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3.08 AVERAGE
3.08 AVERAGE
You know how sometimes you're reading a book, and you get halfway (or so) through it, and you realize that you're not particularly enjoying it because you don't like any of the characters and it's a pervasively unhappy book that you know isn't going to get any happier, but you're halfway through it already, and that's too far to give up, so you just keep slogging through it until you finally, doggedly, reach the end a month later? And then it is over, and you're not glad you read it, you're just relieved it's finally over? Yeah. It's very well-written, though.
Disappointing. Very disappointing.
When I think of scoliosis and coming-of-age, my mind (because I'm old) goes to Judy Blume's Deenie. This book, set in the Soviet Union in the 1980s, doesn't replace that association. If anything, there's less here about both the scoliosis and about life in Moscow than there should be. For younger readers, those who came of age after the wall fell and Yeltsin took over, there are things that just won't make sense, like the endless lines for things or the specialized schools or how difficult intellectuals or Jews (or Jewish intellectuals) had it.
What could have been a good both about either ended up being a bland blend.
When I think of scoliosis and coming-of-age, my mind (because I'm old) goes to Judy Blume's Deenie. This book, set in the Soviet Union in the 1980s, doesn't replace that association. If anything, there's less here about both the scoliosis and about life in Moscow than there should be. For younger readers, those who came of age after the wall fell and Yeltsin took over, there are things that just won't make sense, like the endless lines for things or the specialized schools or how difficult intellectuals or Jews (or Jewish intellectuals) had it.
What could have been a good both about either ended up being a bland blend.
A story about a 6 year old Russian Jewish girl about to start school who is suddenly diagnosed with scoliosis. Instead of her planned life course, she goes to a treatment-oriented boarding school. The book follows her through to age 14, skipping several years here and there, showing her complex relationships with her family and friends and the treatments she endures. A coming of age story.
I just couldn't get into this novel about a Russian girl with scoliosis.
Nope. I ain't got time for this MFA nonsense. I just really, really dislike literary floof. So many words but so little actual fucking story.