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A review by jodar
Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead
adventurous
challenging
emotional
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Well-written and strangely absorbing, but what an odd mix of themes: semi-orphans abandoned to an incapable uncle; a frontier-like childhood; a nasty marriage with liquor-running adventures; wilderness solitude (more than once); a war story; a movie star; an adventure story of long-distance flight.
Scarcely an admirable character appears at all, except perhaps for secondary and tertiary characters. How to think of the MC, her twin brother and closest childhood-then-adult friend? Introverted, certainly, but none to me are attractive. All have their own obsessions (flying, art, wilderness) and seem to care only about their own selfish needs.
There’s sexual promiscuity by the main characters throughout, with barely any consideration for consequences to others. Steps to avoid pregnancy are detailed, but non-historical is the lack of any concern for venereal disease at a time of horrible and inadequate treatment. This ignorance doesn’t even make sense while the characters are young and isolated from society, as the prostitutes the MC befriends would surely be knowledgeable. It’s anachronistic behaviour till after the 1950s–1960s at least, when effective treatments became available and the ‘sexual revolution’ began to take off. The trope of non-heterosexual relationships as some sort of forbidden and secret enlightenment arises, of course; it’s seemingly unavoidable these days.
From time to time throughout the MC’s life and for sure at the end, the futility of existence and a resigned nihilism comes to the fore:
Scarcely an admirable character appears at all, except perhaps for secondary and tertiary characters. How to think of the MC, her twin brother and closest childhood-then-adult friend? Introverted, certainly, but none to me are attractive. All have their own obsessions (flying, art, wilderness) and seem to care only about their own selfish needs.
There’s sexual promiscuity by the main characters throughout, with barely any consideration for consequences to others. Steps to avoid pregnancy are detailed, but non-historical is the lack of any concern for venereal disease at a time of horrible and inadequate treatment. This ignorance doesn’t even make sense while the characters are young and isolated from society, as the prostitutes the MC befriends would surely be knowledgeable. It’s anachronistic behaviour till after the 1950s–1960s at least, when effective treatments became available and the ‘sexual revolution’ began to take off. The trope of non-heterosexual relationships as some sort of forbidden and secret enlightenment arises, of course; it’s seemingly unavoidable these days.
From time to time throughout the MC’s life and for sure at the end, the futility of existence and a resigned nihilism comes to the fore:
All the times she [the MC] has brushed against death, she’s never given much thought to what might come after. Now she considers it. She supposes there will be nothing. She supposes each of us destroys the world. We close our eyes and snuff out all that has existed, all that will ever be. (Final chapter, “The End”)
This is the malignancy that American individualism and its preoccupation with freedom looks like, I suppose, when it is untempered by a wider Christian concern towards others in society or a belief in the ultimate importance of our actions. I doubt this is what the author intends the reader to come away with, however.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Suicide, Abandonment, Death, Suicidal thoughts, War, Alcoholism, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Rape, Sexual content, and Sexual violence
Moderate: Abortion, Murder, Grief, and Infidelity