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A review by katieparker
The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley by Hannah Tinti
5.0
An unsettling sense of vertigo flooded her mind, just as it did whenever she stretched out on her roof at night and stared at the stars for too long, her body spinning upward into the depths of a velvet sky, until up was no longer up and down was no longer down and she wasn't a single, tiny, insignificant being anymore, but the entire earth, hurtling through space, tilting past comets and meteors and blocks of ice that fractured into crystals and left streaks behind in the darkness. Then this understanding began to slip away from her, and she fell back into herself, until she was nothing but a girl stretched out on a hunk of rock with a pen pushing against her ribs.
I'll be frank: This novel kind of blew my mind. I had heard so little about this book prior to reading it, and I have no idea why. (That could be because it came out when I was wrapping up grad school, but still. I knew enough to add it to my to-read list, and that was all.) This is definitely going to be one that I continually sing the praises of from here on out.
Following Samuel Hawley and his daughter Loo, this is a gritty novel contrasted with the most beautiful writing. Truly, the writing is just incredible. Ordinarily, I'd expect a book like this to be focused largely on plot, but Hannah Tinti achieves so much within these 373 pages. Alternating between Loo's present (over about six years, starting when she's 12) and Hawley's past (through decades), the reader understands every thought and motivation influencing these characters' decisions. This could be considered a crime thriller, since so much uncovers Hawley's nefarious past, but at its core it's truly Loo's coming-of-age story as she learns more about her father and her place in his life.
I'll be frank: This novel kind of blew my mind. I had heard so little about this book prior to reading it, and I have no idea why. (That could be because it came out when I was wrapping up grad school, but still. I knew enough to add it to my to-read list, and that was all.) This is definitely going to be one that I continually sing the praises of from here on out.
Following Samuel Hawley and his daughter Loo, this is a gritty novel contrasted with the most beautiful writing. Truly, the writing is just incredible. Ordinarily, I'd expect a book like this to be focused largely on plot, but Hannah Tinti achieves so much within these 373 pages. Alternating between Loo's present (over about six years, starting when she's 12) and Hawley's past (through decades), the reader understands every thought and motivation influencing these characters' decisions. This could be considered a crime thriller, since so much uncovers Hawley's nefarious past, but at its core it's truly Loo's coming-of-age story as she learns more about her father and her place in his life.