Reviews - The Incendiaries

1.62k reviews for:

You don’t realize how incredible this book is until you turn the last page and it’s finished. The story follows 3 different viewpoints, Phoebe the Korean-American student grieving her mother’s death, Will her American boyfriend running from his poor past, and John Leal the head of a fanatical religious group on the college campus. The story describes each characters journey as Phoebe gets closer to joining the cult run by John Leal, and making a decision she will regret for her life. The books builds so quietly that I didn’t realize how enraptured I was until the last couple of chapters. Would definitely recommend.

mandy_88's review against another edition

3.0

This was a weird one for me. It had some very poignant moments and I really did want to like it. Ultimately, though, I think it spent more time trying to be clever and artsy than it did trying to be a good story. All of the characters are unlikable. All of them. The story goes everywhere and nowhere all at once. It tries to address so many different themes that none of them really stands out. A few sentences, upon closer inspection, were just strings of profound-sounding words that had no discernable meaning. It ends as if the author just suddenly ran out of words. And I still don't like reading books without quotation marks. I gave it a real, proper try and attempted to get into the spirit of it and what it was trying to convey but the truth is it just makes for uncomfortable reading. It's not that I couldn't figure it out. It's just frustrating to slog through. All of that said, I think where this author really shines is capturing the fickle and imperfect nature of human beings. There were some very deep and interesting observations in there about dependency and isolation and the lies we tell to keep ourselves sane. Unfortunately, that does not a novel make. I don't regret reading it though. It was an interesting new experience and something to think about.

ameliatrace's review against another edition

3.0

I found this book compelling as I was reading, but forgot about it the moment I put it down. I enjoyed trying to parse out the "truth" -- I love an unreliable narrator -- but overall both the story and character motivations felt underdeveloped. Nothing stuck. (Which I think was a deliberate writing choice! But still.) It left me with a very incomplete feeling, and nothing juicy to reflect on -- which is kinda damning given the (very timely!) discussion of the power of cult-like groups.

Spoiler

This is mostly so I can remember for book club discussion, since I entirely forgot what happened in this book in the four days since I finished it, but the Author's Acknowledgements was like a who's-who of other authors I've read and just been... lukewarm about. Always because the style of their novels felt more important than the content. Novels that are opaque and incomplete in character development or narrative detail, but always clearly by artistic choice. Which is to say, not my bag, but clearly the bag for many.

steph____'s review against another edition

3.0

**3.5**

bibliobethica's review against another edition

3.0

3.5 There were times when this book gripped me as well as confused me. I found myself rooting for the characters, but then I didn't like them. I'm glad I read The Incendiaries, but it was odd.

henrycooke's review against another edition

3.0

Good, but not as good as The Secret History.

amyredgreen's review against another edition

5.0

Rounding up. I was completely absorbed in this story, and I flew through it because I was dying to know what would happen. I loved how there was no clear person to root for, and I absolutely loved the ending. My only issue was I just wanted more, more of everyone and more story. Very impressive debut.