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Wait Softly Brother
After twenty years of looping frustrations Kathryn walks out of her marriage and washes up in her childhood home determined to write her way to a new life. There she is put to work by her aging parents sorting generations of memories and mementos as biblical rains fall steadily and the house is slowly cut off from the rest of the world. Lured away from the story she is determined to write – that of her stillborn brother, Wulf – by her mother’s gift of crumbling letters, Kathryn instead begins to piece together the strange tale of an earlier ancestor, Russell Boyt. As the water rises, and more truths come to the surface, the two stories begin to mingle in unexpected and beautiful ways.
242 pages, Paperback
Published May 23, 2023
7 people are currently reading
296 people want to read
About the author
Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer
15 books61 followersI am the author of the novels All The Broken Things, Perfecting, and The Nettle Spinner, as well as, the short fiction collection Way Up. My recent work is published in Joyland, Numéro Cinq, Significant Objects, Riddle Fence, Filter, The Walrus and Granta.
I teach at The University of Toronto and online through The New York Times Knowledge Network. I advise students in the University of Guelph MFA.
I teach at The University of Toronto and online through The New York Times Knowledge Network. I advise students in the University of Guelph MFA.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 40 reviews
October 4, 2023
Rating: 3.5, rounded down
The protagonist of Kuitenbrouwer’s 2023 Giller Prize nominated novel flees her marriage and teenaged sons in Toronto for her elderly parents’ eastern Ontario home. It’s the place where she and her sisters grew up, an old stone dwelling built by her ancestors, full of history, stories, and memories. Kathryn is a writer who hasn’t been able to move forward with her current project: a piece of auto fiction about her dead brother. She’s long been told that Wulf, the sibling who came before her, was stillborn, but she is determined to find out more about him. When her parents hear about their daughter’s planned book, they wonder how she could possibly write about a person who never actually lived. Indirectly, it turns out.
During the main character’s stay in eastern Ontario, there are intense spring rains that cause unprecedented, even apocalyptic, regional flooding. Cooped up indoors with her parents, she probes them for information about Wulf. They aren’t just displeased about this; they are committed to obstruction and regularly press their daughter to return to Toronto where her duty lies. Refusing to go back to her moribund marriage, Kathryn does agree to make herself useful. She helps her mum sort through multitudinous cast-off objects, including boxes of photos and documents, which have accumulated over the generations in both the cellar and an old pig shed. As she and her mother work, Kathryn hears stories about her ancestors. One kept a diary. Another, a Scottish bride always pining for the sea, was said to be a selkie. The woman had webbed fingers, just as Kathryn does. Of greatest interest to the protagonist, however, are details about her great-great-grandfather, Russell Boyt. During the American Civil War, he had signed on as a soldier substitute for a wealthy American prosthesis maker, believing the money earned for performing military duty for another man would gain him financial independence from his harsh and disapproving father. A medical student who was mentally ill before setting foot on the battlefield, Boyt evidently grew more unhinged from exposure to the carnage. He also became physically disabled: a leg had to be amputated. Diagnosed with Soldier’s Heart—now known as PTSD—he murdered a freed slave woman while in the throes of psychosis.
By researching and imaginatively immersing herself in Boyt’s story, Kathryn believes she can get at the truth—“by indirections find directions out”. While she doesn’t create the auto fiction about her brother she intended to, in writing a biographical novel about Russell Boyt, she intuitively uncovers a family secret and comes to understand why she has been haunted by her dead sibling all these years. Whether the entire novel is auto fiction based on the life of the actual author, Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer, is not clear.
Wait Softly Brother has been constructed to shift back and forth between the main character’s story in the present and her ancestor Russell Boyt’s experiences in the mid-to-late 1860s. There are also a few chapters from the point of view of a young orphan connected with Boyt.
Kuitenbrouwer’s is an interesting and unusual novel, but I often found the writing strange, clumsy, and even amateurish. One might forgive the awkward execution of the sections written from Boyt’s point of view. These chapters are, after all, parts of a first draft which the protagonist works on late at night while at her parents’ home. However, even in rough draft, Boyt’s diction should not sound so jarringly modern. The prose in which he tells his story is too loose, casual, or inappropriate for the 1860s. For example, one character uses the word “genocide”—a term that would not be coined until the mid 1940s by Polish-Jewish lawyer Raphael Lemkin. As for chapters concerning the protagonist, Kathryn: they ought to have provided more detail about her marital troubles. For the sake of credibility, it also wouldn’t have hurt for Kuitenbrouwer to have toned down the main character’s almost total self-absorption. Instead, Kathryn arrives unannounced at her parents’ home, unrealistically expecting to be understood and indefinitely accommodated by people in their mid-eighties. I couldn’t buy that a middle-aged woman would be so little concerned about her mother’s illness and sudden cognitive impairment. It also didn’t ring true that an adult would walk off in an adolescent huff and slam doors when her parents didn’t or wouldn’t deliver the details she was after. Adult children can sometimes find themselves regressing to former roles when in the company of their family of origin, but I found Kathryn’s behaviour over the top. Her dedication to “finding” herself is paramount, and she seems constitutionally incapable of understanding that others may not be as invested in her voyage of self-discovery as she is. She really is quite tiresome.
I liked the book well enough to complete it, but not enough to wholeheartedly recommend it. Had there been more nuanced characterization and more careful prose, Wait Softly Brother might have been an exceptional novel rather than merely an interesting one.
The protagonist of Kuitenbrouwer’s 2023 Giller Prize nominated novel flees her marriage and teenaged sons in Toronto for her elderly parents’ eastern Ontario home. It’s the place where she and her sisters grew up, an old stone dwelling built by her ancestors, full of history, stories, and memories. Kathryn is a writer who hasn’t been able to move forward with her current project: a piece of auto fiction about her dead brother. She’s long been told that Wulf, the sibling who came before her, was stillborn, but she is determined to find out more about him. When her parents hear about their daughter’s planned book, they wonder how she could possibly write about a person who never actually lived. Indirectly, it turns out.
During the main character’s stay in eastern Ontario, there are intense spring rains that cause unprecedented, even apocalyptic, regional flooding. Cooped up indoors with her parents, she probes them for information about Wulf. They aren’t just displeased about this; they are committed to obstruction and regularly press their daughter to return to Toronto where her duty lies. Refusing to go back to her moribund marriage, Kathryn does agree to make herself useful. She helps her mum sort through multitudinous cast-off objects, including boxes of photos and documents, which have accumulated over the generations in both the cellar and an old pig shed. As she and her mother work, Kathryn hears stories about her ancestors. One kept a diary. Another, a Scottish bride always pining for the sea, was said to be a selkie. The woman had webbed fingers, just as Kathryn does. Of greatest interest to the protagonist, however, are details about her great-great-grandfather, Russell Boyt. During the American Civil War, he had signed on as a soldier substitute for a wealthy American prosthesis maker, believing the money earned for performing military duty for another man would gain him financial independence from his harsh and disapproving father. A medical student who was mentally ill before setting foot on the battlefield, Boyt evidently grew more unhinged from exposure to the carnage. He also became physically disabled: a leg had to be amputated. Diagnosed with Soldier’s Heart—now known as PTSD—he murdered a freed slave woman while in the throes of psychosis.
By researching and imaginatively immersing herself in Boyt’s story, Kathryn believes she can get at the truth—“by indirections find directions out”. While she doesn’t create the auto fiction about her brother she intended to, in writing a biographical novel about Russell Boyt, she intuitively uncovers a family secret and comes to understand why she has been haunted by her dead sibling all these years. Whether the entire novel is auto fiction based on the life of the actual author, Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer, is not clear.
Wait Softly Brother has been constructed to shift back and forth between the main character’s story in the present and her ancestor Russell Boyt’s experiences in the mid-to-late 1860s. There are also a few chapters from the point of view of a young orphan connected with Boyt.
Kuitenbrouwer’s is an interesting and unusual novel, but I often found the writing strange, clumsy, and even amateurish. One might forgive the awkward execution of the sections written from Boyt’s point of view. These chapters are, after all, parts of a first draft which the protagonist works on late at night while at her parents’ home. However, even in rough draft, Boyt’s diction should not sound so jarringly modern. The prose in which he tells his story is too loose, casual, or inappropriate for the 1860s. For example, one character uses the word “genocide”—a term that would not be coined until the mid 1940s by Polish-Jewish lawyer Raphael Lemkin. As for chapters concerning the protagonist, Kathryn: they ought to have provided more detail about her marital troubles. For the sake of credibility, it also wouldn’t have hurt for Kuitenbrouwer to have toned down the main character’s almost total self-absorption. Instead, Kathryn arrives unannounced at her parents’ home, unrealistically expecting to be understood and indefinitely accommodated by people in their mid-eighties. I couldn’t buy that a middle-aged woman would be so little concerned about her mother’s illness and sudden cognitive impairment. It also didn’t ring true that an adult would walk off in an adolescent huff and slam doors when her parents didn’t or wouldn’t deliver the details she was after. Adult children can sometimes find themselves regressing to former roles when in the company of their family of origin, but I found Kathryn’s behaviour over the top. Her dedication to “finding” herself is paramount, and she seems constitutionally incapable of understanding that others may not be as invested in her voyage of self-discovery as she is. She really is quite tiresome.
I liked the book well enough to complete it, but not enough to wholeheartedly recommend it. Had there been more nuanced characterization and more careful prose, Wait Softly Brother might have been an exceptional novel rather than merely an interesting one.
January 28, 2024
This novel is actually a work of “auto-fiction”—part fact, part fiction. It’s based, in part, on the circumstances in the author's own life, on conversations held with her parents about the family’s long history, about her fascination with her stillborn brother, and on photos, diaries, and bits and pieces uncovered while helping to clean out the family home.
The main character—also called Kathryn—has left her husband (as did the author, in real life) and drives to the family home in Trenton, Ontario for a bit of rest and respite. What seems unusual is that, while telling the story of her family (during an extended period of incessant flooding), she’s simultaneously writing a novel about one of her ancestors—a soldier by the name of Russell Boyt—that is also part fact, part fiction. She knows a fair bit about the story, but at times, has to fabricate parts of it.
As the book nears its conclusion, the family story and the story in her draft manuscript appear to merge. And (perhaps?) an interesting aside… It began to rain as she pulled off the highway into Trenton on Day 1 of her visit. It continued to rain daily until they were rescued, by boat, on Day 40. A coincidence?🤔 It’s an incredibly intriguing novel that contains some very interesting factoids, and I highly recommend it!
4 “Truth-is-Stanger-than-Fiction” stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐
The main character—also called Kathryn—has left her husband (as did the author, in real life) and drives to the family home in Trenton, Ontario for a bit of rest and respite. What seems unusual is that, while telling the story of her family (during an extended period of incessant flooding), she’s simultaneously writing a novel about one of her ancestors—a soldier by the name of Russell Boyt—that is also part fact, part fiction. She knows a fair bit about the story, but at times, has to fabricate parts of it.
As the book nears its conclusion, the family story and the story in her draft manuscript appear to merge. And (perhaps?) an interesting aside… It began to rain as she pulled off the highway into Trenton on Day 1 of her visit. It continued to rain daily until they were rescued, by boat, on Day 40. A coincidence?🤔 It’s an incredibly intriguing novel that contains some very interesting factoids, and I highly recommend it!
4 “Truth-is-Stanger-than-Fiction” stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐
December 22, 2023
3.5 stars
Puts the “fiction” in “autofiction.”
Autofiction is a genre I don’t care much for to begin with, but I bought this due to a) a rave review in the Toronto Star and b) it being published by a tiny press near my parents’ home. I have to admit I sighed when on page 1, a woman named Kathryn gets a call from her therapist.
However, there’s a lot going on here, and much of it is quite imaginative. Kathryn leaves her marriage of 20 years and returns to her parents’ old stone home in the country. She wants to write a book about her stillborn brother Wulf. Her parents are reticent, but her mother gives her a letter from another ancestor, a “replacement” soldier in the American Civil War, who went to fight in the name of a drafted local in exchange for money.
Lacking any information about her brother, Kathryn begins to write a fictitious account of the life of this soldier, his mental health struggles, his wounding in the war, and his relationship with the Black widow of an enemy soldier. Though it’s never explicitly spelled out, almost all of this seems to be pure conjecture, but it’s conjecture that summons a world that seems real, full of well-realized people.
Meanwhile, in interspersed chapters set in the present, Kathryn faces obfuscation from her rapidly-aging parents and sees ghostly brother-manifestations while apocalyptic rains beat down on the family home.
In keeping with my allergy to autofiction, I was far, far more interested in the fictionalized historical story which wasn’t just skillfully written but also extremely informative about events I knew nothing of. But even the modern-day sections were interesting, clearly written with a great deal of thought. They suffered some in my view by spelling things out a bit too clearly — as with the therapist chat at the beginning, I didn’t need the theories of a selkie great-grandmother hammered over my head for metaphor and meaning. Got that, thanks.
The ending, unfortunately, fell a bit flat for me. I had the feeling of a very dramatic story from the author’s own family… truly very dramatic if it was your own family, but losing its effect somewhat by being spliced in with very interesting fictional content.
This is ultimately my issue with autofiction. Of course all writers draw from their own experiences, and many fictional protagonists are avatars of their creators. When this is made explicit however, he seems to take some freedom from the author, the freedom to take the elements of their tale and create something that transcends a family anecdote. I frequently wondered, what if Kuitenbrouwer had started with exactly the same intentions, but called her character Laura instead of Kathryn? In dramatizing Laura’s life, might she not have let go, finally, a little more? Might there not have been an ending that followed the logic of the preceding text, rather than the logic of the author?
Ultimately this didn’t quite work for me, but it was a very engaging reading experience.
Puts the “fiction” in “autofiction.”
Autofiction is a genre I don’t care much for to begin with, but I bought this due to a) a rave review in the Toronto Star and b) it being published by a tiny press near my parents’ home. I have to admit I sighed when on page 1, a woman named Kathryn gets a call from her therapist.
However, there’s a lot going on here, and much of it is quite imaginative. Kathryn leaves her marriage of 20 years and returns to her parents’ old stone home in the country. She wants to write a book about her stillborn brother Wulf. Her parents are reticent, but her mother gives her a letter from another ancestor, a “replacement” soldier in the American Civil War, who went to fight in the name of a drafted local in exchange for money.
Lacking any information about her brother, Kathryn begins to write a fictitious account of the life of this soldier, his mental health struggles, his wounding in the war, and his relationship with the Black widow of an enemy soldier. Though it’s never explicitly spelled out, almost all of this seems to be pure conjecture, but it’s conjecture that summons a world that seems real, full of well-realized people.
Meanwhile, in interspersed chapters set in the present, Kathryn faces obfuscation from her rapidly-aging parents and sees ghostly brother-manifestations while apocalyptic rains beat down on the family home.
In keeping with my allergy to autofiction, I was far, far more interested in the fictionalized historical story which wasn’t just skillfully written but also extremely informative about events I knew nothing of. But even the modern-day sections were interesting, clearly written with a great deal of thought. They suffered some in my view by spelling things out a bit too clearly — as with the therapist chat at the beginning, I didn’t need the theories of a selkie great-grandmother hammered over my head for metaphor and meaning. Got that, thanks.
The ending, unfortunately, fell a bit flat for me. I had the feeling of a very dramatic story from the author’s own family… truly very dramatic if it was your own family, but losing its effect somewhat by being spliced in with very interesting fictional content.
This is ultimately my issue with autofiction. Of course all writers draw from their own experiences, and many fictional protagonists are avatars of their creators. When this is made explicit however, he seems to take some freedom from the author, the freedom to take the elements of their tale and create something that transcends a family anecdote. I frequently wondered, what if Kuitenbrouwer had started with exactly the same intentions, but called her character Laura instead of Kathryn? In dramatizing Laura’s life, might she not have let go, finally, a little more? Might there not have been an ending that followed the logic of the preceding text, rather than the logic of the author?
Ultimately this didn’t quite work for me, but it was a very engaging reading experience.
Read
September 14, 2023Giller long list #1
I almost dnf several times but something kept me going and it got a little easier. I’d be hard pressed to tell you what it was about - 2 different stories that were both strange that sorta came together at the end. I probably won’t remember this one tomorrow.
P. 195
“I keep thinking no one will ever read this. Humanity will be extinguished before it is printed. I think of all the books jouncing on an open sea that covers the planet.
Dad’s Biblical Deluge. Did Noah get to rewrite the story after the flood? I love that story trope where future civilizations find some old paperback and believe it to be sacred. Is not all writing sacred? If we had found a different, better text to believe in way back then - not the bible but, say, Gilgamesh, or even a weird poem like “Wulf and Eadwacer” - might things have turned out differently? Might we have been more careful in our friendships, might we have been more prudent with our forests, might we have understood the gorgeous centrality of womanhood? Might the human story not be now teetering on the brink of tragic endings?”
I almost dnf several times but something kept me going and it got a little easier. I’d be hard pressed to tell you what it was about - 2 different stories that were both strange that sorta came together at the end. I probably won’t remember this one tomorrow.
P. 195
“I keep thinking no one will ever read this. Humanity will be extinguished before it is printed. I think of all the books jouncing on an open sea that covers the planet.
Dad’s Biblical Deluge. Did Noah get to rewrite the story after the flood? I love that story trope where future civilizations find some old paperback and believe it to be sacred. Is not all writing sacred? If we had found a different, better text to believe in way back then - not the bible but, say, Gilgamesh, or even a weird poem like “Wulf and Eadwacer” - might things have turned out differently? Might we have been more careful in our friendships, might we have been more prudent with our forests, might we have understood the gorgeous centrality of womanhood? Might the human story not be now teetering on the brink of tragic endings?”
September 24, 2023
Loved this for so many many reasons. Captivating and mesmerizing. Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer can really tell a story. Review to follow after I pick up the pieces of my heart.
"It's not happiness I'm after."
"It is true that if you start to scratch at the threads of any narrative, you discover it is just another enchantment. You discover there is no such thing as realism. All of it is just made up. All of life, all of everything."
"They say that everything you write, just like everything you dream, is a replica of you, or your unconscious self. They say that you can't write a character who is not, in some true way, an aspect of yourself. If this is true, then all fiction is autobiography. All writing is self."
"Lives are stories or stories tucked into other stories. My parents know this. That is what families do, don't they? They set out a fiction that poses as a truth and the members of the family perform their roles."
"Maybe it doesn't matter what I write. Maybe it is the fact of writing that will always be the thing."
"In the hush of the forest now, the rain like white noise, I can finally hear myself think. How I need this water, is what I am thinking, despite the chill of it. It's like I am beginning to recall my roots with a liquid thirst."
"And dwell I do. On the past, on this ancient Civil War story. It's funny, the word dwell. Funny how it implies obsessive rumination but also living in a place, as if the two things are contiguous or even precisely the same thing. I'm aware of the extent of Boyt's story is just me working through whatever I am working through in this old childhood homestead."
"I know the unspeakable thing. I live it all through my body. It resides every crevice of my nervous system. Trauma is body just as writing is. I know their trauma even if I don't have words for it yet. For they, in their huddled attempt at protection, have bequeathed it to me in every way. By their shifty silence, by their fury, their whispers, their guarded emotions, their particu and idiosyncratic habits, their scorn, their very bodily being, they have given t the gift that their parents gave them, and their parents' parents."
"I keep thinking maybe no one will ever read this. Humanity will be extinguished before it is printed. I think of all the books jouncing on an open sea that covers the entire planet."
"And the story, like a great snake eating its own tail, is just another way of seeking myself. You see, you can't escape the duty you have to that. You can't exit the matrix or whatever it is in you that needs healing. Either you stand in it and suffer, or you exit and suffer less. And by you, I mean me."
"This expedition is another rabbit hole. There is no there there. The truth - whatever that means - resides somewhere between the research and the fantasy. The archive is only productive insofar as it is spurring my imagination."
"It's not happiness I'm after."
"It is true that if you start to scratch at the threads of any narrative, you discover it is just another enchantment. You discover there is no such thing as realism. All of it is just made up. All of life, all of everything."
"They say that everything you write, just like everything you dream, is a replica of you, or your unconscious self. They say that you can't write a character who is not, in some true way, an aspect of yourself. If this is true, then all fiction is autobiography. All writing is self."
"Lives are stories or stories tucked into other stories. My parents know this. That is what families do, don't they? They set out a fiction that poses as a truth and the members of the family perform their roles."
"Maybe it doesn't matter what I write. Maybe it is the fact of writing that will always be the thing."
"In the hush of the forest now, the rain like white noise, I can finally hear myself think. How I need this water, is what I am thinking, despite the chill of it. It's like I am beginning to recall my roots with a liquid thirst."
"And dwell I do. On the past, on this ancient Civil War story. It's funny, the word dwell. Funny how it implies obsessive rumination but also living in a place, as if the two things are contiguous or even precisely the same thing. I'm aware of the extent of Boyt's story is just me working through whatever I am working through in this old childhood homestead."
"I know the unspeakable thing. I live it all through my body. It resides every crevice of my nervous system. Trauma is body just as writing is. I know their trauma even if I don't have words for it yet. For they, in their huddled attempt at protection, have bequeathed it to me in every way. By their shifty silence, by their fury, their whispers, their guarded emotions, their particu and idiosyncratic habits, their scorn, their very bodily being, they have given t the gift that their parents gave them, and their parents' parents."
"I keep thinking maybe no one will ever read this. Humanity will be extinguished before it is printed. I think of all the books jouncing on an open sea that covers the entire planet."
"And the story, like a great snake eating its own tail, is just another way of seeking myself. You see, you can't escape the duty you have to that. You can't exit the matrix or whatever it is in you that needs healing. Either you stand in it and suffer, or you exit and suffer less. And by you, I mean me."
"This expedition is another rabbit hole. There is no there there. The truth - whatever that means - resides somewhere between the research and the fantasy. The archive is only productive insofar as it is spurring my imagination."
January 1, 2024
A well-done book with so much to ponder.
September 7, 2023
This is a beautifully written story of piecing together a family history where fiction blurs into reality and a writer finds her truth through scraps of history both real and fictional. It feels like a double memoir. Gorgeous
October 21, 2023
Wait Softly Brother is a beautifully written story of the history and present day life of the Boyt family. Kathryn's marriage falls apart and so she goes back home to her parents. Kathryn has a pre-occupation with her stillborn brother Wulf. Trying to veer her off this story, her mother asks her to start cleaning up a pig shed and basement of memorabilia. As they are sifting through things, Kathryn comes across the story of an ancestor who fought in the US civil war. Although there is little information about him, she weaves a fictional story around the details. Kuitenbrouwer takes this story and that of Wulf and interlaces them with the present. Her protoagonist slips in and out of reality as her characters follow suit. The author shows how events affect us in different ways and how the decisions we make reverberate throughout our lives; sometimes into other generations. Although I disliked the characters at the beginning of the book, I empathised with the wounds they carried and the struggles they had. By the end of the novel, I was so entranced by the stories. This book definitely deserves the Giller nomination.
January 13, 2024
Got into this a lot more at the end. I appreciated the connections the author made between the stories, and the "auto-fiction" she was writing did become a lot more appealing as the story went on, but the first half wasn't wholly interesting to me. I do like the idea of creating a story out of a rough outline of history and some artifacts. But I feel like it would drive me insane to not know the full story LOL. The ending was nicer than I expected it to be!
January 30, 2024
This is a strange book. It is written in first person about a mother/wife who leaves her family and goes home to her parents. She feels like part of her is missing and is obsessed over her older brother who died at birth. But woven into the narrative is her great great grandfather’s story of wartime. Quite frankly, everyone is a bit crazy.
Read
September 30, 2023I'm bailing for now. If it is shortlisted for the Giller I may come back to it
November 11, 2023
I loved reading WAIT SOFTLY BROTHER by Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer! I loved the structure of the writing in this novel. It’s part autofiction and part historical fiction. The main character, Kathryn, returns to her childhood home to help her parents and tries to write the story of her stillborn brother but instead writes the story of Russell Boyt who fought in the American Civil War. I loved the contrast between the two timelines and how they were intertwined through to the end. There is intense sadness in this book but also humour which is another great duality. I loved the natural dialogue between Kathryn and her parents. Her mother says “your Google” and “the Skype”. The addition of photos adds another realistic quality. This is one of my fave CanLit novels of this year!
Congrats to Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer for Wait Softly Brother being chosen for the Scotiabank Giller Prize 2023 longlist!
Congrats to Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer for Wait Softly Brother being chosen for the Scotiabank Giller Prize 2023 longlist!
September 16, 2023
Original and so beautifully rendered! The way the two stories ultimately mesh is brilliant and satisfying.
February 26, 2024
Ok, what an ambitious story! I am sad to give it three stars, but it feels true to my reading experience. The author weaves together various narratives here, and I think they converge best at the end (last 50 pages or so). Prior to that, it felt stilted and I kept wondering whether this should’ve been two books rather than one. I really applaud the ambition of the narrative and structure, but think that for me it fell a bit short of cohesion.
October 25, 2023
Wait Softly, Brother is an emotional journey into the past with a writer struggling to fit the pieces of her life together. What she feels to be true is challenged by the photographic and journaled evidence she finds in the shed on her parents’ property. Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer does a fantastic job of fictionalizing the epistolic evidence of an ancestor who fought in the civil war as a substitute, a displaced madman searching for the love denied him by his parents.
The ending is one of the most heartbreaking I’ve read in a while and the writing is a master class in plotting and narrative drive.
Highly recommend this book for anyone who loves stories about complicated families full of false histories.
The ending is one of the most heartbreaking I’ve read in a while and the writing is a master class in plotting and narrative drive.
Highly recommend this book for anyone who loves stories about complicated families full of false histories.
December 9, 2023
A true literary work of art, this books interweaves two stories 162 years apart in a beautiful and heartbreaking way.
October 10, 2023
I wanted to fit this book into my current reading queue as I was delighted to discover it was longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize, and already sitting on my bookshelf. Wait Softly Brother by Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer is a (somewhat?) experimental novel, one that I wasn’t exactly sure I fully grasped, but found myself getting caught up in the characters’ lives nonetheless. I’ve reviewed a Kuitenbrouwer book before, and really enjoyed it, so no surprise this one also appeals to me, and to prize juries!
Plot Summary
Protagonist Kathryn begins the book by pulling over to the side of the highway and calling her friend in tears; she’s decided to leave her husband of two decades and is on her way to stay with her parents in their aging farmhouse for a while. She leaves behind her two teenage boys and a resentful partner who is hoping this will just blow over. It doesn’t. Kathryn arrives at her childhood home to find her two parents who are also hoping it will just blow over – almost daily, they try to convince her to just go back to her family, even giving her ultimatums that she just ignores. While there, a rainstorm descends on the area and doesn’t leave. For weeks on end it rains while their fields flood and the roads become impassable. But Kathryn is fully occupied by things other than the weather – she is there to learn about her brother who never survived childbirth, a stillborn named Wulf who her parents avoid talking about. Desperate to learn more about him, she begins sifting through her parents detritus in their basement when her Mom presents an interesting piece of family lore; old letters pertaining to a distant relative from the 1800s. The book alternates between the story of Kathryn’s weeks-long stay at her parents house, and the fictional life and narrative she builds around Russell Boyt, a soldier who fought in, and lost his leg to the civil war.
My Thoughts
The entire book floats in a dream-like atmosphere, making it very difficult for the reader to discern what is real, and what is not. Firstly, the fact that the protagonist has the same name of the author, and is also a writer, really had me dying to know whether or not this was based in reality; did Kuitenbrouwer leave her husband like in this book? (and if so, why do I care?) It just niggled at me, what did or didn’t actually happen in real life. The fictional character based on small snippets of truth, Russell, struggles with reality, as he suffers from a bad case of PTSD, even admitting that he is “becoming strange”, so we can’t believe everything he tells us. But we also can’t believe everything Kathryn’s parents are telling us; they are clearly hiding something, and her mother falls into a feverish period where she babbles nonsense that Kathryn tries to make sense of, in hopes it will offer clues about Wulf’s short life.
Even the landscape that fills with water around Kathryn takes on a magical sheen; Kathryn catches glimpses of her stillborn brother stealing around the forest, and Kathryn herself has webbed fingers, which allows her to swim more efficiently, something she is certain kept her alive as a child. Kathryn has a few fears; one is that her parents’ house is being swallowed by the land as the flooding continues, and that an old story from her family’s past is coming true and there are selkie roots in her and her brother. Her parents are constantly telling her that it’s only her imagination when she recalls certain situations from her childhood, and in Russell’s case, his imagination is a danger to him, and others. Kathryn’s parents also fear her imagination, and its referred to as a problem from her childhood, but in the case of this book, it’s her imagination that’s creating Russell’s life, and keeping her sanely occupied while’s trapped by the rain.
Regardless of what’s happening in the present day, Russell’s fictional retelling is vibrant and intricate, impressive in the amount of detail we learn about him through Kathryn’s mind. Switching back and forth between the two narratives offers an easy kind of suspense, one that kept me pushing through the chapters are a quick pace, eager to see how the stories turned out for both. Some readers may not appreciate the ambiguousness of this book, but if you can get comfortable with the idea of never truly knowing, it’s a book worth trying.
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Plot Summary
Protagonist Kathryn begins the book by pulling over to the side of the highway and calling her friend in tears; she’s decided to leave her husband of two decades and is on her way to stay with her parents in their aging farmhouse for a while. She leaves behind her two teenage boys and a resentful partner who is hoping this will just blow over. It doesn’t. Kathryn arrives at her childhood home to find her two parents who are also hoping it will just blow over – almost daily, they try to convince her to just go back to her family, even giving her ultimatums that she just ignores. While there, a rainstorm descends on the area and doesn’t leave. For weeks on end it rains while their fields flood and the roads become impassable. But Kathryn is fully occupied by things other than the weather – she is there to learn about her brother who never survived childbirth, a stillborn named Wulf who her parents avoid talking about. Desperate to learn more about him, she begins sifting through her parents detritus in their basement when her Mom presents an interesting piece of family lore; old letters pertaining to a distant relative from the 1800s. The book alternates between the story of Kathryn’s weeks-long stay at her parents house, and the fictional life and narrative she builds around Russell Boyt, a soldier who fought in, and lost his leg to the civil war.
My Thoughts
The entire book floats in a dream-like atmosphere, making it very difficult for the reader to discern what is real, and what is not. Firstly, the fact that the protagonist has the same name of the author, and is also a writer, really had me dying to know whether or not this was based in reality; did Kuitenbrouwer leave her husband like in this book? (and if so, why do I care?) It just niggled at me, what did or didn’t actually happen in real life. The fictional character based on small snippets of truth, Russell, struggles with reality, as he suffers from a bad case of PTSD, even admitting that he is “becoming strange”, so we can’t believe everything he tells us. But we also can’t believe everything Kathryn’s parents are telling us; they are clearly hiding something, and her mother falls into a feverish period where she babbles nonsense that Kathryn tries to make sense of, in hopes it will offer clues about Wulf’s short life.
Even the landscape that fills with water around Kathryn takes on a magical sheen; Kathryn catches glimpses of her stillborn brother stealing around the forest, and Kathryn herself has webbed fingers, which allows her to swim more efficiently, something she is certain kept her alive as a child. Kathryn has a few fears; one is that her parents’ house is being swallowed by the land as the flooding continues, and that an old story from her family’s past is coming true and there are selkie roots in her and her brother. Her parents are constantly telling her that it’s only her imagination when she recalls certain situations from her childhood, and in Russell’s case, his imagination is a danger to him, and others. Kathryn’s parents also fear her imagination, and its referred to as a problem from her childhood, but in the case of this book, it’s her imagination that’s creating Russell’s life, and keeping her sanely occupied while’s trapped by the rain.
Regardless of what’s happening in the present day, Russell’s fictional retelling is vibrant and intricate, impressive in the amount of detail we learn about him through Kathryn’s mind. Switching back and forth between the two narratives offers an easy kind of suspense, one that kept me pushing through the chapters are a quick pace, eager to see how the stories turned out for both. Some readers may not appreciate the ambiguousness of this book, but if you can get comfortable with the idea of never truly knowing, it’s a book worth trying.
To read the rest of my reviews, please visit my blog:
https://ivereadthis.com/
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Or follow me on social media!
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June 27, 2024
(This review was originally published in Devour Art & Lit Canada - Winter edition 2023/24)
Twin stories by unhinged narrators about twins and the indomitable holds they have on each other. This novel, or autofiction, is a remarkable entwining of story strands — one contemporary, the other historical, in alternating chapters — to render the message that relationships humans put asunder, human nature will strive to reunite.
In the contemporary strand, Kathryn, the author, is obsessed with uncovering what happened to her older brother, Wulf, who died soon after his birth, or so she’s been told. She still sees his ghost in the forest. But how does one uncover the story of an infant who did not live long enough to record one? The attempt to write Wulf’s narrative drives Kathryn to face her dissatisfaction in life, abandon her 25-year marriage and teenage children, and return to her parents’ home in rural Ontario which is under siege from rising floodwaters. Sifting through six generations of family memorabilia, she stumbles upon the record of her great-great-grandfather, Russel Boyt, a substitute soldier in the American Civil War. Instead of Wulf, she pursues Russel.
Russel’s story is a fictionalized one that Kathryn constructs from traces of diaries and letters found in the flooding basement. This tale is far more interesting with the number of bizarre plot twists it involves. Russel is a reflection of Kathryn’s mental state — when there is no record, she makes something up. He is a runaway like her. He falls in love with a coloured free slave, fights horrible battles in the war, loses a limb, and kills the one he loves. He pleads insanity and enters an asylum.
Kathryn is battling her parents: her mother who is in the throes of dementia yet willing to drop hidden secrets with perfect recall; her father, who is the embodiment of the patriarchy “Women don’t sweat.” Both parents do not wish to reveal the past. They want Kathryn to suck it up and return to her family before the road washes out. And Kathryn escapes after they are flooded in, to go to America to collect information on her errant ancestor, and get back to the waterlogged house – ours is not to question how or why, but to enjoy the ride. Unreliable narrator?
Late in the novel, just when I thought that all imaginative pathways had been explored, the twins emerge to take both stories through to their resolution. The stories converge in the final chapter, but I’m not letting on anymore. In resolving Russel’s story, Kathryn is able to accept her own sibling’s passing, and we hope, will now return to her nuclear family, although that part is not covered. Perhaps that other reconciliation is in the sequel, which must follow, for there are more concealed, generational records in the flooded basement to auto-fictionalize, I’m sure.
In Kathryn’s narrative, the writing is energetic, even frenetic. Her anger with the marital breakup and her disenchantment with the world is palpable. Russel’s narration is more apologetic. The alternating chapters between the present and the past, however, were a constant “stop and start” for me and broke dramatic thrust. At a crucial point, Russel’s first-person POV becomes insufficient to carry his story and an omniscient narrator (Kathryn) takes over to tell us all that’s happening to and around him – novel craft be damned!
I found this an ingeniously constructed autofiction. One wonders how much is real and how much is fiction, and how many real-life people in the book put up with being cast in an unfavourable light — the acknowledgements section may provide a clue. That’s why I feel sorry for those who marry writers — beware, you will be auto-fictionalized, in some shape or form!
Twin stories by unhinged narrators about twins and the indomitable holds they have on each other. This novel, or autofiction, is a remarkable entwining of story strands — one contemporary, the other historical, in alternating chapters — to render the message that relationships humans put asunder, human nature will strive to reunite.
In the contemporary strand, Kathryn, the author, is obsessed with uncovering what happened to her older brother, Wulf, who died soon after his birth, or so she’s been told. She still sees his ghost in the forest. But how does one uncover the story of an infant who did not live long enough to record one? The attempt to write Wulf’s narrative drives Kathryn to face her dissatisfaction in life, abandon her 25-year marriage and teenage children, and return to her parents’ home in rural Ontario which is under siege from rising floodwaters. Sifting through six generations of family memorabilia, she stumbles upon the record of her great-great-grandfather, Russel Boyt, a substitute soldier in the American Civil War. Instead of Wulf, she pursues Russel.
Russel’s story is a fictionalized one that Kathryn constructs from traces of diaries and letters found in the flooding basement. This tale is far more interesting with the number of bizarre plot twists it involves. Russel is a reflection of Kathryn’s mental state — when there is no record, she makes something up. He is a runaway like her. He falls in love with a coloured free slave, fights horrible battles in the war, loses a limb, and kills the one he loves. He pleads insanity and enters an asylum.
Kathryn is battling her parents: her mother who is in the throes of dementia yet willing to drop hidden secrets with perfect recall; her father, who is the embodiment of the patriarchy “Women don’t sweat.” Both parents do not wish to reveal the past. They want Kathryn to suck it up and return to her family before the road washes out. And Kathryn escapes after they are flooded in, to go to America to collect information on her errant ancestor, and get back to the waterlogged house – ours is not to question how or why, but to enjoy the ride. Unreliable narrator?
Late in the novel, just when I thought that all imaginative pathways had been explored, the twins emerge to take both stories through to their resolution. The stories converge in the final chapter, but I’m not letting on anymore. In resolving Russel’s story, Kathryn is able to accept her own sibling’s passing, and we hope, will now return to her nuclear family, although that part is not covered. Perhaps that other reconciliation is in the sequel, which must follow, for there are more concealed, generational records in the flooded basement to auto-fictionalize, I’m sure.
In Kathryn’s narrative, the writing is energetic, even frenetic. Her anger with the marital breakup and her disenchantment with the world is palpable. Russel’s narration is more apologetic. The alternating chapters between the present and the past, however, were a constant “stop and start” for me and broke dramatic thrust. At a crucial point, Russel’s first-person POV becomes insufficient to carry his story and an omniscient narrator (Kathryn) takes over to tell us all that’s happening to and around him – novel craft be damned!
I found this an ingeniously constructed autofiction. One wonders how much is real and how much is fiction, and how many real-life people in the book put up with being cast in an unfavourable light — the acknowledgements section may provide a clue. That’s why I feel sorry for those who marry writers — beware, you will be auto-fictionalized, in some shape or form!
February 3, 2024
2.5 stars rounded up. I got this book based solely on the cover, because I collect glass doorknobs.
This author put the "creative" in creative writing. It was too florid for me, and the dialog stilted. A freed slave talked like that? Elderly parents? It was almost like reading a long book co-authored with Wes Anderson. There were aspects of the story that were intriguing but the surrealness distracted, as well as all the obfuscation by the supporting characters and the unreliable narrative from Boyt's perspective. For example. "I seem to have slipped out of my personhood, it was that incantatory." I don't necessarily think it would've been improved by dumbing down the text, but it felt inauthentic, attributing all these language attributes to every character. And the characters were all 100% annoying, even the child. Her parents and Boyt particularly. Auto fiction in reality.
What I did like was the chaotic, out-of-control spinning in both timelines, and we don't know if it will blow up on the two characters or they will find salvation. Great flood imagery is used in both to push the tumult. If Boyt had been remotely likable or empathetic, it would've lent more to his storyline. However, his narrative came from the protagonist's own imagination, and though she was not as worrisome, she was completely unlikable and unsympathetic herself. Through most of the book I thought the author was trying too hard, over-writing, over creative, taking away from her.... personhood.
This author put the "creative" in creative writing. It was too florid for me, and the dialog stilted. A freed slave talked like that? Elderly parents? It was almost like reading a long book co-authored with Wes Anderson. There were aspects of the story that were intriguing but the surrealness distracted, as well as all the obfuscation by the supporting characters and the unreliable narrative from Boyt's perspective. For example. "I seem to have slipped out of my personhood, it was that incantatory." I don't necessarily think it would've been improved by dumbing down the text, but it felt inauthentic, attributing all these language attributes to every character. And the characters were all 100% annoying, even the child. Her parents and Boyt particularly. Auto fiction in reality.
What I did like was the chaotic, out-of-control spinning in both timelines, and we don't know if it will blow up on the two characters or they will find salvation. Great flood imagery is used in both to push the tumult. If Boyt had been remotely likable or empathetic, it would've lent more to his storyline. However, his narrative came from the protagonist's own imagination, and though she was not as worrisome, she was completely unlikable and unsympathetic herself. Through most of the book I thought the author was trying too hard, over-writing, over creative, taking away from her.... personhood.
February 11, 2024
This autofiction novel will captivate readers who are drawn to enigmatic plots, deep explorations of identity, the interplay between reality and fiction, and intertwined storylines. The protagonist, a writer, leads us on a quest to uncover her family history while immersing us in the fictionalized account of her ancestor, Russell Boyt.
The story comes together seamlessly in the end, yet the journey to get there was not as engaging as anticipated. The primary challenge lies in comprehending the motivations and internal logic of the main character and Boyt, both of whom are not particularly endearing, making it hard to empathize with their journeys. While it took me a while to complete, I ultimately found the book rewarding. The author skillfully evokes a vivid sense of place and atmosphere through her writing.
As an audiobook, the narration is superb, although it would have been enhanced by the use of a male narrator for Boyt’s chapters. Nevertheless, Taylor delivers an exceptional performance, skillfully handling both narratives.
Characters - 5
Atmosphere - 9
Writing - 7
Plot - 7
Intrigue - 8
Logic - 5
Enjoyment - 4
The story comes together seamlessly in the end, yet the journey to get there was not as engaging as anticipated. The primary challenge lies in comprehending the motivations and internal logic of the main character and Boyt, both of whom are not particularly endearing, making it hard to empathize with their journeys. While it took me a while to complete, I ultimately found the book rewarding. The author skillfully evokes a vivid sense of place and atmosphere through her writing.
As an audiobook, the narration is superb, although it would have been enhanced by the use of a male narrator for Boyt’s chapters. Nevertheless, Taylor delivers an exceptional performance, skillfully handling both narratives.
Characters - 5
Atmosphere - 9
Writing - 7
Plot - 7
Intrigue - 8
Logic - 5
Enjoyment - 4
October 1, 2023
I bought and read this book because it is on the 2023 Giller Prize longlist, and published by Wolsak & Wynn. The title is from an Al Purdy poem, and indeed the writing is poetic; the prosaic telling of the two story lines (one about a mentally ill ancestor who fought in the American civil war, and one about the writer who is trying to write an entirely different story about her dead brother while her aging parents are either not remembering, or keeping secrets) may not have enticed me, and yet the writing pulled me in... in part because of the insight into writing process, in the writer's need to write even in the midst of her own family drama (her marriage breakup, and staying in her parents' home while it is caught in rising floodwaters). I haven't read all of the books on the Giller list yet, but will be interested to see if this makes the short list.
January 7, 2024
A miserable, dreary book populated by miserable dreary people. Kuitenbrouwer doesn't just sink to the lowest common denominator, she eagerly swims, probably with her deeply, profoundly symbolic webbed fingers, to the bottom of the muck to find it.
I could write many words on how tedious and wretched this book is but i) who really reads the long reviews?, and ii) I have wasted too much time and energy and brainpower on this book already.
I am happy I can return this book to the library with my greatest sympathies to the next person on the wait list. I will not look up other work by this author. And, if her hypothesis about authors writing themselves into their characters true, if I ever find myself at a gathering where Kuitenbrouwer is present, I will run in the other direction; I don't need that type of negativity in my life.
I could write many words on how tedious and wretched this book is but i) who really reads the long reviews?, and ii) I have wasted too much time and energy and brainpower on this book already.
I am happy I can return this book to the library with my greatest sympathies to the next person on the wait list. I will not look up other work by this author. And, if her hypothesis about authors writing themselves into their characters true, if I ever find myself at a gathering where Kuitenbrouwer is present, I will run in the other direction; I don't need that type of negativity in my life.
January 23, 2024
This was beautifully written, with some truly lovely turns of phrase, but the story lagged in places. I didn't enjoy the revolutionary war storyline, which is a significant portion of the story (even as it's told as a story within a story). I'm not much of a historical fiction fan, so I found myself always racing through those portions to get back to the contemporary story of the biblical rains.
📚 Series or Standalone: standalone
📚 Genre: literary fiction
📚 Target Age Group: adult
📚 Cliffhanger: no
✨ Will I Reread: no
✨ Recommended For: literary fiction fans who enjoy war stories
💕 Characters: 4/5
💕 Writing: 5/5
💕 Plot: 3/5
💕 Pacing: 3/5
💕 Unputdownability: 2/5
💕 Enjoyment: 3/5
💕 Book Cover: 3/5
Thanks, NetGalley and Bookrider Books, for the gifted ARC in exchange for an honest review.
📚 Series or Standalone: standalone
📚 Genre: literary fiction
📚 Target Age Group: adult
📚 Cliffhanger: no
✨ Will I Reread: no
✨ Recommended For: literary fiction fans who enjoy war stories
💕 Characters: 4/5
💕 Writing: 5/5
💕 Plot: 3/5
💕 Pacing: 3/5
💕 Unputdownability: 2/5
💕 Enjoyment: 3/5
💕 Book Cover: 3/5
Thanks, NetGalley and Bookrider Books, for the gifted ARC in exchange for an honest review.
April 6, 2024
This eerie, at times surreal, dystopian tale pulled me right into the lives of the characters, Peter Boyt, Christiana, Charles Muldon, Kathryn herself, and her parents. Set within the backdrop of a severe flood signifying the end of the world, the novel also casts back to the civil war and Boyt’s ill-informed choices that ultimately lead to tragedies that echo down the generations to Kathryn and her parents. Either inventing a new genre, or joining an emerging one, Kathryn blends fact with fiction in this “autofiction,” drawing off family lore and photographs and ephemera that are literally rotting in her parent’s basement and pigsty. She applies her exceptional writing skills to a well-researched and crafted story of madness, love—even under the direst of conditions—and how trauma can begin to heal generations down the line.
April 13, 2024
Auto-fiction or novel? Kathyrn Kuitenbrouwer’s comments on the process of writing are intriguing: more such ruminations, please.
"They say that everything you write, just like everything you dream, is a replica of you, or your unconscious self. They say that you can't write a character who is not, in some true way, an aspect of yourself. If this is true, then all fiction is autobiography. All writing is self."
"It is true that if you start to scratch at the threads of any narrative, you discover it is just another enchantment. You discover there is no such thing as realism. All of it is just made up. All of life, all of everything."
Here’s to the fiction in auto-fiction!
Read Loghan Paylor’s riveting The Cure for Drowning in conjunction with Zalika Reid-Benta’s marvellous River Mumma and Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer’s Wait Softly Brother!
"They say that everything you write, just like everything you dream, is a replica of you, or your unconscious self. They say that you can't write a character who is not, in some true way, an aspect of yourself. If this is true, then all fiction is autobiography. All writing is self."
"It is true that if you start to scratch at the threads of any narrative, you discover it is just another enchantment. You discover there is no such thing as realism. All of it is just made up. All of life, all of everything."
Here’s to the fiction in auto-fiction!
Read Loghan Paylor’s riveting The Cure for Drowning in conjunction with Zalika Reid-Benta’s marvellous River Mumma and Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer’s Wait Softly Brother!
February 8, 2024
Wholly unique, and unusual. The beginning of the book was a real struggle and I thought for a bit it’d be a dnf, but then something changed and I was hooked.
A story within a story really captured the imagination and I soon found I was thoroughly enjoying both the novel and the auto fiction that our protagonist created. I loved the fact that myth and legend were carefully woven into truth. The basis for Kathryn writing the autofiction was excellent. The way the two stories intertwine was quite beautiful.
The narration was excellent too!
A somewhat tricky 4 stars, but once I was in I was all in.
Thank you to NetGalley and ECW Press Audio for the opportunity to listen to this audiobook in return for an honest review.
A story within a story really captured the imagination and I soon found I was thoroughly enjoying both the novel and the auto fiction that our protagonist created. I loved the fact that myth and legend were carefully woven into truth. The basis for Kathryn writing the autofiction was excellent. The way the two stories intertwine was quite beautiful.
The narration was excellent too!
A somewhat tricky 4 stars, but once I was in I was all in.
Thank you to NetGalley and ECW Press Audio for the opportunity to listen to this audiobook in return for an honest review.
February 20, 2024
3,5
This is an a-typical mix of autofiction and family memoir, which convinced me only in part.
The chapters alternate between Kathryn – who is in a marital crisis and has returned to her parents – and the (rather more compelling) biography she dreams up of her ancestor who served in the Civil War as a so-called ´substitute´ soldier, taking the place in the army of a richer man.
Gradually the parallels between Kathryn´s life and that of her ancestor become clearer, which may of course be due to the fact that it is Kathryn inventing his life based on the scant biographical details at her disposal. I enjoyed the ending, which cleared up some lingering doubts.
Many thanks to Netgalley for an audio-ARC – it works very well on audio.
This is an a-typical mix of autofiction and family memoir, which convinced me only in part.
The chapters alternate between Kathryn – who is in a marital crisis and has returned to her parents – and the (rather more compelling) biography she dreams up of her ancestor who served in the Civil War as a so-called ´substitute´ soldier, taking the place in the army of a richer man.
Gradually the parallels between Kathryn´s life and that of her ancestor become clearer, which may of course be due to the fact that it is Kathryn inventing his life based on the scant biographical details at her disposal. I enjoyed the ending, which cleared up some lingering doubts.
Many thanks to Netgalley for an audio-ARC – it works very well on audio.
July 25, 2024
2 1/2 stars
It is true that if you start to scratch at the threads of any narrative, you discover it is just another enchantment. You discover there is no such thing as realism. All of it is just made up. All of life, everything. 27
I was reminded of Henke in his last moments, how he paused to steel himself as if he had figured out some solution to living - and the solution was to die. 423
I thought of my leg festering in the field and wondered whether anyone had buried it. A part of me was perhaps already winging up to heaven; did the souls depart piecemeal for those in my situation? Was the soul dissipated throughout man’s body or was it housed somewhere, in some particularly lively part - the heart, the lung, the pituitary gland - and unleashed when the whole perished? 425
It is true that if you start to scratch at the threads of any narrative, you discover it is just another enchantment. You discover there is no such thing as realism. All of it is just made up. All of life, everything. 27
I was reminded of Henke in his last moments, how he paused to steel himself as if he had figured out some solution to living - and the solution was to die. 423
I thought of my leg festering in the field and wondered whether anyone had buried it. A part of me was perhaps already winging up to heaven; did the souls depart piecemeal for those in my situation? Was the soul dissipated throughout man’s body or was it housed somewhere, in some particularly lively part - the heart, the lung, the pituitary gland - and unleashed when the whole perished? 425
October 13, 2024
I loved this book. It was so atmospheric, surreal and dystopic, but at the same time grounded in the kind of complex, difficult, almost comedic family drama that I could relate to viscerally (even though I came from an entirely different culture). It managed to weave two distinctive stories 160 years apart into a relatively slim volume. I once heard the author talk about her process of writing the book, trying many different paths before finding her groove in its current form, spending years researching and thinking about how to construct this tale. Highly recommended!
December 5, 2023
A whiny and self-absorbed woman leaves her family to live with her elderly parents.
A duel timeline story of an ancestor is the best bit. Hearing her berate and harangue her elderly parents for access to more information on a dead brother is tiresome and the secret they are hiding is implausible. Not sure (if she cares so much about this long dead child) why she didn't seem to have any time for her 3 living children.
A duel timeline story of an ancestor is the best bit. Hearing her berate and harangue her elderly parents for access to more information on a dead brother is tiresome and the secret they are hiding is implausible. Not sure (if she cares so much about this long dead child) why she didn't seem to have any time for her 3 living children.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 40 reviews