imijen 's review for:

American War by Omar El Akkad

3.0

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It was, all of it, a lie—and the worst kind of lie: a charade of normality at a time of war.

There was a lot to like here. Taking place towards the end of this century and beyond, a few southern states in America make the decision to leave the Union, triggering a second Civil War. There's some great world-building, in parts, and it does seem scarily plausible. Having said that, I am not American, so my background knowledge in American politics and history may be lacking compared to other readers, but, still, to me it seemed believable. I loved the use of excerpts from historical/factual documents and, to be perfectly honest, I think I would have preferred a whole book of these, rather than what we got, which was a focus on one person, Sarat's, wartime story. There was something off about the narrative and plot surrounding Sarat. I think part of it was pacing, which definitely crawls at points, another was the fact the reader knows the ending/history from the start, and finally it's a fairly one-sided look at the war, because this is the perspective from just one person. The historical excerpts help a little with this, by giving some larger context and hints into the political mechanics that led to this reality, but as I said before, I almost wanted more of that. I think at least one other perspective was needed, to really get deep into this alternate history/future. And Sarat is a difficult protagonist in many ways, sometimes falling into the usual norms of a dystopian hero, while at other times just feeling like a vehicle for the plot which is already known to the reader. It sounds like I'm making a lot of complaints here, when really I did enjoy it a lot, but certainly didn't love it entirely.