cbr17bingo – G
I liked this book. But. I think I struggle a bit with books for which I can’t quite determine the point, although I recognize they don’t necessarily need a single, clear-cut point (or that I could have just missed it). I did genuinely enjoy this novel of interlocking narratives—a style that the author tends toward. The novel is about how Jonathan Alkaitis’s Ponzi scheme affected a wide range of people, from Vincent (who maintains a throughline of the book), to his employees, to his investors. (This is not a spoiler: The book blurb tells you it’s a Ponzi scheme.) We don’t really spend much time with many of the characters who comprise these narratives, which leads to a sense of emotional distance from them.
I can say that the book is certainly interesting. I liked picking it up. I wanted to see how these narratives would come together and how things would fall apart after Alkaitis’s scheme is revealed. It’s a character-driven novel that still holds a strong thread of plot, in terms of how all of these people are connected and affected.
But also, what was the point? I’m not sure what the takeaway is. You could argue that the book is about choices we make and how they affect others, about secrets we keep, about how we are all connected in ways we may not realize. Ultimately, though, when I finished the book, it just felt like something was missing.
I feel like this makes it sound like I didn’t like it, so I want to reiterate that I enjoyed the process of reading it, and I like the author’s writing style. The beginning and ending are particularly atmospheric. I just felt a little adrift at the end. 3.75 stars rounded up.