Review: The God of the Woods (by Liz Moore)

 My Rating: 5 stars

With summer in full swing, I’ve been trying to catch up on all the reading I had planned to do, which, admittedly, has not been easy given the many other obligations that I’ve been trying to juggle as well.  Having said that, I’m working through my stack slowly but surely, prioritizing the “must-reads” by favorite authors that I’ve been looking forward to for months.  One of those favorite authors is Liz Moore, whose 2 previous works Long Bright River (2020) and The Unseen World (2016) I had read and loved.  Moore’s newest novel, The God of the Woods, is her most ambitious novel to date and absolutely a brilliantly written masterpiece!

 

This intricately crafted, multi-layered story weaves together several complex threads, told from the perspectives of multiple complicated (and often morally ambiguous) characters, to create a wonderfully nuanced narrative that I honestly could not put down (despite clocking in at nearly 500 pages, I flew through this one in two sittings).  The story begins with a mystery – the disappearance of teenager Barbara Van Laar from a family run summer camp in the Adirondack Mountains (in New York) – but when it is revealed that another Van Laar child had also disappeared from the same family compound 14 years ago (Barbara’s older brother Bear), the possible connection between the two cases leads to a riveting exploration of family dynamics and much, much more.  This is truly a wide-reaching novel that covers many themes and social issues, including family and marriage struggles, parent/child relationships, class disparities and the implications of these differences on the rich vs the poor, gender discrimination, land conservation vs exploitation of nature, coming of age, identity and belonging, abuse and neglect vs caretaking and found family, inequalities within the criminal justice system, etc.  At the same time, there are also historical elements that Moore incorporated into the narrative that aren’t readily apparent without reading the Author’s Note (which I highly recommend). 

 

There is so much to unpack with this story, yet at the same time, it’s not the overly complex type of story where you have to read it several times to understand what it’s trying to say. In addition to the mystery / suspense element being superbly done (at multiple points when I thought I had figured out the ending, turns out I was completely wrong), the atmospheric nature of the writing (to the point that I felt transported back to a different time and place) gave this a historical fiction feel, while the extensive coverage of various contemporary social issues also made the story and characters highly relatable. 

 

One of the things I love about Moore (in addition to her knack for creating memorable characters that I can’t help stop thinking about) is her ability to take a subject that I’m usually not too keen on reading about (i.e. drug addiction/opioid crisis, computer science and technology, environmentalism) and craft such an emotionally compelling story around it that it piques my interest and I find myself wanting to read/learn more about the subject.

 

This brilliant, genre-defying novel is the perfect summer read and one that I highly, highly recommend.  If this is your first-time reading Moore’s novels, this is a great place to start, but definitely go back and read her previous novels as well, if you can (I myself still have to read her first 2 novels, which are on my list to get to at some point).  I can’t wait for what Moore decides to write next – hopefully we’ll hear something soon!

 

Received ARC from Riverhead Books via NetGalley.

Review: The Unseen World (by Liz Moore)

My Rating: 5 stars

This book blew me away, which, to be honest, I absolutely was not expecting.  When I first read the premise, all the mentions of things like "computer science" and "artificial intelligence" and "virtual reality" and "cryptanalysis" made me wary, as I thought this would be one of those "overly science-y" books that would go way over my head and end up being a struggle to read. Well, I couldn't have been more wrong!  Yes, there was "science stuff" in here and computer as well as coding-related terms that didn't make tremendous sense to me at times — but what I appreciated was that these elements didn't overwhelm the main story; rather, they were more in the background. complementing the story, and only being brought to the forefront occasionally as necessary.

Despite the book's title as well as its science-themed elements, this story, at its core, is actually a coming-of-age tale that follows the main character Ada Sibelius as she navigates an unconventional life raised by her eccentric single father David, who runs a computer science lab in Boston in the 1980s.  Ada is homeschooled and accompanies her father to his lab everyday where she learns the ins-and-outs of his work, so that by the time she is twelve years old, she is already a prodigy in the area of computer tech and coding. It is around this time that David is diagnosed with Alzheimer's and his mind begins to deteriorate more rapidly than anticipated — a diagnosis that deals a devastating blow to Ada, as David was essentially her entire world and now she finds herself unequipped to face the "real" world outside.  Ada goes to live with David's colleague and neighbor Diana Liston, a divorcee with three sons who is also David's closest and most trusted friend. Before Ada has a chance to adjust to the new circumstances of her life however, she finds out that her beloved father actually is not who she (and everyone else who knew him) thought he was.  This leads Ada to embark on a convoluted path to unravel the secrets that David had been hiding — a journey of discovery that follows Ada from adolescence to adulthood and becomes a necessary means to understanding her own existence.

As I mentioned earlier, I went into this one a bit apprehensive, but ended up loving it so much. Admittedly, this is a story that takes awhile to get into, especially the first third or so, as the author Liz Moore takes her time introducing and building up the characters (which definitely pays off in the end given how attached we become to these characters — specifically Ada, David, and Liston). This is very much a character-driven story told primarily through the lens of Ada's coming-of-age and interactions with those around her, yet the arc involving her father David's past and the quest to find out his identity is also written so compellingly. It's always a good sign when I pick up a hefty book such as this one (which clocks in at nearly 500 pages) and find myself unable to put it down because I care so much about these characters and want to keep turning the pages so I can find out as much as possible about them. 

This is the second book of Liz Moore's that I've read (the first one was her newest novel Long Bright River, which I read in early 2020 and also loved) and I've noticed that her stories always seem to have sad undertones to them (probably because she writes about serious, difficult subject matter) where her characters experience their fair share of heartache and pain, and of course things don't necessarily turn out perfectly in the end — though with that said, there is also hope and resilience, which prevents the story from descending into complete bleakness.  

This is a poignant, beautifully written story that is well worth the patience it takes to get through some parts.  It's also a story that invokes thought and self-reflection and definitely won't be easily forgotten.  I'm glad I took a chance on this one and I'm also grateful that this is one of my book club reads, as discussing a book of this nature (where there are aspects I still don't really understand) usually helps clarify and enhance the reading experience for me.  

One last comment that I would like to make about my rating of this book:  throughout the time I was reading, I kept wavering between whether to rate this 4.5 or 5 stars, as I felt it could've gone either way.  Well, in the end, it was the Epilogue (which was amazing!) that pushed this up to 5 stars for me.  Given how much I enjoyed the two Liz Moore novels I've read so far, no doubt that I am definitely interested in exploring her backlist at some point! 

Review: Long Bright River (by Liz Moore)

My Rating: 4.5 stars

I chose Liz Moore's Long Bright River as my very first read of 2020 and I am happy to say that it was an excellent choice!  This story, about two sisters who were extremely close during their childhood but ended up on grossly divergent paths, reads like a thriller at first, but as the events in the story unfold and the characters evolve, it becomes apparent that this is no ordinary suspense novel.  In fact, I would actually classify this more as literary fiction than suspense / thriller, as the "disappearance" of one of the sisters serves as a catalyst with which the author does a deep dive into various societal issues — most specifically, opioid addiction and it's impact on individuals as well as their families.  

In the Philadelphia neighborhood of Kensington, where every street corner bears the scars of a town in the throes of an opioid epidemic, Mickey Fitzpatrick patrols the streets of the 24th district on her regular police beat.  On her patrols, sometimes she crosses paths with her sister Kacey, who has been gripped in the vise of opioid addiction since her teenage years and now permanently lives on the streets.  The two of them are no longer on speaking terms, yet the underlying concern and worry that the once inseparable siblings have for each other, still occasionally rises to the surface. When a string of murders takes place in the district, with each victim seeming to fit Kacey's profile — a young woman living on the streets and engaged in prostitution in order to support her drug addiction — Mickey is immediately alarmed when she discovers that her sister has suddenly (and coincidentally) disappeared.   From that moment, Mickey's singular goal becomes finding the person responsible for the murders — and possibly her sister's disappearance — a goal bordering on obsession that threatens to upend the life that Mickey worked so hard to build.

This is a beautifully written story, atmospheric and realistically rendered, with flawed characters whose actions and choices put them in morally ambiguous territory. Ultimately, in addition to being a story about the dangers of addiction, it is also about the bonds of family and ties between sisters that are hard to break even through betrayal and heartbreak.

At times heart wrenching, yet ultimately hopeful, this is a timely novel that I feel everyone needs to read.  Though this book clocked in at nearly 500 pages, don't be put off by the length, as this was fast-paced enough and the story engaging enough that the time reading this actually flies by.   When planning your reading at the start of this new year, definitely add this "must-read" novel to your list!

Received ARC from Riverhead Books via Edelweiss.