I wasn't sure whether I wanted to write a review for this book for two reasons: 1- I couldn't finish it 2) I didn't enjoy it.
But in the interest of being honest I decided to do it anyway. A good novel for me is one with an amazing style, characters who come to life and a story that keeps me engaged. This novel had a good style but it was not consistent. Here is my review:


I had to preserve with the beginning of this book as it did not hook me. I expected to read a dark, gothic story that was what appealed to me about the description of this book. But it did not live up to it's description. I got to the part where they move to the gothic house with it's amazing library I thought that the story was going somewhere, I thought maybe it's going to be a gothic tale -Poe is mentioned after all- maybe I just have to go past the beginning set up and now the story will begin.
But it never did. It reads like a memoir but one that rambles on. And on. Sometimes the author skips ahead a month or years, the narrative just jumps around too much. A detail was given late in the story about a nickname the main character calls his sister, as though the author had thought of this late in the novel but not thought to go back and add it in the beginning.

Parts of this book did draw me in and I loved the writing, it was atmospheric and intriguing. But it's like the book is written by two different people- one moment the language and the style is lovely (not called literary fiction for nothing). But the next moment it reads more like a report than a story. I go from being drawn in to bored.

I didn't feel like I was involved or immersed enough in the story either and I could not connect with the main character at all. I had no sympathy for the way he cut himself off from his family with no reasoning behind it. If this character was a real person you'd just think he was arrogant and self-involved, why would we want to read a story about him? He doesn't appear to have any redeeming features.

I couldn't recommend it, if you love literary fiction you will be let down by the parts that don't seem to fit. And if you love fiction in general you will wonder why you should bother reading a book that doesn't grip you or seem to have a point.

I tried to get into the book, I tried over and over but each time I was frustrated. I hate not finishing a book, but I also don't wish to waste time reading a book I don't enjoy when there are so many out there that I could be enjoying instead.

This is such a promising debut but it's a shame that Lewis loses his way during the long central section that feels disconnected from both the beginning and ending. We first meet Henry senior as a child whose love of books makes him an outsider in his family and his small-town Appalachian community. As he grows up, he dedicates himself to writing The Great American Novel, neglecting, to some extent, his wife and young family. When something traumatic happens, his son, Henry junior, leaves their gothic house in the mountains for college, putting distance between himself and his family - and this long section feels like a separate novel as he pursues an elusive woman with (of course) a difficult background. The final section has Henry junior return home and reveal the family secrets he has withheld from us as readers. With its moving scenes of reconcilation and forgiveness, this last section offers an emotional edge that had been missing in many of the earlier pages.

With themes of fathers and sons, sons and mothers (there are lots of, perhaps too many, repetitions of the famous opening line of Camus' L'Etranger), disappointment, connection and disconnection, and the hard work that relationships require, there's a lot going on here, probably too much. Overlaid is much name-dropping of books and music - some are necessary to create an intellectual milieu but Lewis doesn't quite know where to stop.

The same could be said of the writing which lurches from the over-written to the lyrical, from purple prose to something brooding and acutely evocative. So an unstable debut overall: Lewis is a talented writer but he seems to be trying overhard to write in a Southern Gothic tradition which constrains him at times. If he can find a more authentic voice, he will certainly be a writer to watch: 3.5 stars rounded down.

I get what the author was going for here but he missed the mark by a mile. It would be untrue to say this book was unreadable but it was not a pleasant read. The story was messy, the characters were not fleshed out and small things in this book just rubbed me the wrong way.

Small thing #1: Author introduces a very minor character who has written a book. When asked what the book was about the reader is told the book concerns a man in the minor character's same profession who... wrote a book. Coincidentally the author of this book is himself a lawyer who wrote a book about a young man studying to be a...lawyer.Maybe this was meant to be a "fun" riff on the author himself but for me this just fell flat. Why follow your character through the hardships of college and law school only to get a few sentences about how he arrives at a small town law office to work and then hear nothing ever again about the work he does there.

Small thing #2: So many instances where people are cutting up limes to put them in a Corona bottle or just ordering Coronas at a restaurant instead of just saying "beer". Or someone calling a Peroni "fresh and crisp!" For a character that enjoys "good beer" it is unbelievable that said character would stock his house with Peroni or Corona. Book reads like product placement for these two terrible beers.

Small thing #3: The "Story" plot was too obvious and at times overshadowed the main character. It was obvious from her introduction and family history who her father was, no big surprise there.

This would have been a better read without the inclusion of Story and her messy tale of faux woe. Had the author focused more on the familial relationships I think he could have made these characters shine. Instead he spends pages describing drunken antics at bars or parties.

It felt disrespectful to treat the story of Henry's father so lightly. After all of the buildup and character development in the beginning of the book to have the fate of Henry's father summed up so quickly at the end was just not a good move.

There is a lot of literary name dropping in this book but none of the substance to make it a good read.

Mesmerizing, stunned and puzzled are my main descriptions about this book. I enjoyed it, but it is not letting me go without knowing why.