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A review by peeled_grape
Swamplandia! by Karen Russell
3.0
Hmm. Hmmm...
I've never read a book more rooted in history and place. It's a blend of historical fiction/horror with a shit ton of geographic detail. Sometimes this was lazy. Sometimes I felt like Kiwi only existed as an excuse to pack in historical detail(and to rescue Ossie, at the end) , and that felt kind of lazy. Karen Russell is very good at descriptions. She is incredible at accurately describing a feeling, a noise, a motion, etc. in a handful of words.
The beginning and middle of this book are very long -- I wouldn't say dragged out, but long. Then so much happens in the last 50 pages. Every sentence introduces some big leap. This didn't feel purposeful enough to me.
As far as the ending goes: This book loses its magic quickly. That's not saying it gets bad quickly, but it just loses every supernatural, absurd or otherwise unreal element to it. It feels like being dragged to the surface all at once, an "oh haha, that was all silly" feeling. You know when you leave the movie theater and it's bright in the hallway and it sinks in, again, that there's a real world out there? Like that. It was abrupt. I like books that let you feel the gravity of this situation, and this did that! But the last 100 pages did NOT match the first 300. (Think: Kelly Link for 300 pages, George Saunders for the last 100.) This reminded me of "Stephen Florida" in terms of bizarre, technically-realistic-but-so-weird-it's-not details, but I hoped it would do the same kind of unanswerable ending, where you don't know what happens, really, and there's a lot to speculate on. I wasn't satisfied with the ending.
Also, this was a very small portion of the book but it is something that gets me incredibly angry when it is done wrong: Do! Not! Write! About! Journalists! If! You! Clearly! Know! Nothing! About! Journalism! I think these parts were supposed to be exaggerated, but really, what happened is that Russell bloated the stereotype of a journalist, and it was lazy. It's not funny. It's not cute. It's not creative. Just move on.
I've never read a book more rooted in history and place. It's a blend of historical fiction/horror with a shit ton of geographic detail. Sometimes this was lazy. Sometimes I felt like Kiwi only existed as an excuse to pack in historical detail
The beginning and middle of this book are very long -- I wouldn't say dragged out, but long. Then so much happens in the last 50 pages. Every sentence introduces some big leap. This didn't feel purposeful enough to me.
As far as the ending goes:
Also, this was a very small portion of the book but it is something that gets me incredibly angry when it is done wrong: Do! Not! Write! About! Journalists! If! You! Clearly! Know! Nothing! About! Journalism! I think these parts were supposed to be exaggerated, but really, what happened is that Russell bloated the stereotype of a journalist, and it was lazy. It's not funny. It's not cute. It's not creative. Just move on.