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A review by blueberryhotel
Sea Change by Gina Chung
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
i didn’t expect to dislike this book as much as i did, but i think it lost me right away by dumping so much exposition at the very beginning…. and then continuing to consist of mostly exposition for the entire book. this is a great example of what “show, not tell” is warning against. rather than letting the characters’ actions speak for themselves the narrator is constantly explaining everyone’s motives and backgrounds which makes the writing feel so dumbed down almost to a YA level. the main character wasn’t compelling to me at all despite her struggling with the universal difficulties of adulthood. the author seemed to be attempting to straddle the fine line between sympathetic narrator in a tough situation vs a completely dislikable/impossible to understand narrator, in the vein of my year of rest and relaxation or the first bad man. those books work better imo because you at least have some interesting exploration of the extremes of human characteristics and behavior, while the main character in sea change is painfully average. you want to write another novel about a twenty/thirty-something who, like, Can’t Even Adulting? give me something INSANE!
also, i think alternating between present/past throughout the narrative is difficult to pull off with dexterity, and this book definitely doesn’t do so. it almost drags more because we keep returning to the narrator’s past and she’s hardly doing anything in the present aside from saying things like “I think about that one time when I was younger and my mom hurt my feelings. That was hurtful. I’m messed up because of it now.”
then there’s a bunch of lamely under-explored details that seem thrown in for textural effect but just look lazy, like the author hinting at the main character having ocd within the last 50 pages when nothing else has suggested as such thus far. or the narrator’s cousin’s toxic relationship, which verges on abusive but again seems to be written to straddle a delicate line in order to avoid having to write a more complex narrative about abuse. i think overall this book lacks a distinct point of view.
also, i think alternating between present/past throughout the narrative is difficult to pull off with dexterity, and this book definitely doesn’t do so. it almost drags more because we keep returning to the narrator’s past and she’s hardly doing anything in the present aside from saying things like “I think about that one time when I was younger and my mom hurt my feelings. That was hurtful. I’m messed up because of it now.”
then there’s a bunch of lamely under-explored details that seem thrown in for textural effect but just look lazy, like the author hinting at the main character having ocd within the last 50 pages when nothing else has suggested as such thus far. or the narrator’s cousin’s toxic relationship, which verges on abusive but again seems to be written to straddle a delicate line in order to avoid having to write a more complex narrative about abuse. i think overall this book lacks a distinct point of view.