A review by vanessakm
Big Machine by Victor LaValle

3.0

Essentially you either get magical realism or you don't. I am the latter. So, I didn't really get this book. But the writing is so good and the protagonist is so amazingly written and realized, that I didn't entirely mind. Ricky Rice's back story was so interesting it would have made a fabulous book on its own. Instead, he is dropped into a really strange (but utterly original) story about a mysterious "research" organization staffed by former junkies and criminals that are looking for messages from God. Maybe. The story gets weirder until you finally realize the end is not going to be able to wrap things up to your satisfaction if you are looking for any kind of logical conclusion. Specifically, when I read what really happened to Ricky in Cedar Rapids that changed his life, I knew the end couldn't possibly make sense but I liked the writing so much I plowed ahead. The last 30 pages--well, you'll either get it and probably love it or you'll just be completely befuddled. I give LaValle props for at least trying to give the story some kind of satisfactory conclusion instead of ending with the equivalent of "..and it was a big old freaky mess of nonsense. The end."

I would like to give Lavalle another whirl as a writer someday. But he'd have to abandon magical/symbolic tropes for that to happen. His writing, pathos and characters are what kept me reading this story.