Review 639: The Definitions

The Definitions by Matt Greene
My rating: 2.75 of 5 stars

I finished this book a week ago and took some time thinking about it, because it’s not your typical short novel. It is reminiscent of I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman. I started my review of Harpman’s book with “A dystopian book, without a lot of answers.” And that line fits well with this book as well: short and left with ambiguity and more questions in the end. Seems also to be not really my kind of book.

A virus has rendered people amnesiacs. They don’t remember anything, so are at this facility to learn how to behave in society, maybe regain their memories of who they were before. They take new names. The narrator, however is unnamed. They are unsure about the virus, there appears to be a new version that may reinfect or not.

There is a lot of focus on words. The narrator and a friend are focused on the meaning of a few, such as chair and bench. How to define exactly these words and what they represent.

It felt like the students at the center aren’t being told the full truth. Things are going on in the outside world they don’t know about, at least anymore, and are sheltered or given a new story. It’s hard to tell since we as readers never get the full story either.

This will likely work better for some people, while others who don’t like vagueness and obscurity, this may be a pass.



Thanks to Henry Holt and Co. and NetGalley for an uncorrected electronic advance review copy of this book.

Review 615: I Who Have Never Known Men

I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Maybe 3.75 is a better rating than 4.

A dystopian book, without a lot of answers. The narrator doesn't have a name, only called The Child, as she was young when her and 39 other women were put into the bunker. The men guard them closely. She knows nothing other than this bunker, can only learn what the women tell her. As she becomes a teenager she wants to know more.

Interesting and simple book, and yet it isn't.

Review 29: The Parade

The Parade by Dave Eggers
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I like Dave Eggers books. Each one I've read has stuck with me and I expect this short book will as well. It's perhaps a parable. I didn't know the premise of the story, I just knew it was Eggers and read the book.

It starts with two men meeting for the first time in a foreign country, no passports and no names, for safety concerns. It sounded to me like a set-up for CIA or co-ops type of operation, but it turns out they are about to pave a road on a war-torn country that just ended decades of civil war. This new road is bridging the North and South to a new prosperity, to the new century.

The two men are numbers, Four is the experienced and regimented man, wanting to get the job done quickly and get out. Nine is the adventurous, his first time doing this type of job. He has his hair cut in a "ridiculous" way in which it is always falling into his face and having to be brushed aside. They could not be more different.

The place is unnamed and no one has a real name. But the story has a purpose. At times it can be laughable at these two and their differences and then it gets serious.

I read this in a day. It is short, but it still surprised me. And happily Eggers hasn't disappointed me yet. I will definitely read more of his works, and there are several I have not yet read.


Previously read Dave Eggers books:
What is the What (fiction) - August.2008
Zeitoun (non-fiction) - January.2017