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nehaanna 's review for:
Orange Wine
by Esperanza Hope Snyder
hopeful
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
From the outset, I was very interested in reading this book. But I think I might not have been the best audience fit for this book because I really struggled to stay engaged, interested, and feel empathy for these characters. Reading the author’s acknowledgements and recognizing that this story is inspired by the author’s grandparents helps to personalize the story, but the work still struggles to be humanized for me.
The first aspect was the writing style and approach. The entirety of the book is told in the past tense, and things are narrative with the passive voice. The narration is more like a long winded diary entry stitched together to form the narrative. Huge plot events happen and are over and done with in one chapter. And it makes it incredibly difficult to feel the emotional buildup or interest in the narrative at all.
The second aspect was the characterization. The characters suffer from the writing approach, and seem two dimensional and flat. The main character is a self proclaimed feminist and yet the entirety of the novel is her in a relationship with two separate men, who are (arguably) not worthy of her. She is also someone who is incredibly vain with a great degree of internalized misogyny, leading to a lot of disillusionment in readers. The other side characters are flat and feel more like goofy caricatures to be the villains in this character’s story.
Overall, I struggled immensely to connect with this book. I think that it has merits though, as some people have found it to be a good read. I think perhaps I’m just not the right audience for this book, and that there are stylistic choices that I as a reader do not prefer.
The first aspect was the writing style and approach. The entirety of the book is told in the past tense, and things are narrative with the passive voice. The narration is more like a long winded diary entry stitched together to form the narrative. Huge plot events happen and are over and done with in one chapter. And it makes it incredibly difficult to feel the emotional buildup or interest in the narrative at all.
The second aspect was the characterization. The characters suffer from the writing approach, and seem two dimensional and flat. The main character is a self proclaimed feminist and yet the entirety of the novel is her in a relationship with two separate men, who are (arguably) not worthy of her. She is also someone who is incredibly vain with a great degree of internalized misogyny, leading to a lot of disillusionment in readers. The other side characters are flat and feel more like goofy caricatures to be the villains in this character’s story.
Overall, I struggled immensely to connect with this book. I think that it has merits though, as some people have found it to be a good read. I think perhaps I’m just not the right audience for this book, and that there are stylistic choices that I as a reader do not prefer.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Child death, Grief, Alcohol
Moderate: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Misogyny, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Gaslighting