Days After the Crash

by Joshua Fields Millburn

There is wreckage in the rearview. Jody Grafton's world is crumbling around him. To get away from it all, Jody moves from his native Ohio to Brooklyn to sort through the rubble of his self-indulgent twenties. His marriage is over. His new girlfriend is pregnant. And his career as a pseudo-famous singer-songwriter has fallen apart: gone is his record deal, his money, his fame-even his desire to create new music. While he stares at the ruins of his musical career, his mother becomes ill, and Jody starts drinking heavily to deaden his new reality. After months of struggle, he attempts to put the pieces of his life back together the only way he knows how: through music. DAYS AFTER THE CRASH, by Joshua Fields Millburn, is a short, five-chapter novella about a troubled man struggling to reconcile the demons of his past. To fade the scars of the last decade, Jody must face his self-inflicted wounds head-on if he plans to discover a brighter future on the horizon. But does he have the strength to piece his life back together?

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories

52 pages, Paperback

First published June 12, 2012

About the author

Joshua Fields Millburn is one half of the simple-living duo The Minimalists. As the bestselling author of five books, Millburn has been featured in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Time magazine and has spoken at Harvard, Apple, and Google. His podcast, The Minimalists Podcast, is often the #1 health show on Apple Podcasts, and his popular documentary, MINIMALISM, is available on Netflix. Raised in Dayton, Ohio, he currently lives in Los Angeles.

Reviews

[. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wow…okay, so first (and surprisingly) there are a lot of words in this short story…a lot of words.

Example:
“Taverns such as this one carried a desolation that swept aside words and dull sentiment. The troubled man asked the barkeep for another round-a shot and a pint. He coiled his fingers through the mug’s handle; his eyes weren’t his own when he peered down at the liquid inside. The mug was filled with hope. He closed his eyes and brought it to his ready lips. It tasted like truth, though he knew it was filled with lies, as the truth often is.…”

So yeah, a LOT of words. It felt almost like the author was going for profound, but missed the mark and for me at least, it ended up killing much of the story’s potential power and emotion.

DAYS AFTER THE CRASH is probably best described as a self-reflective write up of an individual who rises from a damaged home life and somehow manages to overcome his bad hand and “make it big”; only to see all he has accomplished in his young life to come crashing back down around him. And finally, while cogitating on his many mistakes, he is slowly rebuilding his life again.

In the end, did I love it?...no. Like it?...yes, I did like it. It’s obvious Millburn knows how to write, but I personally felt a lack of connection to the character and think it might have been a stronger more enticing read if all those words were spread out a bit. As is, the compactness of the novella felt unnecessarily… heavy.

[Rachel · Rating 1 out of 5]

Um, this wasn't what I expected. At all. The author made a big deal in the prologue (which seemed half as long as the story) about who we readers nowadays don't appreciate literary fiction and that he had worked very hard to create a piece of literary fiction the reader would really like. I have to say, if this is great literary fiction, I really don't know how to appreciate literary fiction. It could be my fault. But this story didn't capture my interest, didn't develop characters well, had sentences that were way too long, and the story was too short and under-developed. I didn't like the ending.
Again, it could be because I don't appreciate good writing when I see it.

[Ginger · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'll start off with a couple of positives: I applaud anyone who can write and be published. I needed to clear space off my Kindle. This short story was free. I hate to say it, but that's all the "positives" I can find. This was just so wordy which I found to be totally unnecessary. The author even mentions in the "foreward" that it took him quite awhile to write and structure his 750-word sentence at the end of Chapter 1. Really???? UGH!!!!! Won't be looking for any of his other works.

[Alyssa · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like it, I really did. But the whole thing, particularly the first chapter was, so frenetic that it totally turned me off. There was one sentence that was nearly three kindle pages. I haven't read sentences that long since The Scarlet Letter. I do love his blog so I will stick with that.

[Roland Martinez · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am a big fan of the minimalist blog, which is probably the best start to most of the reviews here. I've read pretty much everything Milburn has put online.

This novella is actually a step better than his previous fiction work. I give it a low rating because it doesn't resemble what I would expect read in a work called a Novella.

The two things that are missing are character and plot.

The writing is technically sound. In the last book I noticed that some of the words were used unconventionally at best and completely counter to their definitions at worst. In this book the language is good, really good and it makes me hopeful that with a little work that Milburn could produce some enjoyable fiction.

The reason this book fails is because the character does stuff, but that stuff really isn't motivated by anything internal to the character. Milburn's non-fiction is about leading an internally focused meaningful life, but the characters in his fiction are dragged along by external events. Maybe that's supposed to be the point, but if you don't have any kind of picture of what the character wants, the character looks like a Muppet dragged around the stage to show off another well described scene.

If Milburn spends a few pages showing us what the characters want and how they feel he would give the characters a central axis. If he then cuts out the scenes that don't revolve around this axis we would then have a story.

[Heather Shaw · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'd give this 2.5 stars if I could, and that speaks to my conflicted feelings about this book. From Millburn's own promotional efforts, I know this is 1) his first attempt at a novel (the novella is a pared down version of his full-length novel As a Decade Fades) 2) a deeply personal fictional rendering of his own life experience and 3) self-described literary fiction.

I don't think fiction can set out to be literary. Some of the novel's problems may stem from this. It is heavy with metaphors: some work beautifully, some fall flat. In places the story seems to serves the language, instead of the other way around. There are some beautiful passages, but it feels like Millburn set out to make every passage beautiful, and the end result is that we lose the story behind the decoration. Millburn would do well to apply a little minimalism to his writing as he does to his life.

That said, I still found the story compelling, and I was willing to wade through the language to discover it. The spark is there, and in places he succeeds in drawing the reader into his world. I'll look forward to his next story...

[Nienke Witteveen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Short, impressive novel by Joshua. It's fiction, but you can read part of Joshua's life story - as far as I know of his life story - intertwining with the main character. It's a inspiring little novel about the sad, unforgiving and undeniable parts of life. To me, the book tells me that nothing really does take your doubts and fear away, the only thing you can do in life, is try to figure out who you are, try to figure out how to love yourself and the people around you, and accept that we sometimes need to hit rock-bottom to find out what we're made of.

[Amanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this to a point. I really liked the way Joshua dives into the words and pulls no punches emotionally. I found it a bit dense, but the fact that it was so short meant that I didn't need to keep putting it down and I finished it in one session. If I'd put it down I'm not sure if I'd have picked it up again. That said, I'm glad I read it, it has some lush wordplay and imagery that I really enjoyed.

[Krys · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like the author said, this is a short book but not an easy read. It requires a certain kind of surrender - for the reader to allow the words, the structure, the cadence to take you on a journey through part of Jody's life. If you engage enough with this ride, you can almost hear the song he writes to express the complexity and simultaneous simplicity of his story. Well worth a read.

[Dana · Rating 2 out of 5]

Asi to můžu těžko objektivně posoudit, když nejsem rodilý mluvčí. Ale na můj vkus tam bylo trošku moc slov. JFM se asi rád "poslouchá" (ten dojem mám někdy i z jeho článků na minimalistech). Četlo se to dobře, ale žádné zvláštní dojmy to ve mně nezanechalo.

[Sarah Vangheluwe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mooie novelle, las het in een treinrit uit. Wel wat lange beschrijvingen (in vaak lange zinnen), wat soms wat saai is. Maar het is maar een 40-tal pagina's lang, dus langdradig wordt 't niet.

[Paulo Ribeiro · Rating 4 out of 5]

Start slowly, with lots of deep description, but the plot development is surprisingly good.

[Chris Gallant · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wording was poetic, but just as you got to know Jody the story was over.

[david · Rating 1 out of 5]

I wish he wrote this before the crash.