I love them- it’s like
opening a new book. I can almost feel the thick crispness of unopened pages,
smell the untouched words in the fresh start of a New Year.
Admittedly, I’m a
huge fan of self help and listen to Brene Browns audiobooks on repeat,
interspersed with Rahit Sethi and Jen Hatmaker, amongst others. So it should be
no surprise that New Year’s resolutions are totally my jam.
I have many this
year. This is the year I’m getting my finances in order! I’m losing 20 lbs and
running a 10k! My house will be uncluttered - and I won’t buy more stuff to junk
it up! Date night at least once a month! More game nights, less phone scrolling!
And this is the year I’m going to review every book I read.
All 100+.
Starting
today.
I began Rumaan Alam's Leave The World Behind in 2023, but was
sidetracked by the holidays, so it gets to be my first book of 2024! I had been
hearing about this book for a few months.
When the Julia Roberts adaptation came
out on Netflix, the book got a revival (at least it did in the book clubs I’m a
part of) and it became very polarizing. Readers either loved it or hated it. I
LOVE books that are hated. I don't trust books that everyone likes AND get good
reviews, so I was very excited to try this one.
I was less than one chapter in
when I began rolling my eyes at the writing. It was so over the top, so
superfluous that I wondered if he had his thesaurus open on one screen while
typing the manuscript on another. Copy paste. Insert new word here.
Then as I
read further, I either stop noticing it in the flow of the story, or the author
stopped doing it. I started to think the word usage was intentional- the flowery
writing was an extension of the characters. None of the characters were
particularly likable or noteworthy. In fact, they had such indistinctive
qualities that I kept getting Ruth and Rose confused - two female characters
with practically nothing in common. One an older black woman, the other a white
tween daughter. But the similarities in name and sameness among them all had me
rereading sentences.
The first half of the book was hard to get through, but
after that, the pages flew by until all of a sudden I only had two chapters left
and I was wondering how the author was going to wrap this all up.
I try to avoid
spoilers, so I won’t tell you how it ends. But it turns out I’m in neither the
love it or hate it camp. I’ve hated books before - books I couldn’t get through
at all or ones I finished and threw across the room, eager to get away from it
as quick as possible. This was merely meh. I absolutely loved some of the plot
points, such as the descriptions of and plot points of the animals. I also love
psychological thrillers and apocalyptic stories, both of which fit neatly within
this storyline. But I didn’t feel the terror or doom I wanted to feel, merely a
“hmmm” and a thought of what I would do, how I would react.
I gave
Leave The World Behind a solid 3 stars on Goodreads. Rumaan Alam is an
excellent writer, although it can take some time to get used to the flowery
writing style. I wouldn’t recommend it, won’t read it again and have no desire
to see the movie (even if it is starring the amazing Julia Roberts) but I
wouldn’t talk anyone out of reading it. I can see how the right audience might
enjoy it.
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