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Human Trees
ROOTED IN PLACE YOU SEE EVERYTHING AND NOTHING
Following news of a mysterious condition threatening to take their parents' lives, two brothers are thrust into one another's reluctant company. Within the disquieting absurdity of Kubler Hospital, time loses meaning and reason dissolves. As their wait continues and unattended patients die around them, the brothers are forced to confront the confusing abuse of their past.
Following news of a mysterious condition threatening to take their parents' lives, two brothers are thrust into one another's reluctant company. Within the disquieting absurdity of Kubler Hospital, time loses meaning and reason dissolves. As their wait continues and unattended patients die around them, the brothers are forced to confront the confusing abuse of their past.
156 pages, Paperback
First published August 15, 2017
109 people want to read
About the author
Matthew Revert
40 books94 followersMatthew Revert is a writer, musician and graphic designer from Melbourne, Australia.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
August 21, 2017
My favorite read of 2017, so far.
Human Trees draws inspiration from several iconic surreal narratives: Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, Franz Kafka's The Trial and more or less everything American movie director David Lynch's ever worked on. It makes fun of contemporary institutions, their self-importance and the pointlessness of their rules, which condemns Robert and Michael to an existential confrontation they would've otherwise avoided. And the beautiful thing about Human Trees is that it does it without necessarily casting a moral judgement. (for more, read the complete review : http://www.deadendfollies.com/blog/bo...)
Human Trees draws inspiration from several iconic surreal narratives: Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, Franz Kafka's The Trial and more or less everything American movie director David Lynch's ever worked on. It makes fun of contemporary institutions, their self-importance and the pointlessness of their rules, which condemns Robert and Michael to an existential confrontation they would've otherwise avoided. And the beautiful thing about Human Trees is that it does it without necessarily casting a moral judgement. (for more, read the complete review : http://www.deadendfollies.com/blog/bo...)
September 6, 2017
Human Trees weaves a richly surreal narrative within the confines of a bland hospital waiting room. I am fascinated by the way Revert relates both the environment and interactions. The atmosphere is painted in the mind of the reader in uncommon detail. Even simple questions often delineate an uncommon significance in the air and those surrounded by it.
The opposition and defiance among the two brothers are vast and enduring. Blaming each other for moments which have changed their lives forever. And what of the parents? Never given all of the clues along the way, the reader is a willing captive to the narrative until….
The opposition and defiance among the two brothers are vast and enduring. Blaming each other for moments which have changed their lives forever. And what of the parents? Never given all of the clues along the way, the reader is a willing captive to the narrative until….
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December 29, 2018A wonderful review of Matthew Revert's Human Trees :
http://www.deadendfollies.com/blog/bo...
http://www.deadendfollies.com/blog/bo...
January 9, 2018
It's a difficult thing, reviewing a Revert novel. BASAL GANGLIA rewired my brain when I read it, so I knew going into Matthew's latest that I had to get in the "right head space" but how was I to know what that meant? Eventually, I just jumped into it and, whoa, it became apparent quickly that I was reading a work of genius. How to explain what that means, though, is beyond me. I can use adjectives like "hypnotic," "surreal," and "emotional," but that feels cheap. Still... I'm at a loss. This is one you've just got to take everyone's word for, and dive into the thing.
August 13, 2019
(...)
A few final words on those emotions. Human Trees doesn’t seem to be written from a happy perspective. Parental abuse and their little sister dying were formative for the Larson brothers. There’s angst and phobia, and Robert, the main character, hasn’t made peace with the world yet.
There was a lingering emptiness, which Robert absorbed into his character, but life, he would come to learn, was a procession of new emptinesses to explore, absorb and forget.
While I cannot claim to have been happy my entire life, I simply cannot relate with the book’s main atmosphere – which sometimes has something of unfledged rebellion to it. I do not feel life is empty. I do not feel afraid.
That said, I do think Human Trees manages to evoke something of how certain people feel, and again, that is no mean feat – even though Robert suspects “that all empathy is self-absorption.”
A difficult book to market – give it a go, you might like it a lot.
Please read the full review on Weighing A Pig Doesn't Fatten It
A few final words on those emotions. Human Trees doesn’t seem to be written from a happy perspective. Parental abuse and their little sister dying were formative for the Larson brothers. There’s angst and phobia, and Robert, the main character, hasn’t made peace with the world yet.
There was a lingering emptiness, which Robert absorbed into his character, but life, he would come to learn, was a procession of new emptinesses to explore, absorb and forget.
While I cannot claim to have been happy my entire life, I simply cannot relate with the book’s main atmosphere – which sometimes has something of unfledged rebellion to it. I do not feel life is empty. I do not feel afraid.
That said, I do think Human Trees manages to evoke something of how certain people feel, and again, that is no mean feat – even though Robert suspects “that all empathy is self-absorption.”
A difficult book to market – give it a go, you might like it a lot.
Please read the full review on Weighing A Pig Doesn't Fatten It
November 14, 2017
Another masterclass in absurdism from Matthew Revert.
August 26, 2017
Like a Lynchian "Waiting for Godot" with higher stakes. Weirdly beautiful.
Also, almost didn't make it past the cover, because I couldn't stop staring at it.
Also, almost didn't make it past the cover, because I couldn't stop staring at it.
February 5, 2018
Two feuding brothers sit in a hospital waiting room, awaiting information on their parents. That's the plot of this Human Trees, summarized in one easy sentence. But it's far, far more than that.
This is a strange, paranoid book. It felt at times like a mushroom trip. I liked it. I didn't always get it. I had to go back and re-read certain pages because it just seemed so odd. I don't know if I've ever read prose like Matthew Revert's. It's not difficult, or overly wordy. It's just...unique. His sentence structures, his descriptions, alongside the unreal happenings occurring through the hospital halls, makes for a reading experience unlike any I've had in recent times. I'll definitely re-read this in the future. This is high concept bizarro executed with class and uniqueness.
This is a strange, paranoid book. It felt at times like a mushroom trip. I liked it. I didn't always get it. I had to go back and re-read certain pages because it just seemed so odd. I don't know if I've ever read prose like Matthew Revert's. It's not difficult, or overly wordy. It's just...unique. His sentence structures, his descriptions, alongside the unreal happenings occurring through the hospital halls, makes for a reading experience unlike any I've had in recent times. I'll definitely re-read this in the future. This is high concept bizarro executed with class and uniqueness.
August 2, 2018
Your brother calls you. Something is wrong with your parents. So you go to the hospital. Then nobody will tell you what exactly happened to your parents. So you wait with your brother. But turns out you and your brother don't get along. So your stuck in the one place that should have answers, but it has no answers. Just confusion and odd situations. So your forced instead to find out answers on why you and your brother don't get along. The cover for this book might be the best cover ever. It also has the best quote. Rooted in place you see everything and nothing.
January 21, 2025
This beautifully blends pure absurdism and a heartfelt foray into family ties and buried sorrows. It often felt like Waiting For Godot meets The Third Policeman, but it is far more. I admire Matthew Revert's talent for conjuring otherworldly imagery and building an escalating tension. His characters are strikingly peculiar and unsettling, though they never cross into full discomfort, and sometimes even shift into moments of endearing warmth. The prose is surgical and the symbolism pierces the heart with precision. There are no other writers quite like him.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews