characters and their lives were sketched. I also liked the balance. Harding highlighted the wrongness of eugenics and of the state’s actions but didn’t neglect problematic aspects of life on Apple Island, such as incest and its impacts.

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haileyspencer's review against another edition

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relaxing slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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carrieclothwright's review

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challenging dark reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

A tragic story told with resonant echoing prose.

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cassandrahcooke's review

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challenging dark informative tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? N/A
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.25

I was fortunate to receive an audiobook ARC on NetGalley for this novel.

This book was atmospheric in its contents, creating the world using heavily descriptive sentences. While reading the first half of the novel, the descriptive devices truly made you feel the oppression of poverty faces with the main characters and the families residing on the island. We learn later throughout the novel what it means to not be "purely white" and the way they viewed, despite the islanders residing on Apple Island for multiple generations while somehow surviving tragedy, storms, starvation, and lack of supplies.

What made this novel stand out was the journaled references to art and documents to that time prior to relocation of settlers, and how these references hardly captured the truth behind their stories.

Although the story and characters are fictional, the events that take place are non fictional, so this provides insight to lives and experiences through a new lens.

This was a slower read, not so heavily plot-based or character driven, but more so written to experience what life could have been like for the families living on Apple Island. The descriptiveness both helped and hindered the novel at times, making a certain scene feel drawn out, but overall set the tone of the environment

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