Book #74: The World Without You

Book #74: The World Without You by Joshua Henkin

February 13, 2014


When I started this book, I found myself thinking, Allrighty, then, another family story. And to be perfectly frank, I didn't find the story of the Frankel family to be entirely...I don't know. Profound? Entertaining? This was a book, a story, that had some potential, but Henkin was trying to tell too many stories, and they all kind of got lost in each other.

The story surrounds the Frankel family on the Fourth of July weekend (or rather, from about July 2-5, 2005). They're a Jewish family, and they're getting together for the one-year anniversary of Leo's death, for his unveiling. The family has spread far and wide. Clarissa and her husband Nathaniel (who are trying to have a baby; I found myself not really giving a shit about either one of them, her frustrations with her infertility or him with his apprehensions about possibly becoming a Nobel Prize winner or something) live in New York City (as their parents do); Lily and her long-time boyfriend Malcolm live in D.C. (don't know what her deal is...she's kind of a bitch, but also the character I found myself most connecting with, as weak as that connection was); Noelle and her husband Amram live in Israel; and Thisbe, Leo's widow, lives in Berkeley. The book, at various points, follows each of the three Frankel sisters, and their parents, David and Marilyn, who are announcing their separation that weekend. I think the book should have stuck to either David, Marilyn, Noelle, or Thisbe; Thisbe would have made for the best protagonist, I think. The young widow and mother, who feels so awkward around her dead husband's family, and is hiding the secret of her new boyfriend...I definitely wanted to see more of her story.

But what really drove me nuts as I read this book was how dated it seemed. Not that it took place in 2005, but all the Bush-bashing. See, Leo had been a journalist who had died in Iraq. He'd apparently been kidnapped by terrorists, then shot. Marilyn (and Lily) had refused to allow President Bush to make Leo a national martyr; they'd even gone so far as to campaign vigorously for John Kerry, and had been dismayed at his loss. And there was still many bad feelings about it in this book, this attitude that the country was going to hell with Bush at the helm. Look, I was only 13 when Bush was elected. I didn't like him at all, and when I was young and stupid, I may have believed some of the idiots at the time who blamed him for everything. There are always stupid, greedy people in power; there's nothing usual in that. So, I don't know, maybe in a few years this book will seem like an interesting look at the state of our nation during that time, a time when we were losing the war and the national pride that we'd all had after 9/11 was waning.

The characters in this book aren't exactly unlikeable or anything. But there was something I didn't like about the whole Frankel clan as a whole. Maybe I thought they seemed like snobs, or that they were trying too hard to not seem like snobs. I don't find families that are rich and successful to be particularly interesting. I used to think that I would like living in New England, but now, even though I've only spent a very little bit of time there, I find myself feeling, I don't know, a bit repelled by the East. I've always kind of felt that way about the Deep South, but with all the literature I've read that takes place in New England...I guess I'm just a Midwesterner when it comes down to it.

I didn't hate this book, but after trudging through it, I didn't really get anything out of reading it. Perhaps this book would speak more true to the experiences of families during the war in Iraq if it was about a working-class family who'd lost a soldier? Not to take anything away from families who lost someone who was a journalist, someone who was also just trying to do their job, in such a way. But let's look at it realistically; maybe a few dozen, at most, journalists have been killed in Iraq, versus thousands of U.S. soldiers. And haven't there been stories about the experiences of the journalists told? And in this case, it wasn't even the victim, but his family...even though they've all gathered for Leo, all of their stories are focused on themselves.

Nothing wrong with that. In that way, I do appreciate that this book shows how all of these individuals are moving on from a family member's death. Hey, maybe the book would have touched me more if it had focused more on that fact, and not included the political stuff. And maybe not all of the different stories, in such a disjointed fashion. It would have been one thing if one character had been the main focus, and the other characters' shit had been presented in that frame. That would have made for a rich, realistic family story. But the fact that the book really didn't have a single focus, it was just sort of these people having this important event...I found myself thinking that this book would actually have made a really great stage play.