Tournament of Books discussion

Honestly, I was pretty intimidated by this match-up. From my behind-the-scenes perspective, I knew that either way I would be disappointing a lot of people. Tell the Wolves I’m Home was both one of the most frequently nominated books (14 nominations) and the top overall zombie choice (25.9% of the vote). I had never read it before. The Great Believers has also gotten quite a lot of love, with 11 nominations (including my own) and a 3rd place showing in the zombie poll. It is a personal favorite of mine. I first read it during the time between the longlist and shortlist announcements in late 2018, and its exclusion from the bracket that year remains one of my ultimate ToB disappointments.

I decided to read Tell the Wolves I’m Home first, and I understood pretty quickly why you all loved it so much. It’s absolutely charming. June’s voice is a lovely representation of the torments and challenges of adolescence, and her relationship with Toby develops beautifully over the course of the novel. I was enchanted. When I closed the book I honestly thought that it might end up beating out one of my all-time ToB favorites.

But then I read The Great Believers again. Honestly, as much as I loved Tell the Wolves I’m Home, it wasn’t even that close. Mostly because, again on the second read, I loved Yale more than almost any character I have read in recent memory. Makkai does such a beautiful job making you care about him and root for him, even as you know you’re about to get your heart broken.

And break it did. Even having read the book before, I was still utterly devastated by his fate. On the second read, I also appreciated the scenes in recent Paris even more than I did on the first read. I think that the overall structure is a lovely way to tell this kind of story of the lasting impacts of loss. I think that The Great Believers does the most amazing job of capturing the ways in which grief and trauma can be both collective and personal.

Tell the Wolves I’m Home is an excellent book. I will be perpetually thankful to all of you for thrusting it into my hands, and for the lovely rainy day that I spent with my husband in The Cloisters because of it. Still, The Great Believers managed to capture and break my heart even more completely on a reread, and I’m sending it on to the finals.

Beautifully written review!

Thanks Maggie, for your review and for all you've done for this and other tourneys here. ❤️

I'm looking forward to the finals! (What was the second most nominated zombie?)

Maggie's review captures so much of why we read what we read. Just lovely!

I'm not sure how I would have gone on this one.

That we end up in this round with two novels that have the AIDS crisis as catalyst and context makes for an interesting match-up, and both "TGB" and "Tell the Wolves" have their deservedly passionate fans.

Both novels do a great job with place -- it matters that TGB is set in the Chicago of the 1980s (and not in NYC or San Francisco --the "usual suspect" cities for stories about this crisis), and and it matters that "Tell the Wolves" juxtaposes so well NYC and its suburbs (and the European setting in which Toby and Finn meet, an opportunity that the mother declined to pursue in favor of what she perceived as greater safety and security).

Both novels are about more than just grief (though they are that); they are about love and heartbreak and survival and memory. One of the things I like best about "Tell the Wolves" is the grace with which Toby treats June's heartbreak. He knows that she is not just a girl whose favorite uncle has died; she lost someone with whom she was in love. Greta and Toby both see this -- Greta uses this understanding as a weapon against June because she is so envious of that relationship, and Toby uses it to connect with June because, for each of them in their own very different way, Finn was the love of their lives. What Toby and June realize that they have in common is that they both felt on some level unworthy of Finn's love and yet they both have come to see themselves differently, because of the way that Finn viewed them.

It would have been so easy for Toby -- who is himself suffused with grief, and ostracized and (unjustly) blamed by Finn's family -- to have ignored June's heartbreak or treated it with condescension. Instead, he empathizes with June and tries to love her as Finn would have, as a way of continuing to love Finn. And June eventually cares for Toby the way Finn would have had he survived, because this is a way that June can continue to love Finn. So beautiful!

I agree with you, Maggie, that Yale is a wonderful character. I fell hard for him and rooted for him and was devastated by the loss of him. If I lean in the direction of "Tell the Wolves", it is because the contemporary storyline of TGB, for me, simply wasn't as engaging. I know it sounds terrible to say that I didn't really care much about the lost daughter plot, but ... I didn't. I cared about the Paris plotline only insofar as it shed further light onto Yale and the people who cared about him. And that is because I had come to care about him so much.

So, I guess I do know how I would have judged this -- "Tell the Wolves" would have received my vote, in part because I am a sucker for a strong debut, and in part because while half of TGB really touched my heart, all of "Tell the Wolves" did.

I wish we had the UpVote button to click. Love this review and judgment by Maggie -- and Risa's, too. I just discovered that my library has the ebook of Tell the Wolves so I'm dipping into it again right now. And I will also be putting TGB on my reread plan for someday.

Thank you!

Very nice judgment, Maggie, and SUCH insightful comments from the gang. Thank you all!!

These are two wonderful books! I would have gone the same way. Risa's comment is also lovely and I appreciate the defense of Wolves because I was so immersed in it too.

Excited to see what shapes up tomorrow!

Wonderful judgment and commentary! My top two books of this year’s ToF were LaRose and Wolves, but I think I’ve been convinced to find time to reread TGB in 2024. :)