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laurelbard 's review for:
To Paradise
by Hanya Yanagihara
What I took away from this is that all three stories were set in dystopias; the last was the only one in which the protagonist really felt the effects of it, but the others were dystopic all the same.
In To Paradise, Yanagihara continues exploring themes from her first published work, The People in the Trees, to great effect. I still think The People in the Trees is my favorite of hers, but this book is a decent companion to that one. Here, she again explores colonization and the "threat" that racialized people and queer people pose to the structures of colonial society as well as the ways in which they can be complicit in and reproduce that society. She also, again, explores illness and the fear of illness in a way that I feel ties thematically to the aforementioned explorations of colonization and race.
What didn't I like? Well, it was extremely long, but fortunately the interesting stuff was really packed into the latter half of the book, so it never felt like the slog that A Little Life became. I also didn't really like or understand the first half of the second story.
I hope that Yanagihara continues to explore these themes, and I especially hope that she continues to branch out into speculative fiction and science fiction. The third story was especially strong (she shines in first person writing honestly!).
In To Paradise, Yanagihara continues exploring themes from her first published work, The People in the Trees, to great effect. I still think The People in the Trees is my favorite of hers, but this book is a decent companion to that one. Here, she again explores colonization and the "threat" that racialized people and queer people pose to the structures of colonial society as well as the ways in which they can be complicit in and reproduce that society. She also, again, explores illness and the fear of illness in a way that I feel ties thematically to the aforementioned explorations of colonization and race.
What didn't I like? Well, it was extremely long, but fortunately the interesting stuff was really packed into the latter half of the book, so it never felt like the slog that A Little Life became. I also didn't really like or understand the first half of the second story.
I hope that Yanagihara continues to explore these themes, and I especially hope that she continues to branch out into speculative fiction and science fiction. The third story was especially strong (she shines in first person writing honestly!).