A review by kkilburn
Arcadia, by Lauren Groff
3.0
I wish I could rate this book in sections. Arcadia tells the story of Bit, who grew up in the Arcadia commune, from his early childhood to his middle adulthood. For me, the book comprised four sections: Bit's earliest childhood in the new commune; his 14th year as the commune was falling apart; a very brief glance at his early adulthood, marriage, birth of his child, and desertion by his wife; and his return to Arcadia, which time includes the death of his father and the long death of his mother from ALS. The first two parts mesmerized me; the latter two, unfortunately, bored me. The difference between them, I think, was this. In the first two sections, we live Bit's experience of a complex, fascinating community from its birth to its death. Because the story is told in the present tense, we live those experiences in two fundamentally distinct ways - as a young child more capable of experiencing than understanding, and as a teenager who can be both a more faithful narrator and an interpreter of events. We learn about Bit himself and the people who matter the most to him, and we learn about the dynamics of the community. This is rich stuff.
The latter two parts, in contrast, felt more superficial. To begin with, I found the adult Bit to be far too passive to sustain my interest as a character. He seemed far more distant from people as an adult than as a child, so he engaged less with others. He is, as we are repeatedly reminded, a photographer - an observer by nature. But I just wasn't excited about what he was given to observe. We get a little bit about what happens to the kids he grew up with. We get only a glimpse of what I thought would be one of the most important parts of his life: the return of his childhood love, now a recovering addict, 20 years after she left Arcadia; the birth of his daughter; and his desertion by his wife. We get a pandemic that, for me, serves very little narrative function. Finally, we have his return to Arcadia and his mother's long decline and death from ALS. This last part, at least, offers food for thought - but again, I just didn't find Bit's thoughts very interesting. Of course, this is one person's opinion only, and I can understand that others may feel differently!
That said, one thing that kept me reading to the very end was Groff's gorgeous prose. As Goodreads author Lydia Netzer points out in her review, she uses the present tense narration brilliantly to immerse us in Bit's world. I also found her imagery to be powerful and evocative without being contrived. Just a few examples: The young Bit is happy -- "A good bubble rises in Bit, and he moves lightly to keep it whole." Bit's mother, Hannah, suffers from depression and has gone weeks without stirring from bed. The commune's women come to get her up and wash her. "Slowly, her smell is thinned with Astrid's rose soap. Her skin, her hair, her sleep, is watered until, at last, what is her own disappears.", If you've ever suffered from depression, that last phrase is staggering. As an adult, at a party with his childhood friends, now successful urban or suburbanites, a stray word triggers a quick, shared memory: "He thinks of the rotten parachute they played with as kids in Arcadia: they hurtle through life aging unimaginably fast, but each grasps a silken edge of memory that billows between them and softens the long fall."
Whatever the parts I didn't care for, I'm really glad I read this book.
The latter two parts, in contrast, felt more superficial. To begin with, I found the adult Bit to be far too passive to sustain my interest as a character. He seemed far more distant from people as an adult than as a child, so he engaged less with others. He is, as we are repeatedly reminded, a photographer - an observer by nature. But I just wasn't excited about what he was given to observe. We get a little bit about what happens to the kids he grew up with. We get only a glimpse of what I thought would be one of the most important parts of his life: the return of his childhood love, now a recovering addict, 20 years after she left Arcadia; the birth of his daughter; and his desertion by his wife. We get a pandemic that, for me, serves very little narrative function. Finally, we have his return to Arcadia and his mother's long decline and death from ALS. This last part, at least, offers food for thought - but again, I just didn't find Bit's thoughts very interesting. Of course, this is one person's opinion only, and I can understand that others may feel differently!
That said, one thing that kept me reading to the very end was Groff's gorgeous prose. As Goodreads author Lydia Netzer points out in her review, she uses the present tense narration brilliantly to immerse us in Bit's world. I also found her imagery to be powerful and evocative without being contrived. Just a few examples: The young Bit is happy -- "A good bubble rises in Bit, and he moves lightly to keep it whole." Bit's mother, Hannah, suffers from depression and has gone weeks without stirring from bed. The commune's women come to get her up and wash her. "Slowly, her smell is thinned with Astrid's rose soap. Her skin, her hair, her sleep, is watered until, at last, what is her own disappears.", If you've ever suffered from depression, that last phrase is staggering. As an adult, at a party with his childhood friends, now successful urban or suburbanites, a stray word triggers a quick, shared memory: "He thinks of the rotten parachute they played with as kids in Arcadia: they hurtle through life aging unimaginably fast, but each grasps a silken edge of memory that billows between them and softens the long fall."
Whatever the parts I didn't care for, I'm really glad I read this book.