Reviews with content warning for Dysphoria - My Year of Rest and Relaxation

This was a grueling read with a detestable main character and disgusting events. I could barely put it down. I found it well written, stuffed (over-stuffed?) with references and connections to other works so the themes were always exploding outwards in many directions. Honestly not sure how sincerely I should take

the inner peace at the end as a sign of redemption

but I found it to be pretty satisfactory. I feel like this demands a reread but I'll have to muster up some major fortitude before I can attempt it. I read the back 2/3 in quarantine which definitely contributed to the atmosphere, Would recommend if you have COVID.

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literaryash's review against another edition

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4.0

We love unhinged women.

Lonely and depressed main character is numb and tired of her life. (Ditto, Same!) Her parents leaves here with inheritance money, she had an easy job because she is prertty and skinny, and is educated. She turns to medication and sleeping (hibernating black outs) for a year to rest and regain her senses.

I really like best friend, even if the main character wasn't a good friend to her. But what happene to her when she took the pill? Ping xi friend was cool too. Who else would willingly stop by at your place for six months, bring you food, clean, and keep all your document safe, even if they are making art about you. Also The therapist as an interesting choice. I would have like to see any repercussions about her medical practice? Shes like handing out drugs just like that. Maybe it's a commentary that psychiatrists commonly do this and dont really get to know their patients..

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kniholenka's review

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reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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megmei's review

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dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I knew going into this book that it had divided a great deal of its readers. What I didn’t expect was for it to leave such a strong impression on me, and that I might consider myself a new fan of Moshfegh’s work.

Briefly, the plot of My Year of Rest and Relaxation (MYORAR, for short) can be most easily described as ‘Sleeping Beauty for the modern misanthrope’. I was immediately addicted to the stark contrast of New York at the turn of the millenium, full of potential, evoking the imagery of the Sex and the City, but against the backdrop of the narrator’s crumbling mental health. From the start, she knows she’s beautiful, white, blonde, and most importantly skinny, and yet she is not even remotely moved by it. On one hand you want to hate her, especially if you are nothing like her, but on the other hand, there is something reflected in her descent into absurd solipsism that just resonates with the experience of being a 20-something year old woman stuck in a life she hates, in a world that she feels is just vapid and meaningless.

I think where a lot of people get stuck with this is that they expect something weird and trippy when really this is just a very microscopic view into a voice that I think a lot of us have in our heads, whether we admit it to ourselves or not. We all have something mean, inexecusable and selfish in us. It’s natural, we are only human. What is interesting about this, is that the narrator allows herself almost reverently to succumb to all of her laziest instincts during a time of mental distress, to truly throw herself into this idea of sleeping through her own character development, hoping to fix these awful parts of herself. Perhaps this is exposing myself a little bit here for identifying so strongly with that, but if I could fix everything wrong with my brain by doing what the narrator does, I would. And then it is all written captivatingly by Mosfegh. I liken my experience a little bit to watching a car crash that I just couldn’t look away from: I was hooked, waiting to know how this would go wrong for her.

I was surprised at how this novel also deals quite deeply with the dissolution of a friendship that is steeped in the kind of toxicity that comes from two people who are just terrible for each other.

Reva and the narrator’s relationship feels like the kind of ‘frenemy’ trope that was just rampant in the early 2000s media (Serena and Blair?). Constantly competing, and yet neither really understanding why, or why they continue the friendship. Perhaps this resonated so deeply with me because as I enter my 30s, I’ve recently experienced a similar phenomenon in my own life. This probably isn’t rare. You enter your late 20s, and realise you are no longer the same people you were. Suddenly a friendship that spans decades leaves both parties sorely unsatisfied, and in some respects, deeply unhappy.

Reva is only ever portrayed through the eyes of the narrator, and she flickers between frank dislike, to moments where she is almost convincing herself that this friendship is worth it, in the moments where she seeks comfort in the banal, even if it she knows it doesn’t serve either of them. Reva is an important foil to the narrator, as she is living her life at almost a frenetic energy, going through the trials and tribulations of life head on, while the main character avoids it. She is constantly entering and leaving scenes going from one event to another, doing sit ups, etc. She is clearly competing with the narrator, consciously or not, and is similarly dismissive of the narrators struggles by constantly insisting that she’s beautiful, rich, lucky. Both are clearly dealing with their own struggles, one more outwardly than the other, and both are quite sad in their existences. I found it strangely cathartic to read these two battle each other through this friendship in a way that was so uncomfortable and sad, and yet deeply familiar and reassuring.

Mosfegh manages to find moments of levity in this tale, somehow, even if it’s tongue in cheek, or outright strange. The narrator’s obsession with Whoopi Goldberg, for example, was just such a specific character choice that despite it’s absurdity, it made sense. The interludes with the few men in this story also act as punctuation marks that create much more tension than I was expecting from a book about sleeping for year. The ending had me looking out of a window like Robert Pattinson in complete shock (iykyk). But the poignantly brief mention of it brought the rest of the year in MYORAR into sharp clarity and highlighted that the minutiae of our private suffering is so easily outshone in a moment of wild tragedy.

Maybe MYORAR just hits better and closer to home if you’ve experienced the deeply monotonous greyness of depression, and the desperately unempowered desire to change despite it all. I think you have to be a bit mentally unwell for this to really resonate with you. Take that as you will, but I personally was delighted by this book and I can’t wait to try more of Mosfegh’s writing.

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livwestland's review

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challenging dark funny reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

I find it difficult to even translate my feelings about this book into words. I think I hated it, but I couldn’t stop reading it either? The blurb on the back cover isn’t really an accurate reflection in my opinion. Funny? Maybe, although the only thing I found particularly amusing was the narrator’s obsession with Whoopi Goldberg and the true nonsense offered by Dr. Tuttle. Tender, compassionate? No, I wouldn’t say so. The protagonist is truly unlikeable, which I don’t hate, but doesn’t lend itself to a “tender” or “compassionate” read. She doesn’t provoke any level of sympathy for me.

The narrator is vapid, gross, entirely self-absorbed. Her best friend is actually quite sweet. It’s interesting to read from the unpleasant character’s perspective. There’s just no plot, only a premise. The ending was lacking anything spectacular, which I guess is fitting since nothing spectacular happens throughout.

I enjoyed the author’s style of writing and prose. I just can’t really say how much I enjoyed the book overall? I’m really torn on this one.

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