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A review by pixie_d
Grief Is the Thing with Feathers by Max Porter
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Right before I turn to the first page and start reading, a crow caws. Just one of the regular crows hanging out in the big tree, not being violent, aggressive, or weird. They are not at all like Crow in the book, a Mary Poppins/ Trickster Crow that was somehow inspired by Ted Hughes crow poems. I've never been interested in Ted Hughes poems, but the writing in this book -- the dad's grief, the kids' parts done mostly as poetry, and the wild Crow sections -- is all excellent, the word craft and thought-provoking and empathetic storytelling.
You don't need to read Hughes, or even focus on the grief topic, to like this little book. Is it a novella? It is some kind of prosey/poemy hybrid. You also don't need to be married or have kids. The author does a superb job of describing what it's like to raise boys or be a boy. I wondered if he started out imagining writing what it was like for Hughes and kids after Sylvia died, but very wisely did not go there.
The dad is writing about Hughes, without Plath. He describes a book proposal that he didn't write: "I told him my idea for a complete works of Ted Hughes annotated by Crow.... I explained that Crow would violate, illustrate, and pollute Ted's work. It would be a deeper, truly wild analysis, a critical reckoning and an act of vengeance. It would be a scrapbook, a collage, a graphic novel, a dissolving of the boundaries between forms because Crow is a Trickster, he is ancient and post-modern, illustrator, editor, vandal..."
Well, I'd read that. Are you going to write it, Max Porter? Also, the dad and his kids in this book do a lot of drawing. I wish this book were illustrated.
You don't need to read Hughes, or even focus on the grief topic, to like this little book. Is it a novella? It is some kind of prosey/poemy hybrid. You also don't need to be married or have kids. The author does a superb job of describing what it's like to raise boys or be a boy. I wondered if he started out imagining writing what it was like for Hughes and kids after Sylvia died, but very wisely did not go there.
The dad is writing about Hughes, without Plath. He describes a book proposal that he didn't write: "I told him my idea for a complete works of Ted Hughes annotated by Crow.... I explained that Crow would violate, illustrate, and pollute Ted's work. It would be a deeper, truly wild analysis, a critical reckoning and an act of vengeance. It would be a scrapbook, a collage, a graphic novel, a dissolving of the boundaries between forms because Crow is a Trickster, he is ancient and post-modern, illustrator, editor, vandal..."
Well, I'd read that. Are you going to write it, Max Porter? Also, the dad and his kids in this book do a lot of drawing. I wish this book were illustrated.