Review: The Sequel (by Jean Hanff Korelitz)

My Rating: 4 stars

 

Given how much I loved Jean Hanff Korelitz’s literary thriller The Plot, it should come as no surprise that when I heard Korelitz had written a sequel to that book – aptly titled The Sequel – I was dying to read it (pun intended, lol).  The Plot was a book that blew me away – clever, creative, and so masterfully done, with an ending that was wholly unexpected (but made sense given the clues hidden throughout the story).  It was so well done, in fact, that I initially couldn’t help but wonder whether a sequel would be able to live up to the original (even Korelitz gives a shout out to this common cultural sentiment when one of her characters in The Sequel states that “they’re never as good as the first book, are they?”).  Well, it seems that the jury is still out with this one, as there seem to be varying reactions to it from what I can see – some readers feel the second book is better while others feel the original is still the best; for me personally, I would have to say that I fall into the second camp.  While I did enjoy this one and found it to be every bit as clever as the first book (I absolutely loved the way Korelitz named each chapter the title of a real-life literary sequel, as half the fun of reading this book, for me at least, was figuring out which book the sequel title belonged to), I also felt that it was not as tightly-written as the first book was and much less “suspenseful” in comparison. 

 

Before I go any further, I have to say this: despite what people may say about it being fine to read this one as a standalone, I actually feel it is absolutely necessary to read The Plot first, for multiple reasons.  First and foremost is the fact that this book starts off where the first one ended; second, much of the story expands upon many of the plot points from the first book, particularly as it pertains to Anna’s background; third, many of the characters from the first book also show up again, with a few featuring heavily in the storyline this time around; and fourth, there are a few points in the book where the big “twists” from the first book are mentioned.  So basically, if you have not read The Plot but try to read The Sequel, you will either be completely lost with the storyline or you will encounter so many “spoilers” from the first book that there’s no point going back to read it anymore.  To be honest, even reading the “blurb” on the jacket of the sequel is not a good idea if you haven’t read the first book, since there are some references to plot points in that story that, in my opinion, can be “spoiler-ish.”

 

In any case, with that out of the way – as I mentioned earlier, I feel that this book was enjoyable but the original was definitely better. I think part of the reason why I feel this way is because The Plot was unique enough on its own, from all aspects, whether storyline, characters, format (the “story within the story” concept was particularly well-done), tone, voice, flow, etc. – it all came together brilliantly.  With The Sequel, I feel that Korelitz was trying to rehash essentially all the same elements, except this time around, with Anna as the protagonist instead of Jacob (for obvious reasons).  This gave me a little bit of a “been there, done that” vibe for one, and two, it made the storyline a lot more predictable – case in point: with a few minor exceptions, the first book largely had me guessing as to the direction that Korelitz was going to take and I was genuinely shocked with ending; with this book, I already had everything figured out midway through the story and not only that, I ended up being exactly on-the-dot in terms of the ending.

 

I also have to say that I’m not entirely sure how I feel about Anna being the protagonist in this story given all the horrible things she did (and continues to do). The blurb on the jacket states that with The Sequel, Korelitz “gives readers an antihero to root for” – well, this wasn’t really a true statement for me because with Anna, I honestly did not see anything worth rooting for (though I understood Anna’s motivations, I still found her behavior and actions beyond appalling).  But I guess this is more a case of “it’s me, not the book,” since I’m not really a fan of diabolic, villain characters as protagonists.

 

Overall, this was a worthwhile read, especially if you’ve already read The Plot, as this story fills in nearly all of the gaps that were left open-ended from the first book (and it’s definitely a thrill to be able to recognize a character or plot point from the first book and wonder what the implications will be for the new protagonist who wasn’t involved in the interaction the first time around).  As for whether I would read a third book (if there were to be one – which, all indication so far is that there might be), probably yes, but definitely with less anticipatory excitement, especially if Anna is also going to be the protagonist the third go around.

 

Received ARC from Celadon Books via NetGalley.

 

Review: The Latecomer (by Jean Hanff Korelitz)

My Rating:  3.5 stars

I read Jean Hanff Korelitz's fantastic literary mystery The Plot last year and was very much blown away by how cleverly (and creatively) the story was written (in fact, I would even say it was one of the best literary mysteries I have ever read).  Given that context, I was of course super excited to land an early copy of Korelitz's newest work, The Latecomer — not only that, going into this, my expectations were also extremely high in that I was anticipating another intricate, brilliantly written literary mystery that would give me the same thrilling reading experience as The Plot did. Unfortunately, in the end, that's not how this one turned out.  Instead of giving The Plot vibes, this one ended up hewing closer to Korelitz's earlier work You Should Have Known (the book that the HBO series The Undoing was based on) in both story and structure.  Don't get me wrong — You Should Have Known was a good book overall, but its biggest problem was that it meandered way too much, making the story way more convoluted and confusing than I felt it needed to be (I go into much more detail in my review of that book).  

With The Latecomer, the writing was indeed intricate, with an overabundance of descriptive details that Korelitz lays out in a sophisticated and meticulous, but also incredibly "slow burn" way.  In addition, it felt like Korelitz was trying to cram as many recent / contemporary events and complex society issues into the story as possible — for example:  the pandemic, the previous administration, identity politics, infertility and reproductive rights, surrogacy, racial discrimination and social justice, PTSD, social media, religious freedom and exploration, politics, parent/child relationships, higher education and academia, love and marriage, fidelity, homosexuality, etc. (believe it or not, I am only scratching the surface here in terms of the tremendous amount of ground covered in the story).  And as if that weren't enough, all of it was woven into a complicated web of drama and dysfunction courtesy of the Oppenheimer family — parents Salo and Johanna, triplets Harrison, Lewyn, Sally, and "the latecomer" fourth child Phoebe.  All in all, this made for a tedious, exhaustive read that, in the end, became a chore to get through.

Convoluted story and structure aside though, I felt that Korelitz did a good job in terms of character development (which I also found with the two previous books of hers that I had read).  Korelitz takes her time flushing out the characters, giving us detailed insight into their thoughts and motivations as well as how each one evolves throughout the story — to the point that we as readers feel like we know this family intimately.  One thing I found interesting with the way the characters were written was that they were all quite unlikable (some more so than others — Harrison, for example, who acted like an arrogant bastard pretty much throughout the entire story), yet instead of loathing them like I normally would with these types of characters, I actually found myself pitying them (which, for the record, doesn't mean I condone any of their actions — in fact, I had the opposite reaction in that I was frustrated and angered by a lot of the things they did).  I'm not sure if I'm explaining this correctly — I guess the closest comparison would be that each character had redeeming qualities that, while far from canceling out their flaws, did make it difficult to completely despise them.

One thing I feel it's important to mention is that I went into this book thinking it would be either a literary mystery in the same vein as The Plot or a psychological thriller similar to You Should Have Known (the only 2 previous books of Korelitz's that I had read up to that point) — it turns out I was wrong on both fronts.  In fact, this book doesn't fall into the mystery / thriller / suspense genre at all (if I had to classify it, I would say it falls under contemporary fiction or literary fiction). Normally, this wouldn't matter much, but in this instance, because I had placed it in the mystery / thriller category, I was anticipating a big reveal / plot twist (maybe even multiple plot twists) somewhere along the line — it wasn't until I got to almost the end (400+ pages into the story) with no plot twist to be found, that I realized my mistake.  I bring this up in case this kind of thing matters to those who decide to pick this up, so you don't make the same mistake I did.

Overall, I did "enjoy" this one and am glad I read it, but it was definitely unnecessarily long, and also the story was way more convoluted than it needed to be (in my opinion at least).  If you decide to pick this one up, just know that it will require quite a bit of patience (which may or may not be worth it in the end).  With all that said, I like the way Korelitz writes her characters and I have no doubt that I will continue to read her works, though I will probably need to make sure I plan out the time better given the amount of patience needed to get through her novels.

Received ARC from Celadon Books via NetGalley

Review: The Plot (by Jean Hanff Korelitz)

My Rating:  4.5 stars

Two years ago, I had read Jean Hanff Korelitz's previous novel You Should Have Known (which is now famously known as the book that the HBO series "The Undoing" was adapted from) and while I liked the story overall, I remember how tedious of a read it was for me, mostly because the story meandered quite a bit and went off on various different tangents that didn't seem to have a whole lot to do with the plot.  And the book was long (400+ pages) — which normally wouldn't matter, except that the story was written in such a convoluted way that, by the time I got to the end, I was just glad it was over.

Given the above experience, it shouldn't come as a surprise that I went into Korelitz's newest book The Plot with a bit of trepidation, despite the fact that, as soon as I had read the book's premise, I had immediately wanted to read it.  My concerns didn't go away even after starting the book, as the story progressed really slowly for the first 50 pages or so — not only that, I also started noticing some of the long, meandering, overly-descriptive passages that had irked me in her previous book. But I stuck with it and am so glad I did, as this ended up being such a wonderful read! 

The story centers around a writer named Jacob Finch Bonner, a once successful author of a bestseller who hit a snag with his second book and is now struggling to move his career forward. While teaching at a low residency MFA program, Jake encounters a student, Evan Parker, who shares with him the plot of a story he plans on writing that he believes will be "a sure thing." Several years later, as Jake still struggles with his writing and has just about given up all hopes of reviving his career, he inadvertently finds out that Evan Parker has died, supposedly without having finished the "sure thing" novel he had bragged about during the MFA session.  At this point, Jake does what he feels any self-respecting writer would do — he takes the plot that Evan had told him about and turns it into a widely-read, bestselling novel.  Jake instantly becomes famous and also wealthy beyond measure.  One day, as he is riding the highs of success in both his personal and professional lives, he receives a mysterious message that contains four terrifying words: "You are a thief."   But it doesn't stop there — as Jake receives more and more threatening messages, to the point that he can't ignore them anymore, he sets off on a race against time to find out who his harasser is in the hopes of confronting them before they expose him.

As I mentioned earlier, I initially didn't have very high expectations going into this book (despite all the hype it has gotten so far) because I thought it would be a convoluted, drawn-out story that would take me longer than preferred to read.  But this book turned out to be opposite of what I was expecting — not only was it a quick read for me (I finished it in 2 sittings, with majority of the book completed in the second sitting because I just couldn't bring myself to put it down), the story was also tightly-plotted and absolutely brilliantly written.  Of course, there were still moments throughout the story where certain passages veered into the "overly-descriptive" category, but not to the extent as her previous book, in my opinion.  Having said this, in researching the author and her other works, I've come to realize that this is actually her distinctive writing style, which is good to know.  

In addition to a cleverly-crafted story however, one of the things that makes this book stand out is the way the characters are rendered, especially the main character Jake.  As a character, Jake is entirely fictional, however the way his struggles as a writer and the angst he goes through all came across so realistically, it really made the character come alive for me — to the point that I found it difficult to figure where I stood in terms of what he did.  Here, Korelitz did a masterful job weaving in recent "discussions" about certain aspects of the publishing industry and literary community that have been concerns over the years: issues such as appropriation versus inspiration, who should get to tell what story, the writing process and the trials and tribulations of being a writer, and most interesting of all, an inside glimpse into the publishing world and the role of the writer in that world. 

Another unique aspect of this book is the way Korelitz utilizes the "story within a story" method to tell Jake's story by incorporating excerpts from his book (the one with the "stolen" plot) interspersed throughout the story, culminating in a fantastic coming together of the plot to create a "fiction vs reality" twist in the end.  I don't want to say too much so as not to give away the ending, but I will say that this was one of the most propulsive, surprising endings that I've read in awhile.

Lastly, I just wanted to comment on why I ended up rating this one 4.5 stars rather than the full 5 stars.  The main reason for this is because I actually was able to figure out aspects of the ending early on, which made the "big reveal" (specifically as it pertained to the person sending the messages to Jake) less impactful — though with that said, the last couple scenes were definitely unexpected and very well-done.

This literary thriller is definitely a "must-read" in my book!  It's clever and creative and even though I did figure out parts of it early on, I still found much of the plot to be unpredictable in terms of the direction things ended up going.  Already, this book is getting a lot of buzz, and deservedly so, in my opinion!  And I wouldn't be surprised if this one also gets optioned for a movie or TV series at some point — I would definitely be interested in watching if that were to be the case!

Received ARC from Celadon Books via NetGalley

Review: You Should Have Known (by Jean Hanff Korelitz)

My Rating: 3 stars

I decided to take a little bit of a detour from the ARCs and library books that I’ve been reading to squeeze in this buddy read with one of my good friends.  She was interested in reading this because she had heard that the book would be the basis for an upcoming HBO mini-series adaptation starring Nicole Kidman -- who is one of her favorite actresses -- and being the “informed watcher” that my friend is, she wanted to understand the backstory first so that she will be prepared when the series actually comes out (I’m actually the exact same way when it comes to TV series and movies, which is one reason why we’re such good friends, lol). 

This is a novel that actually came out back in 2014 -- the story revolves around Grace Reinhart Sachs, a marriage therapist in New York City who seems to have the perfect life, with a smart and handsome husband (Jonathan) who is a respected doctor at one of the city’s biggest medical establishments and a teenage son (Henry) who is musically gifted, intelligent, and is a model student.  In addition to living among the upper echelons of New York high society, Grace also has a forthcoming book that is the culmination of her career experience and quite possibly could make her one of the most sought after therapists in the city.   One day, when tragedy strikes the family of a boy at her son’s school and Grace’s husband coincidentally goes missing around the same time, the perfect life that Grace had built for herself threatens to unravel right before her eyes.  But the physical turmoil that she goes through pales in comparisons to the turmoil in her mind and in her heart, and soon, the question becomes whether she will be able to maintain her sanity and rebuild her life.

My first reaction after reading this book is that, at 400+ pages, it was way longer than it really needed to be.  I normally don’t have a problem with big books like this but this particular one felt especially long due to the way it was structured.  The first two-thirds of the book felt really slow and dragged out, mostly because the story would go off on various tangents every few pages, to the point that one simple scene could take an entire chapter to play out.  Not only that, whenever there was dialogue between characters, it was almost always interrupted by Grace’s personal thoughts and memories (the narrative is told from Grace’s perspective) – so a conversation that might be 4 or 5 lines of dialogue, something that would take up at most a quarter of a page let’s say, ends up spanning over 20 to 30 pages.  There was also a lot of “describing” of minutiae (for instance, several pages describing Grace’s office, from the color of her couch to the paintings on the wall and the backstory on both), details that I felt weren’t really necessary in advancing the plot and mostly made the story more tedious to read.  Halfway through the book, I started to ask myself what the point of the story was, as plot-wise, nothing significant had happened – it was mostly pages and pages of Grace’s thoughts and the tangents she goes off on when someone says something that triggers a particular memory for her.  Interestingly enough, in the last third or so of the book, the style seemed to shift in that the story went from slow and drawn out to very fast-paced, with one thing happening after another – it was almost as if the last third of the book was written by someone else entirely and not the same person who wrote the first two-thirds.  I felt like the story was told in a very “roundabout” way, which made it a bit hard to follow and also exhaustive to read.

With all of that said though, the reason I rated this 3 stars and not lower (technically I’m between 3 and 3.5 stars on this one) is because, despite the convoluted structure, the way the story was written made me feel compelled to keep reading and to find out whether Grace would be able to put the pieces of her life back together.   Character development-wise, I actually felt the author did a good job with the main character Grace in that, by letting us (the readers) into her mind and making us experience first-hand the mental and psychological breakdown that she endures as the result of her carefully-manufactured world collapsing around her, it presented an interesting, thought-provoking commentary about relationships as well as human behavior.  Basically, I liked the premise of the story overall and even felt some sections were cleverly written (especially the parts that subtly juxtaposed what was happening to Grace with the advice that she was giving to her clients), but I wasn’t a fan of the story’s structure or its execution.  When it comes to books, I’m really big on the “experience” of reading a book and for me, this one was a bit of a struggle, though I did get some food-for-thought out of it so in that sense, it was a worthwhile read.

Tying the book back to the TV series adaptation mentioned at the beginning of this review – in reading what is out there so far about the series, one thing I found interesting is that there seem to be characters in the series that were not actually in the book.  Also, in addition to Nicole Kidman taking on the role of Grace Sachs, they also cast Hugh Grant in the role of her husband Jonathan – this is significant because in the book, Jonathan is a character that is only talked about but never actually appears…yet in the series, it seems that Jonathan as a character will have more of a presence than he did in the book.  Both of these things lead me to wonder just how “faithful” this adaptation will be to the book -- but since the series is still in the works right now, I will withhold further judgement until the filming is actually completed and the series is released.

Overall, I feel this book is highly readable, but for the right audience.  It does give some interesting insight on relationships, but I think the length of the book and the convoluted way it was written will probably deter some folks from picking this one up.  I was actually tempted to abandon this one myself during the parts that I felt were especially slow, but of course I continued with it and it does pick up pace near the end.  The reviews for this book seem to be a mixed bag so it’s probably a good idea to check out both the highly rated and lower rated ones to get a better feel for what to expect.