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.
