A review by tregina
-30- by Clinton W. Waters
5.0
Wow was THIS a surprise! I grabbed it because it was new and the title caught my eye and it was the right length to finish before I fell asleep. I was not expecting such an incredible, thoughtful, powerful piece of work.
30 is an age where a lot of us experience a kind of existential dread. It's a milestone that has always at least partly signified the end of something, a transition from youth to full adulthood. This book makes that existential crisis a real, concrete thing: when you turn 30, your life either ends or moves on, and it's a 50/50 crapshoot. This could have been a one-note concept, but the book explores how it affects a whole society, from history to business to family to entertainment and more, and primarily how it affects a person on the cusp of turning 30. And the ending is...I was trying to figure out how it could possibly end, and the way it did was perfect. I have never been that breathless about where a story was going before.
And let's talk about that title! In a former life, I worked as a typesetter for several newspapers and journals, which is the only reason I know that "-30-" is what is used to indicate "the end" of a submitted piece. I'm not even sure if it's still in use anymore; even when I was in the field, it was largely only used by longtime contributors and press releases and not by the average article. So yes. Brilliant.
And all of this in the space of a novella. Not a word was wasted, and not a word more was needed. Everything worked. I am very conservative and sparing with my 5 stars, but by the time I got to the end of this novella, I didn't even have to debate it.
30 is an age where a lot of us experience a kind of existential dread. It's a milestone that has always at least partly signified the end of something, a transition from youth to full adulthood. This book makes that existential crisis a real, concrete thing: when you turn 30, your life either ends or moves on, and it's a 50/50 crapshoot. This could have been a one-note concept, but the book explores how it affects a whole society, from history to business to family to entertainment and more, and primarily how it affects a person on the cusp of turning 30. And the ending is...I was trying to figure out how it could possibly end, and the way it did was perfect. I have never been that breathless about where a story was going before.
And let's talk about that title! In a former life, I worked as a typesetter for several newspapers and journals, which is the only reason I know that "-30-" is what is used to indicate "the end" of a submitted piece. I'm not even sure if it's still in use anymore; even when I was in the field, it was largely only used by longtime contributors and press releases and not by the average article. So yes. Brilliant.
And all of this in the space of a novella. Not a word was wasted, and not a word more was needed. Everything worked. I am very conservative and sparing with my 5 stars, but by the time I got to the end of this novella, I didn't even have to debate it.