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3.21 AVERAGE
3.21 AVERAGE
This book was well written and at times captured human emotions beautifully. However, it was saaaaaaaaaad in a low-level everyone is miserable way and was slower than I can take right now, so I ended up skimming the last third.
One of those books that I was thrilled to be done with. Is the author a talented writer? Sure. Would I pick up his other, more critically acclaimed book? Why not. But this book was a literal drag. It dragged my mood down and it dragged in terms of pace. Want to spend some time with deeply unpleasant people? Pick this thing up and meet its cast of characters. I get what the author was trying to do. I understand that he was illustrating to us why each of these people was so repellent. However, that does not mean that it was at all possible to connect with them, like them, or feel any investment in their stories. The only barely tolerable person in the story is the mother, whose insularity feels at least somewhat explicable because what she goes through with her husband. Do you like listening to people lie at length? Then you'll love the last 1/3 of the book, which mostly consists of the main character telling an extended lie - all while telling you it's a lie. I have no problem with fiction in general, but when someone who is a complete asshole of a character who has done nothing to make you interested in his life or psyche or whatever tells you that he's going to lie for a while, it's not appealing. The only reason I gave this two as opposed to one star is that the author is not untalented; he's just written a tremendously unlikeable book.
emotional
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
i didn’t know what to think of this book. structurally confusing but interesting regardless. glad i read it but no idea who i would recommend it to.
Fairly similar to "The Beautiful Things that Heaven Bears" in tone - I don't mind that it's similar characters, but feel like somehow the story is diminished from having the love story tied to it the way this author always does
Characters were too depressing with their lack of connection to each other and humanity. It made me grateful for my family, friends, and life but story (or stories) weren't connected or completed to my satisfaction.
How to Read the Air is the parallel story of two marriages as the participants struggle to connect with each other and find truth in themselves. One couple, Yosef & Mariam, are immigrants from Ethiopia who embark on a road trip from their home in Illinois to Nashville. The trip highlights the fragility of their relationship and their inability (and unwillingness) to make it right. The other couple that the novel depicts are Jonas (Yosef & Mariam's son, still an embryo on the aforementioned trip) and his wife Angela. While they are a modern couple living in New York City, they are faced with the some of the same issues to overcome as Jonas' parents.
As someone who lives a relatively solo existence, the novel's depiction of "aloneness" and loneliness really resonated with me. Each person really kept a lot of themselves silent and secret and were unwilling to open up to their partner about who they truly were and what they were thinking. Then I heard an interview with the author about the theme of "home" in the immigrant experience and that made me think more about the book. None of the characters ever really felt at home with each other or with themselves.
This was the most literary thing I've read in awhile and after reading all those quick romances it was difficult for me to connect to this story at first. But when I did finally, I thoroughly enjoyed it. And I love that even a week after reading it, I'm still thinking about it and contemplating its meaning.
As someone who lives a relatively solo existence, the novel's depiction of "aloneness" and loneliness really resonated with me. Each person really kept a lot of themselves silent and secret and were unwilling to open up to their partner about who they truly were and what they were thinking. Then I heard an interview with the author about the theme of "home" in the immigrant experience and that made me think more about the book. None of the characters ever really felt at home with each other or with themselves.
This was the most literary thing I've read in awhile and after reading all those quick romances it was difficult for me to connect to this story at first. But when I did finally, I thoroughly enjoyed it. And I love that even a week after reading it, I'm still thinking about it and contemplating its meaning.
I gave up. He has a lovely writing style, and I loved the last book (I forget the name, but set in DC). His characters are compelling -- but this one was just too damn depressing. The simul-death of two relationships in different eras is ringing with the "protagonist's" emotional detachment. Too much real crap going on in life right now to ride with this. I kept hoping for a turnaround that would help me stick with it, but it just keeps getting more and more emotionally gray. So, at 57.9%, I quit.
I wish I had been more clear-headed when I began this incredible novel, because I might not have been so confused in the beginning by Mengestu's non-chronological storytelling style. Having started this immediately on the heels of a book of short stories that frequently addressed an African immigrant experience in the U.S., I instantly felt a different tone in this narrative, focusing more on the emotional depths that are universal to all, regardless of citizenship. Told through the eyes of Jonas, the son of Ethiopian immigrants, this story centers on the ideas of truth and personal perspectives. As Jonas wanders through his parents' history, both what he knows to be true and the embellishments that he purposefully creates, he rediscovers more of the deep-seated fears and worries that have been a part of him for as long as he can remember. Haunting and deeply affecting, this novel begs to be read a second time for me- like the stories told by Jonas, this one is full of details and emotion that deserve a second look.
Jonas makes up and retells the story he has only heard from his mother (I think?) about a life-changing road trip his parents made decades ago, before he was born, in the United States. His parents immigrated from Ethiopia at different times and reunited in the United States.
In between his made up recollection of this road trip, he narrates his memories as a child, his work helping refugees seeking asylum in the US, his work as an English teacher, and his relationship with Angela, his wife.
It dragged on, and took me weeks longer to finish than it really should have, because I lost motivation to read it. I liked the first half but the initial charm and magic of the prose wore off about half way through, and the plot came to focus too much on the disintegrating relationship between Jonas and Angela, and there wasn't that much clarity around the incident and the roadtrip. The prose reminded me of Rachel Cusk's works - Outline and Transit - vastly introspective and observant. But it just didn't quite grip me the way Cusk's books did.
Maybe it was supposed to be ambiguous, just as how he had to put together the story from scraps of truth and expanses of imagination, and expectations of reality. But was it supposed to somehow mirror the story he was making up about his parents roadtrip? If so, it wasn't really clear. Like another reviewer mentioned, there wasn't really any character development or resolution. Not that there has to be, but it kinda just ended up being prose on paper. Prose that had potential...but didn't quite live up to it.
In between his made up recollection of this road trip, he narrates his memories as a child, his work helping refugees seeking asylum in the US, his work as an English teacher, and his relationship with Angela, his wife.
It dragged on, and took me weeks longer to finish than it really should have, because I lost motivation to read it. I liked the first half but the initial charm and magic of the prose wore off about half way through, and the plot came to focus too much on the disintegrating relationship between Jonas and Angela, and there wasn't that much clarity around the incident and the roadtrip. The prose reminded me of Rachel Cusk's works - Outline and Transit - vastly introspective and observant. But it just didn't quite grip me the way Cusk's books did.
Maybe it was supposed to be ambiguous, just as how he had to put together the story from scraps of truth and expanses of imagination, and expectations of reality. But was it supposed to somehow mirror the story he was making up about his parents roadtrip? If so, it wasn't really clear. Like another reviewer mentioned, there wasn't really any character development or resolution. Not that there has to be, but it kinda just ended up being prose on paper. Prose that had potential...but didn't quite live up to it.