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A review by emilyclairem
Carpentaria by Alexis Wright
1.0
God, I hate this book. I can see how others might enjoy it and it's not an Objectively Bad book, but it was basically just everything I don't like in a book, and lacked everything that I personally look for in good novels.
The biggest turn-off for me was the characters and their relationships. I don't mind not liking characters, as long as it's fun and rewarding to hate them. These characters were just...nothing. I spent 500 pages with them but I still feel like I don't know them at all. And the relationships are just atrocious and really upsetting to read about. There is definitely merit in writing about abusive relationships, but only if it seems like there is point to them or literally just any attention called to them. Nearly every relationship is seemingly arbitrarily toxic and, as I'm sensitive to these things, the casual throwing in of Angel Day's abuse towards her children made me feel sick. It's never dealt with in literally any way and it upset me a lot.
The narrative style also left me feeling very distant from the text and thus I didn't care at all about the plot or feel like it had any urgency or meaning. Again, I'm aware this is a specific technique, but it's just not my taste. The writing style is very non-descript, which is okay if the plot stands out, but this work didn't succeed at either in my opinion.
Overall, it was painful to get through the book and I absolutely would've dropped it had it not been required reading.
The biggest turn-off for me was the characters and their relationships. I don't mind not liking characters, as long as it's fun and rewarding to hate them. These characters were just...nothing. I spent 500 pages with them but I still feel like I don't know them at all. And the relationships are just atrocious and really upsetting to read about. There is definitely merit in writing about abusive relationships, but only if it seems like there is point to them or literally just any attention called to them. Nearly every relationship is seemingly arbitrarily toxic and, as I'm sensitive to these things, the casual throwing in of Angel Day's abuse towards her children made me feel sick. It's never dealt with in literally any way and it upset me a lot.
The narrative style also left me feeling very distant from the text and thus I didn't care at all about the plot or feel like it had any urgency or meaning. Again, I'm aware this is a specific technique, but it's just not my taste. The writing style is very non-descript, which is okay if the plot stands out, but this work didn't succeed at either in my opinion.
Overall, it was painful to get through the book and I absolutely would've dropped it had it not been required reading.