Rating: 58% | ★☆☆☆☆ Synopsis (from Goodreads): The year is 1995, and email is new. Selin, the daughter of Turkish immigrants, arrives for her freshman year at Harvard. She signs up for classes in subjects she has never heard of, befriends her charismatic and worldly Serbian classmate, Svetlana, and, almost by accident, begins corresponding with Ivan, an older mathematics student from Hungary. Selin may have barely spoken to Ivan, but with each email they exchange, the act of writing seems to take on new and increasingly mysterious meanings. At the end of the school year, Ivan goes to Budapest for the summer, and Selin heads to the Hungarian countryside, to teach English in a program run by one of Ivan's friends. On the way, she spends two weeks visiting Paris with Svetlana. Selin's summer in Europe does not resonate with anything she has previously heard about the typical experiences of American college students, or indeed of any other kinds of people. For Selin, this is a journey further inside herself: a coming to grips with the ineffable and exhilarating confusion of first love, and with the growing consciousness that she is doomed to become a writer. Non-Spoiler Review: This book is going in the "TikTok tricked me" pile. But that's not really a fair critique of the way I feel about this book; mostly, I feel disappointed. My unofficial reading goal for this year is to read more literary fiction, and I had high hopes for The Idiot in that regard. The Idiot is sectioned similarly to Maggie Nelson's The Argonauts, which is part of the reason why reading this book felt so laborious and yet addicting. While Selin's story is technically broken into seasons, there are no chapters within the months—leading to enormous chunks of text separated only by a few strokes of the return key rather than a full page break. The reader keeps reading, hoping for a chapter break where there will be none. But aside from the spacing, I found this novel to be incredibly inconsequential. I assume that the sheer absurdity and aimlessness of the novel is by design; this is a coming-of-age novel that is meant to be a brief exploration of a year rather than a genuine arc from start to finish. (Not to mention the existence of the forthcoming sequel, Either/Or.) But the choices that Selin makes and the characterizations of the people around her she proposes feel incredibly inconsequential, especially as she continues to make the same choices and spend time with the same people. The stakes in this novel are so subtle they feel nonexistent. Many of them also center around Ivan, a character who I'd given up liking or sympathizing with about a third of the way into the novel. Ultimately, I agree partially with Miranda July's quote on the back cover: "An addictive, sprawling epic; I wolfed it down." The Idiot certainly is an epic, an immense fabric sewn with dozens of its characters' threads. It is not, however, particularly deserving of being wolfed down. (Click "Read More" for spoilers.) Plot (17/30) Beginning (6/10), Middle (5/10), and End (6/10) As a college freshman myself, the opening chapters of The Idiot were familiar: walking onto campus, trying to present yourself authentically—but, you know, just a more outgoing authentic version of yourself—signing up for courses without really knowing how to do it, trying to accustom yourself to living in the same room with someone else. Selin's forays into Russian class were particularly, eerily nostalgic for me after seven years of sitting in a classroom struggling to conjugate imperfect French verbs. But with the introduction of Ivan--I V A N, as I pronounced his name in my head—the novel takes a deceptively slow turn towards a story that is less coming-of-age in college and more unrequited, undeserved love. Selin centers her life around Ivan, a choice that proves confusing and ultimately unresolved for either of them. The exact nature of their relationship is unknown, even to Selin, which is what makes the fact that the novel is so centered on it even more frustrating. The third act of the novel sees Selin as quasi-independent, without Svetlana or Ivan's interference. Still, it is not entirely satisfying; it is unclear what, if anything, Selin learns, and what she could learn. Walking through security was like dying—the way you had to say goodbye to everyone, the way you just became your name on a paper and gave up your money and your watch and your shoes. Characters (10/30) Development (6/15) and Allure (4/15) Selin is largely a blank slate; actions are done to her rather than her performing any actions. As such, it's difficult to really understand and root for her. Selin is the epitome of the "normal girl" protagonist—perhaps emphasizing why the line between "realistic story" and "boring story" is so fine. None of the secondary characters are particularly likable, and they likely aren't meant to be, but it's still frustrating to have to read about them. Svetlana is detached from the story despite being a major character, and Ivan is downright unpleasant. It's unclear what Selin sees in Ivan, if she sees anything at all. The characters' lack of dynamism heavily contributes to the story's slow pace and aimlessness. Writing (14/20) Descriptions (6/10) and Flow (8/10) Batuman's writing is crisp, if a little overly straightforward. I am rather biased because I lean purple in my own writing, but I found myself longing for metaphors and similes throughout the novel. Much of the writing rolls along like the story—muted, quotidian. Yet there are some quotes that shine, some quotes that elicit minor chuckles. In Russian class, no one cared about truth conditions. We all said "I have five brothers." Closure/Set-Up (11/20) Logic (7/10) and Allure/Closure (4/10) The ending of the novel confirms its inconsequentiality. The very last page feels like the ending of a chapter (although what really are chapters in this novel?) rather than the ending of a story. I'm not sure if Batuman knew all along that she would write a sequel, but this novel stood alone for so long that it's fairly safe to say that the ending is underwhelming regardless of a second novel. And it's a shame because the last ten or twenty pages of the novel is when Selin truly begins to come into her own. And the reader never has the opportunity to grow with her. But, to me, nineteen still felt old and somehow alien to who I was. It occurred to me that it might take more than a year—maybe as many as seven years—to feel nineteen.
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