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A review by mirandanoel
Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
emotional
mysterious
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.0
The more I think about this book, the less praise I have for it.
In my eyes, this book is a wonderful and heartbreaking coming of age novel, which has so much to say about loneliness, acceptance, and forgiveness, but that is ultimately sullied by the secondary plot of post-Halloween 1969.
I think the dual timeline aspect of this story is its Achilles heel. I found myself quite bored and uninterested during most of the post-Halloween 1969 bits. I didn't find this portion of the book compelling in nearly any way, and thought that it really pushed against the earlier themes of the book.
**spoiler alert**
MAJOR, STORY RUINING SPOILERS AHEAD:
Thematically, I found this book very touching. Then I read the last few pages, and the work that the first 350-ish pages had done came to be unfurled.
The way I see it, there can only be a few positions that the book wants you to take on Kya’s killing of Chase Andrews.
The first option is that the reader is meant to hold Chase’s murder against Kya — to let this action stain our perspective of her. I think this option is the least likely. For one, if this was the case, I think a lot of the work that’s been put in up to that point to build Kya up would be undone. If the reader is meant to hold this action against Kya; to find her guilty not just in a factual sense but in our consciences, as well, then all of the prejudice against Kya (that we have, up until this point, found so horrific and offensive) is correct. That is, if the image of Kya is stained in our minds by this murder, then the idea of her as a wild, immoral character is justified. The town’s opinion of her, as some kind of monster, is justified. I find it unlikely (though perhaps not impossible) that Delia Owens would want us to walk away feeling this way.
The second option is that we are meant to pardon Kya in our minds -- that we are supposed to stand fully behind this choice. If this is what the authorial voice expects us to do, then I feel that Delia Owens has not done a thorough enough job really villainizing Chase Andrews. Narratively, Chase has been pitched to us in a semi-endearing light for the majority of the time we've known him. Then, of course, he turns scummy. More than scummy. But scummy enough to be flat-out murdered? Don't get me wrong -- I absolutely think that Chase Andrews is a sh*tty character. But I just don't think that Owens put in the work for me to feel good about Kya killing him. I'm guessing that most people who love this book *do* fall into this camp, and that's fine. Again, I just think that, if this is the camp the authorial voice /wants/ us to fall in, it's quite lazy in getting us there.
The last option, and the option that I find most feasible based on the other thematic elements of the book, is that we are meant to take some kind of "do what you will to survive; right and wrong are relative" take on Kya's actions. But if this is the case, it seems that we'd need to re-frame the entire narrative. We'd be forced to conceed that Kya's mother's actions weren't wrong. We'd have to concede that Pa's actions weren't wrong. We'd have to concede, ultimately, that Chase's actions weren't wrong. Ultimately, all of the pain we'd felt while gliding through Kya's story would be re-contextualized in a way that reduces it all to being less convincing -- applicable only within Kya's own emotional ecosystem and justifiable only insofar as we remain tighly within that narrative frame. Overall, I don't think this would be a horrible reading, except that Kya explicitly pushes back against this class of thought. Kya is adamant that what her mother did was not what her mother *should* have done; she is often immovable in the position that Tate did not act as he *should* have acted; and, more than anything, she is explicit in the position that Chase operated outside how he *should* have operated. The culmination of this undercuts the position that we should view Kya's actions in a relative sort of light. It supposes that there *is* such a thing as how someone should rightly act.
Given the author's own controversy, thinking about these positions becomes even murkier.
IMO, every position that the reader can take on Kya's actions is flawed or blocked in some way by some other aspect of the narrative. Because of this, I believe this is the type of book that you should read, enjoy, and then immediately prevent yourself from thinking any further about. I think the prose is fairly good and the characters are /mostly/ personable, and that's about as deep as I could successfully take it.
I think the book is enjoyable, overall, but severely flawed in its ultimate narrative scope.
In my eyes, this book is a wonderful and heartbreaking coming of age novel, which has so much to say about loneliness, acceptance, and forgiveness, but that is ultimately sullied by the secondary plot of post-Halloween 1969.
I think the dual timeline aspect of this story is its Achilles heel. I found myself quite bored and uninterested during most of the post-Halloween 1969 bits. I didn't find this portion of the book compelling in nearly any way, and thought that it really pushed against the earlier themes of the book.
**spoiler alert**
MAJOR, STORY RUINING SPOILERS AHEAD:
Thematically, I found this book very touching. Then I read the last few pages, and the work that the first 350-ish pages had done came to be unfurled.
The way I see it, there can only be a few positions that the book wants you to take on Kya’s killing of Chase Andrews.
The first option is that the reader is meant to hold Chase’s murder against Kya — to let this action stain our perspective of her. I think this option is the least likely. For one, if this was the case, I think a lot of the work that’s been put in up to that point to build Kya up would be undone. If the reader is meant to hold this action against Kya; to find her guilty not just in a factual sense but in our consciences, as well, then all of the prejudice against Kya (that we have, up until this point, found so horrific and offensive) is correct. That is, if the image of Kya is stained in our minds by this murder, then the idea of her as a wild, immoral character is justified. The town’s opinion of her, as some kind of monster, is justified. I find it unlikely (though perhaps not impossible) that Delia Owens would want us to walk away feeling this way.
The second option is that we are meant to pardon Kya in our minds -- that we are supposed to stand fully behind this choice. If this is what the authorial voice expects us to do, then I feel that Delia Owens has not done a thorough enough job really villainizing Chase Andrews. Narratively, Chase has been pitched to us in a semi-endearing light for the majority of the time we've known him. Then, of course, he turns scummy. More than scummy. But scummy enough to be flat-out murdered? Don't get me wrong -- I absolutely think that Chase Andrews is a sh*tty character. But I just don't think that Owens put in the work for me to feel good about Kya killing him. I'm guessing that most people who love this book *do* fall into this camp, and that's fine. Again, I just think that, if this is the camp the authorial voice /wants/ us to fall in, it's quite lazy in getting us there.
The last option, and the option that I find most feasible based on the other thematic elements of the book, is that we are meant to take some kind of "do what you will to survive; right and wrong are relative" take on Kya's actions. But if this is the case, it seems that we'd need to re-frame the entire narrative. We'd be forced to conceed that Kya's mother's actions weren't wrong. We'd have to concede that Pa's actions weren't wrong. We'd have to concede, ultimately, that Chase's actions weren't wrong. Ultimately, all of the pain we'd felt while gliding through Kya's story would be re-contextualized in a way that reduces it all to being less convincing -- applicable only within Kya's own emotional ecosystem and justifiable only insofar as we remain tighly within that narrative frame. Overall, I don't think this would be a horrible reading, except that Kya explicitly pushes back against this class of thought. Kya is adamant that what her mother did was not what her mother *should* have done; she is often immovable in the position that Tate did not act as he *should* have acted; and, more than anything, she is explicit in the position that Chase operated outside how he *should* have operated. The culmination of this undercuts the position that we should view Kya's actions in a relative sort of light. It supposes that there *is* such a thing as how someone should rightly act.
Given the author's own controversy, thinking about these positions becomes even murkier.
IMO, every position that the reader can take on Kya's actions is flawed or blocked in some way by some other aspect of the narrative. Because of this, I believe this is the type of book that you should read, enjoy, and then immediately prevent yourself from thinking any further about. I think the prose is fairly good and the characters are /mostly/ personable, and that's about as deep as I could successfully take it.
I think the book is enjoyable, overall, but severely flawed in its ultimate narrative scope.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Domestic abuse and Abandonment
Moderate: Child abuse and Death of parent
Minor: Sexual violence