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bran_the_muffin_man 's review for:
Remarkably Bright Creatures
by Shelby Van Pelt
Content warnings for mentions of suicide, drug/alcohol use, parental abandonment, loss of a child, and eviction.
This book is knocked down to four stars almost entirely because of the blurb. The mystery is a minor and not very compelling part of this book that interferes with the primary theme of finding your place and community in the world, especially when dealing with grief that those around you haven't had to deal with. The character descriptions and voice, especially of the main character (Tova) are amazing and atmospheric. I appreciate that she has a host of traits that might be described as mental illness in other works (she compulsively cleans and is scared of the freeway, for example), but they're treated as a completely normal part of who she is and not something that she feels the need to manage or fix.
I would have preferred less mystery and tension and more exploration of what happens between the final chapter and the epilogue, but for what appears to be Van Pelt's debut novel, it is excellent. Hopefully if she writes another, she can lean more into her talent for the literary without the requirement to add artificial suspense.
This book is knocked down to four stars almost entirely because of the blurb. The mystery is a minor and not very compelling part of this book that interferes with the primary theme of finding your place and community in the world, especially when dealing with grief that those around you haven't had to deal with. The character descriptions and voice, especially of the main character (Tova) are amazing and atmospheric. I appreciate that she has a host of traits that might be described as mental illness in other works (she compulsively cleans and is scared of the freeway, for example), but they're treated as a completely normal part of who she is and not something that she feels the need to manage or fix.
I would have preferred less mystery and tension and more exploration of what happens between the final chapter and the epilogue, but for what appears to be Van Pelt's debut novel, it is excellent. Hopefully if she writes another, she can lean more into her talent for the literary without the requirement to add artificial suspense.