Lauren O. (LoMel) - , reviewed on + 134 more book reviews
As my good friend Liz joked, when I finished this novel I was like "Cloud atLAST this book is over!!"
I get it, I really do. I get why the reviewers and so many readers are under the spell of this book. It's impressive to experiment with a unique literary form. It's impressive to show off all of the genres and eras whose styles you can write competently. While at times it seems like an idea for a freshman literary seminar exercise, it's unique in a book of popular fiction. Great. I am glad experimentation is alive and well. But does (at times successful) experimentation excuse the litany of other flaws in this novel? I don't think so.
Cloud Atlas suffers from a common ailment of short story collections (which this essentially is, albeit a group of related ones): uneven content. The 'Letters from Zedelghem' section was easily my favorite and held my attention the most (maybe Mitchell should write more in this style instead of trying on so many different ones?). The others, however, fluctuated for me from a more boring Master and Commander to Sloosha's Crossin', which I found almost unreadable (and which seemed to have a questionable view on race which went against the rest of the book). The Sci-Fi chapter, 'Orison of Somni-451' (if it can indeed be classified as such) seemed to me, as a sci-fi fan, to be extremely heavy-handed and derivative of some of the classic works (which, to be fair, if you don't write regularly in the genre seems like it would be a common occurrence). Mitchell addressing criticisms in the novel (specifically the 'Timothy Cavendish' sections) drove me absolutely bonkers; "The Ghost of Sir Felix Finch whines, But its been done a hundred times before! as if there could be anything not done a hundred thousand times between Aristophanes and Andrew Void-Webber! As if Art is the What, not the How! preceded by the misunderstood author killing the critic who gave him a bad review? WE GET IT. There are better ways to address your critics, if you need to address them at all.
In the end, even with everything I mentioned above, I think my real problem with this book is that demonstrating your fluency in a particular style doesn't mean you can get at the heart of the prose. There's no deep feeling or meaningful connection with the stories or characters in most of these sections. While genre writers are often maligned by the more "literary" set of readers and critics, I think it just shows that it's not so easy to be able to just pick up a pen (or a keyboard) and write well in any genre or style. Don't get me wrong, Mitchell has obviously worked at his craft, and there are individual moments of light within the story (Sachs' brief discourse on historical meaning in the second Luisa Rey chapter comes to mind), but overall rather than feeling that connection stretching through time and space, as the travelling soul at the heart of this novel seems to, I felt distant and removed from most of this book, and glad when it was finally over.
I get it, I really do. I get why the reviewers and so many readers are under the spell of this book. It's impressive to experiment with a unique literary form. It's impressive to show off all of the genres and eras whose styles you can write competently. While at times it seems like an idea for a freshman literary seminar exercise, it's unique in a book of popular fiction. Great. I am glad experimentation is alive and well. But does (at times successful) experimentation excuse the litany of other flaws in this novel? I don't think so.
Cloud Atlas suffers from a common ailment of short story collections (which this essentially is, albeit a group of related ones): uneven content. The 'Letters from Zedelghem' section was easily my favorite and held my attention the most (maybe Mitchell should write more in this style instead of trying on so many different ones?). The others, however, fluctuated for me from a more boring Master and Commander to Sloosha's Crossin', which I found almost unreadable (and which seemed to have a questionable view on race which went against the rest of the book). The Sci-Fi chapter, 'Orison of Somni-451' (if it can indeed be classified as such) seemed to me, as a sci-fi fan, to be extremely heavy-handed and derivative of some of the classic works (which, to be fair, if you don't write regularly in the genre seems like it would be a common occurrence). Mitchell addressing criticisms in the novel (specifically the 'Timothy Cavendish' sections) drove me absolutely bonkers; "The Ghost of Sir Felix Finch whines, But its been done a hundred times before! as if there could be anything not done a hundred thousand times between Aristophanes and Andrew Void-Webber! As if Art is the What, not the How! preceded by the misunderstood author killing the critic who gave him a bad review? WE GET IT. There are better ways to address your critics, if you need to address them at all.
In the end, even with everything I mentioned above, I think my real problem with this book is that demonstrating your fluency in a particular style doesn't mean you can get at the heart of the prose. There's no deep feeling or meaningful connection with the stories or characters in most of these sections. While genre writers are often maligned by the more "literary" set of readers and critics, I think it just shows that it's not so easy to be able to just pick up a pen (or a keyboard) and write well in any genre or style. Don't get me wrong, Mitchell has obviously worked at his craft, and there are individual moments of light within the story (Sachs' brief discourse on historical meaning in the second Luisa Rey chapter comes to mind), but overall rather than feeling that connection stretching through time and space, as the travelling soul at the heart of this novel seems to, I felt distant and removed from most of this book, and glad when it was finally over.
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