A review by nytephoenyx
Swing Time by Zadie Smith

emotional reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

This is the first time I’ve read a Zadie Smith book, and her writing immediately transported me.  Swing Time tells the story of two girls who were friends when they were young, loved to dance, and took very different paths as they grew up and grew apart.  The story jumps between time periods and continents, but the voice remains the same.

I found Swing Time to be a pendulum between states.  Famous, unsuccessful.  Comfortable, poor.  Intellectual, cosmopolitan.  Natural talent, hard work.  Throughout the entire book, our unnamed narrator finds herself confused and learning.  The world itself never seems to fit in the box she has built in her mind to fit it and as such the alternating chapters between Aimee and Tracey are in many ways repetitive, just from a slightly different perspective.

One thing I will criticize is that Swing Time feels… excessively wordy.  Despite what a wonderful job narrator Pippa Bennett-Warner did with this book, I still had to play it back on 2x because otherwise I found my mind wandering.  Each section is beautifully written, but with hours of material just like this, it’s easy to get fatigued by the philosophical ponderings, socio-economic lectures, and bemused conversation.

Like most literary fiction, this book explores the world.  Smith’s writing is stunning and immersive despite its repetitive nature and wordiness. I enjoyed the slow transformation of not just our narrator, but Aimee and Tracey as well.  Swing Time is a good book to pick up if you’re looking for something slow but interesting that is well-written and raw, though not abrasively so.  I enjoyed it enough that I will pick up more of Smith’s work. 

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