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raegancihammers 's review for:
Freedom
by Jonathan Franzen
I am having trouble deciding between three and four stars for this book. I hated it and I loved it.
I loved it because Franzen created a story where the characters were complicated and contrary, deplorable but worthy of much needed redemption and forgiveness. I find very few writers can pull this off without devolving into two-dimensional stock figures, but Franzen nailed it...in almost every single one of his characters. Stories that contain these types of characters are the ones that resonate in me, in everyone.
I hated this book because Franzen did what he did too well. This was not a distopia, an end-times, post-apocalyptic survival story. It is not speculative fiction; it was not an escapist fantasy. Rather, it is a calmly written narrative whose elements are perfectly recognizable as the ins-and-outs of early twenty-first-century life. A kind of life that will eventually lead to a ravaged earth and imminent horrors, the discussion of which cause (in me at least) a sort of white-hot panic. Something that we know is ever present just beneath the surface, something we know but would rather not acknowledge or look too carefully at or spend to much time with. Frazen trumpets the need for change by undercutting it and capitalizing on the fact that there is no absolute right and there is no absolute wrong. There are only shades gray. He echoes this in his characters actions and beliefs.
So four stars. Well written. Complicated. Terrifying and heartbreaking. Perhaps resigned, perhaps hopeful. Recommended.
I loved it because Franzen created a story where the characters were complicated and contrary, deplorable but worthy of much needed redemption and forgiveness. I find very few writers can pull this off without devolving into two-dimensional stock figures, but Franzen nailed it...in almost every single one of his characters. Stories that contain these types of characters are the ones that resonate in me, in everyone.
I hated this book because Franzen did what he did too well. This was not a distopia, an end-times, post-apocalyptic survival story. It is not speculative fiction; it was not an escapist fantasy. Rather, it is a calmly written narrative whose elements are perfectly recognizable as the ins-and-outs of early twenty-first-century life. A kind of life that will eventually lead to a ravaged earth and imminent horrors, the discussion of which cause (in me at least) a sort of white-hot panic. Something that we know is ever present just beneath the surface, something we know but would rather not acknowledge or look too carefully at or spend to much time with. Frazen trumpets the need for change by undercutting it and capitalizing on the fact that there is no absolute right and there is no absolute wrong. There are only shades gray. He echoes this in his characters actions and beliefs.
So four stars. Well written. Complicated. Terrifying and heartbreaking. Perhaps resigned, perhaps hopeful. Recommended.