Review: A Constellation of Vital Phenomena

Pin It

A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra

My rating: 5 of 5 stars



I'm going to be honest and admit that prior to reading 'A Constellation of Vital Phenomena' I didn't even really know where Chechnya was. My best guess would have been somewhere Russia-ish - in the eastern half of the world. I certainly wasn't aware of the way people live in that part of the world. For the most part I have been happy in my ignorance, occasionally reading a book about a country where you expect wars and danger, like Afghanistan.

Despite my ignorance, I dove in to the pages and found myself engrossed in the characters and events. This story was just my cup of tea. It told the story of war-torn Chechnya and a couple of doctors who find their lives thrown together while hiding a little girl whose father was taken to a prison camp. It is a dark and heart-breaking story but is told so beautifully that you won't be able to get enough.

I love books that tie multiple events and stories together but often find that they aren't executed well by the author. This is one of the successful ones. I've never read anything previously by the author but his story-telling ability is phenomenal.

The book awarded me with not only an immensely enjoyable tale but also a desire to learn a little more about our friends in Chechnya.



View all my reviews

Review: More Than Human

Pin It

More Than Human by Theodore Sturgeon

My rating: 2 of 5 stars



This was a very, very weird book. I'm convinced that the concept was simply beyond the capacity of my intellect because I was lost most of the time I was reading. There were times when I was intrigued and lost in the story but overall I just felt lost.

Basically, if I understood correctly, this is a story about a group of people, mostly children, who are the next step in the evolutionary chain. They have unique abilities such as telekinesis, which when combined together make a "gestalt" unit that basically has incredible ability to do just about anything and control anyone. It's a very complicated and scattered tale that took either a genius or a lunatic to write (possibly both).

I generally try to read for enjoyment and the brains that it took to understand what was going on in this story took most of the fun out of it for me. Theodore Sturgeon is a gifted author but just not my style.



View all my reviews

Review: The End of Your Life Book Club

Pin It

The End of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe

My rating: 2 of 5 stars



This is a book about the death of the author's mother. That explanation is on its own is sufficient for me to have expected a heart-breaking.... or inspiring.... or emotional story. What I really ended up reading was a fairly dry, unemotional, one-dimensional tribute to Will Schwalbe's mother. The book essentially follows the last couple of years of Schwalbe's time with his mom where they share their love of books while they chat in waiting rooms at doctor's offices. The concept sounds like it would be full of heartbreak and tear-filled bonding between mother and son but it really wasn't.

I don't want to sell this book short as not being a lovely tribute to his mother, because I'm sure she'd be very proud, but what it lacked was a reason for me, the reader (who doesn't know his mom), to be interested. It lacked a heart. As with most eulogies, the author seemed unable to admit to any flaws in his mom, which is understandable but makes for bland reading. She's depicted basically as a superhuman who has single-handedly changed the world and hasn't said or done a single negative thing in her life. She was completely selfless and a champion of humanity. That's all well and good and very well may be true, but it just felt like a child describing why their mom is the best mom. The moments in the book that were told as life-lessons felt more like a advocacy campaign than a book I'd want to read.

I enjoyed some of the discussion about the novels they read, especially since I have read many of those myself, but that was mostly due to a comradery that I had regarding the other book, not because the story in this one made it more interesting or compelling. The concept fell flat and was lost in banal descriptions of the things that filled Schwalbe's time with his mom.

What really disappointed me the most is that the book simply lacked emotion. Something like this should have brought a grown man to his knees in a puddle of tears. I didn't even feel sad, or anything else for that matter, when his mom died. To me this one is a book to skip.



View all my reviews