Category Archives: Book Club

December 31, 2013 · 10:14 pm

The Circle: May it be Unbroken

Here is the good thing about Dave Egger’s *The Circle*: the premise. And what’s the premise? A tech company “The Circle” in the not-so-distant future *cough Google cough* has saturated the market to the point where it controls access to all information and uses this ‘power’ to control all spending, government, actions, individual thought. Protagonist Mae begins the novel indifferent to the power of the Circle, but becomes increasingly infatuated and then utterly committed to the ideology of the Circle – “all must be known” and “information is a human right” and “privacy is theft.” She is intended to serve as a reader-surrogate so that the reader might recognize the ways in which her current unconcern or apathy about the reach of global information conglomerates could readily bleed into a) total obligation to and investment in the conglomerate, b) an inability to think independently or to be alone and c) the totalitarian endgame of one entity (re: company) controlling all aspects of a citizenry. That is to say this is a book with a partisan message: start thinking seriously about the power of Google, start actively questioning reasonable limits of information access/sharing, start protesting the erosion of privacy and public space.

And that’s where the good in the novel ends. The premise is executed with a clumsiness and heavy-handedness that made me suspicious of Egger’s trust in the intelligence of his readers. And in the clumsy and heavy-handed I was left with a book that was still brilliant in its idea, rich in its setting, but entirely frustrating to read.

George Orwell’s 1946 essay “Why I Write” posits that one of the principle reasons for writing is to articulate and argue a political position. It isn’t, I don’t think, a terrifically trendy way to write or read fiction in 2013. And so perhaps it’s the decidedly aggressive political argument of *The Circle* that rubs me the wrong way – not the message itself, rather, the heavy-handed way the novel goes about making its argument. It lacks elegance, subtlety or complication. In its rush to make sure the reader gets the allegory and adopts the position of protecting privacy the novel risks negating the potential disruption of the allegory itself. I became less unsettled by the message (and at first it really was compelling) and more annoyed by how little Eggers trusted me to get the idea without Being Showed It In Capital Letters: ALLEGORY.

This heavy-handedness is most obvious (and annoying) in the character development of Mae. We’re supposed to – I imagine – see her casual decline into full acceptance of all things Circle. We’re supposed to see the semi-climactic scene where she’s in a room with one of the Wise Men (really. did I mention it’s heavy-handed?) getting a lesson on the selfishness of secrets and the rationality/generosity of open and unfettered access to individual actions, thoughts and beliefs as some kind of moment of revelation and change. Except all this reader could concentrate on was how *obvious* the whole thing was. The move from dependence on the company – excellent health care! fancy workplace! prestige! – to acceptance of its doctrines for pragmatic reasons – I’ll tweet and email because I’m told to! – to an adoption of the dogma because people are unthinking and pliable enough to assume any ideology if exposed to it long enough.

So while I’ll recommend *The Circle* because I think the (albeit grossly heavy-handed) message is worth considering, I do so with the caveat that if you’re already suspicious of the influence of Google then go ahead and skip this one. However, if you were – like me (and I’ll admit it) – apathetic about questions of surveillance, privacy, access-to-information, public space then do read it. Or at least, do read the first 75 pages. It makes a compelling – if also tenacious and indefatigable – argument well worth considering and acting upon.

 

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December 1, 2013 · 8:23 pm

A Star Called Henry: Marvellous

You should*

I read historical fiction because I love the careful (and sometimes casual) intersection of the factual and the imagined, the playful ways these two imagined-as-discrete categories reveal one another to be permeable and fluid. The ways I learn the traditional historical timeline – the IRA formed in these years under these leaders with these goals – as well as the ahistorical lessons of any good fiction – the cruelties of income inequality, sacrifices of parents for their children, the transient/eternal commitment of lovers. A balance between these two elements – the history lesson and the human lesson – can be tricky to achieve. So much historical fiction becomes unreadable as it tries to force an independently brilliant narrative onto the historical lesson it wants to teach; similarly, the stories that miss the opportunity to tell a resonant story in the peculiar (misguided?) commitment to telling it Just The Way It Was.

Roddy Doyle’s *A Star Called Henry* is perfect historical fiction. It imagines an unsung hero of Irish history and gives him a biography, a set of triumphs and losses, a grand and history-making ending — even though he never existed and isn’t “real” by any historian’s estimation. It’s perfect in that Henry’s biography – that of a homeless orphan who becomes a larger-than-life myth – depends on fiction and myth for its making (metafiction!) just as the novel relies on the imagined to tell its truer-than-truth story of Irish history.

And what a story. Like my understanding of Russian history I had previously wandered about in an embarrassed ignorance of Irish history hoping I’d never be in a circumstance when I’d have to expose how very little I knew. I knew that the IRA was a thing. That “the troubles” existed. Bombs had exploded, etc. But why? when did it start? who cares? Well *A Star Called Henry* gives this history through Henry in a way that makes it personal, non-partisan and engrossing.

My one complaint comes in what/who gets lost in this story. Henry’s mother, Melody, figures as the tragic figure of the Irish underclass. Lost because of the triumvirate of poverty: inadequate housing, nutrition and health care. Henry, who takes to an independent life on the streets at age four loses his mother and that’s the end of her story. At that point in the novel she becomes the functional symbol of loss and grief for Henry. Likewise his wife – first name unknown – is an independent, fierce and unstoppable woman in her own right, but we know her only through her relation to Henry. I appreciate the narration that makes this Henry’s story, I do. And perhaps its a testament to the strength of these characters and this novel that I wanted more of these secondary characters. I wanted their narratives as full as Henry’s – even though his is a patchy work of missing periods and jumped chronology.

Though having poked around I see that *A Star Called Henry* is but the first novel in a triology. So perhaps this complaint gets redressed in the later two novels. I’ll definitely be reading them, so will let you know. In fact, I’m embarrassed both by my scant knowledge of Irish history and that this is the first book by Roddy Doyle I’ve read. He’s brilliant. Really. And this book, well, I do think it’s historical fiction perfection. So there.

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