Tommy Orange’s There, There is in the top three books of 2018. You should go get it and read it and that’s about all you need to know.
If you must know more… the opening chapters – broad and context setting – are powerful, moving, persuasive and other synonyms for compelling. After these historical and broad chapters we move through a series of characters and their tangential relationship to a coming pow-wow in Oklahoma. Weaving through second and third person, these initially discrete chapters layer and build to the climax that is polyphonic and emotionally charged in the best possible ways. While each character receives relatively scant development because of the condensed chapter the reader encounters them, I was nevertheless utterly riveted by the climactic scenes and cared urgently and completely about the outcome.
So there you go. Go get it and read it.
*UPDATE* A bunch of you have been asking for the other two books in the top three for 2018: reasonable request. So…
Literary Vice 