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A review by booksaremysuperpower
A Ticket to Ride by Paula McLain
3.0
I'm waffling between "I liked it" and "It was Ok". Paula McLain is a superb writer and poet, there is no doubt about that. She wrote one of my favorite books from last year- "The Paris Wife"- and I'm finding it very hard to believe "A Ticket to Ride" is also by the same author. The tone and language in both books is COMPLETELY different.
I found "A Ticket to Ride" too florid and almost overwhelming in its beautiful poetic language for the first half of the novel that I was very close to putting it down for good. I like poetry and I admire incredibly well-written literature, but this novel seemed to scream out "Hey, look at me! I know how to write!" so much that I became annoyed rather than in awe. Towards the second half, however, she lets go of the similes and adverbs and the pace and flow of the story picks up dramatically. Unfortunately, the story never quite gets interesting. I wouldn't say the adventures between Jamie and Fawn are anything we haven't read before: lonely, plain parent-less 15 year old girl living in a small town meets gorgeous long-lost cousin who is "bad news". It's easy to guess that the two hit it off but Jamie is always playing second fiddle to the beautiful Fawn who leads her down a troubled path.
McLain does add a side story revolving around Jamie's uncle Raymond and his relationship with Jamie's absent mother Suzette through a series of flashbacks, but I felt this "B" plot was more of a distraction than anything else. Raymond barely exists in Jamie's present, a detail that drove me nuts, so I wasn't understanding exactly why his story was so relevant to the overall arc. I get that Suzette's dark path mirrors that of Fawn's (and possibly Jamie's), but I would have loved more interaction between Raymond and the girls in the present so that we get a sense of what he is reliving. The character spent most of the novel barely at home and out all night at bars, which doesn't seem terribly realistic when you are harboring a particularly wayward teenager who was just kicked out of her own home. I would think he would want to keep on eye Fawn at the very least, but he doesn't even seem aware the two girls sneak out every evening! It is interesting to note that the author mentions in an interview at the back of the book that Raymond was her favorite character, but I felt he was the most underdeveloped and "bland" out of everyone. Not to mention the relationship with his sister bordered on creepy and slightly incestuous.
For most of the novel Jamie is simply following Fawn around and wondering to herself how she can love Fawn so much and aspire to be just like her when she really doesn't care for how she treats everyone else (herself included). This continues and repeats itself so often that I wanted to smack Jamie at one point and tell her to get a grip. To her credit, McLain does know something about the loneliness and the yearning behind being a teen orphan- she herself went through a series of foster homes for most of her childhood. But the dourness and hopelessness and fear Jamie feels most of the time becomes a weight the reader carries as well. The entire novel is almost completely devoid of any humor whatsoever. Every character is cloaked in some sort of sadness, or in Fawn's case utter narcissism, and there is virtually no relief. I put down the book at the very end just a little shy of depressed.
If you are a fan of the novel and film "Girl, Interrupted", you may identify with this book as it carries a lot of the same themes and tone. Again, it is an incredibly beautiful book to read if you wanted to study the language, but the overall story wasn't captivating enough for me.
I found "A Ticket to Ride" too florid and almost overwhelming in its beautiful poetic language for the first half of the novel that I was very close to putting it down for good. I like poetry and I admire incredibly well-written literature, but this novel seemed to scream out "Hey, look at me! I know how to write!" so much that I became annoyed rather than in awe. Towards the second half, however, she lets go of the similes and adverbs and the pace and flow of the story picks up dramatically. Unfortunately, the story never quite gets interesting. I wouldn't say the adventures between Jamie and Fawn are anything we haven't read before: lonely, plain parent-less 15 year old girl living in a small town meets gorgeous long-lost cousin who is "bad news". It's easy to guess that the two hit it off but Jamie is always playing second fiddle to the beautiful Fawn who leads her down a troubled path.
McLain does add a side story revolving around Jamie's uncle Raymond and his relationship with Jamie's absent mother Suzette through a series of flashbacks, but I felt this "B" plot was more of a distraction than anything else. Raymond barely exists in Jamie's present, a detail that drove me nuts, so I wasn't understanding exactly why his story was so relevant to the overall arc. I get that Suzette's dark path mirrors that of Fawn's (and possibly Jamie's), but I would have loved more interaction between Raymond and the girls in the present so that we get a sense of what he is reliving. The character spent most of the novel barely at home and out all night at bars, which doesn't seem terribly realistic when you are harboring a particularly wayward teenager who was just kicked out of her own home. I would think he would want to keep on eye Fawn at the very least, but he doesn't even seem aware the two girls sneak out every evening! It is interesting to note that the author mentions in an interview at the back of the book that Raymond was her favorite character, but I felt he was the most underdeveloped and "bland" out of everyone. Not to mention the relationship with his sister bordered on creepy and slightly incestuous.
For most of the novel Jamie is simply following Fawn around and wondering to herself how she can love Fawn so much and aspire to be just like her when she really doesn't care for how she treats everyone else (herself included). This continues and repeats itself so often that I wanted to smack Jamie at one point and tell her to get a grip. To her credit, McLain does know something about the loneliness and the yearning behind being a teen orphan- she herself went through a series of foster homes for most of her childhood. But the dourness and hopelessness and fear Jamie feels most of the time becomes a weight the reader carries as well. The entire novel is almost completely devoid of any humor whatsoever. Every character is cloaked in some sort of sadness, or in Fawn's case utter narcissism, and there is virtually no relief. I put down the book at the very end just a little shy of depressed.
If you are a fan of the novel and film "Girl, Interrupted", you may identify with this book as it carries a lot of the same themes and tone. Again, it is an incredibly beautiful book to read if you wanted to study the language, but the overall story wasn't captivating enough for me.