A review by ckncert
The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki

reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.25

 
 This book is the representation of if you were to open the suitcase of a frequent over-packer: so many clothes but they forgot to bring socks.
The Book of Form and Emptiness tells the story of a boy called Benny, whose life drastically changes after the traumatic death of his father and as he starts to hear objects talk. We follow his growth as he meets an eccentric Slovenian poet in a wheelchair and a mysterious artist who calls herself the Aleph. These new acquaintances validate his experiences and push him to explore his diversity, while the adults in his life (his mother, Annabelle, and his psychiatrist) are close-minded and clueless. However, Annabelle has her own issues to deal with: her immense grief and her hoarding problem, which almost gets them evicted altogether. Thus, the book follows these two characters as they try to collect the pieces of their broken lives through the help of people and books.
 The novel is built as a dialogue between the Book (Benny's book, the one which narrates his life) and Benny himself, as he sometimes interjects in the story to comment on what is going on. The aspect I liked most about this novel was the gorgeous writing. As a lover of literary fiction, the quality of the writing is essential to me. In this case, I found it compelling, profound, provocative, and very lyrical and poetic in some parts. The writing alone is why I stuck with this book till the end. 
However, because of the same writing, I developed a huge pet peeve as the book went on. I started to deeply despise Benny's chapters. Although they are often no longer than a page or so, they are written exactly as a 14-year-old boy would speak. The realism of the writing, with light cursing, informal turns of phrase, etc, made the sudden jump from the Book's prose to an annoying teenage boy's train of thought extremely jarring. Truly, Benny's comments weren't deep or insightful and I wish they would have added new information or have been cut in half. 
Finally, my biggest disappointment was the ending, which felt incredibly rushed. Throughout the book, Ruth Ozeki continues to add conflict and constantly ups the ante. However, despite having more than 500 pages to resolve most of the problems she has set up, she ends up making the issues magically disappear only in the last 20 pages.
Indeed, she even makes a character almost come back from the dead to end one of the conflicts. Benny can suddenly walk because he decided so and the voices are only background noise now, whereas they were still causing him problems a few pages before.
The reason the ending was so rushed and the characters didn't develop gradually was that Ozeki added too many elements, which suffocated the plot. The book is crammed with references to Buddhism, the Fluxus movement, Jazz, Walter Benjamin, Marie Kondo, and Japan, which makes it so that the plot is sacrificed. 
 Therefore, the enjoyment you will get out of this book depends on what you are looking for in a book. If you are in search of a well-told and developed story, you might need to read something else. However, it is undeniable that the book is a goldmine of references, most of which I was introduced to thanks to this book.
I would say it is a book worth reading anyway if I wasn't aware the length makes it very unapproachable for many readers. 



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