So many words! It would take seven lifetimes to learn them all.
Have mercy! That's how I felt reading this monstrosity of a book. So many descriptions... it would take seven lifetimes to read them all. Sigh.
For all you fans of Anthony Doerr and All the Light We Cannot See, rest assured, because Cloud Cuckoo Land delivers more of the same: endless, beautiful descriptions of mundane nonevents and no actual plot to be seen anywhere. I'm sitting here trying to think up some sentences to describe what this book is about, and I'm honestly at a loss.
It has five points of view and an additional story within, so that's six separate plot lines we are following, with some of them jumping across multiple timelines as well. If that's not confusing enough, each chapter is only a few pages long before switching to someone else. So just as I'm settling into one, I'm yanked out of it and dropped into another.
Speaking of the different storylines, they are not all equally interesting. My most dreaded are Omeir and Anna's, who are both waiting and preparing for war (but separately). How much is there to write about the non-act of waiting? Well, a lot, as it turns out. To pass the pages, we get to know intimately these characters' landscapes and their every thought.
We also read all about Zeno being in war, though this is a different war from the other one, so it requires its own detailed descriptions. It's not that there is no action, but rather that whenever anything potentially exciting happens, it's immediately mired within paragraphs of descriptive prose, which no matter how beautifully written, just don't hold my interest.
I do want to point out something that made me uncomfortable. The one "villain" we follow is clearly described as an autistic person, and I'm honestly a little surprised this made it through. Are we still living in a time period where it's ok to vilify certain groups of people? I understand that his storyline is eventually redemptive, but why was it necessary to make him autistic to begin with?
The most interesting of the storylines happens aboard the Argos. But here, too, it disappointed me. One of the (only!) interesting things to happen was never fully explained. And the plot's eventual pivot towards the end of the book felt underdeveloped and a waste of potential.
The six different storylines do all tie together in the end, but it's a pretty weak connection. Honestly, you could've strung random storylines together the same way and called it good too.
Obviously, many readers love Anthony Doerr, so something must be broken in me because I just can't understand it. This is the second novel I've read by him, and I feel exactly the same both times. When I see his paragraphs upon paragraphs of descriptive prose about walking or hiding or skulking, my eyes glaze over. No matter how hard I try, I can't seem to process or retain his writing. My mind wanders constantly. And when I do manage to focus, my memory of what I read is gone as soon as I've finished the sentence. Often I can't even make it to the end of a paragraph before I've forgotten the beginning and had to start over. This happened for almost the entire book.
If I sound somewhat bitter, I apologize. It's just that this book is more than 600 pages and I read through it all (many parts multiple times) just to make sure I didn't miss some epiphany. Spoiler alert: I didn't.
Readaroo Rating: 1 star
My heartfelt thanks for the advance copy that was provided for my honest and unbiased review.
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