Review: Thought-provoking and Original
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 08 4, 2013
The After/Life is the story of Nad Raven who enters a bunker at age five after a nuclear holocaust and grows up in this insular society created in order to survive the apocalypse. As survivors are teachers and students of the former school that use to rest above the bunker, a new "government" of sorts is created where the principal becomes the leader and School becomes the center for daily living. As Nad ages, there is an evolution of ideas in governing the bunker that result in a dystopian society...a society that stirs up a rebellion and is no longer a place Nad wishes to reside.I have to be honest, I have a love/hate relationship with this book. Clearly Vardan is creative, original and intelligent, that much is obvious. I admit I had difficulty believing in the narrative of the 5 year old Nad. Occasionally, I caught a glimpse of a child's perspective to the turmoil surrounding him, but primarily I just couldn't visualize the depth of his understanding of the situation or the fact that he was relating the Rolling Stone's lyrics to the chaos ensuing; no five year old I know is that philosophical.I appreciate how Vardan uses Nad's internal dialogue and stream of consciousness to tell the story, but at times it felt manic, confusing and down right lacking the human connection. What I mean by that is that there isn't a lot of dialogue with other characters, but when there was, I was rejoicing. I kind of get it though...Nad is a bit self-absorbed, a tad-selfish and reeks of male stupidity at times.As much as I appreciate Nad's internal dialogue, there was too much philosophical pandering. I love a great, thought-provoking quote, but I felt bombarded with them constantly and sometimes I just want to enjoy the story, not decipher it. I kept thinking about the literary acclaim of Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye (not my favorite book by any means) in relation to Nad and his journey. What I mean is that I really loathe him in general and I want to grab him and shake him, but I still found myself hoping that he would catch on and do the right thing.Here is another literary comparison for you, if you like the poetry of ee Cummings, jump on this book wagon because Vardan's writing not only philosophical resembles her writing, but physically as well. This book is chalked full of run-on sentences, paragraphs that travel down the page road for miles, random paragraph delineation, oddly spaced words and tons and tons of parentheses. Even though this style is intended, I still think a big red editing pen is needed to correct typos, missing quotation marks, etc. After becoming absorbed in the plot, I began to ignore these distractions in order to get to the real action.My final thoughts, although this might not be my normal cup of tea, I found the plot intriguing, it stirs up a controversy of questions and it is thought-provoking for sure...the comparison to Salinger and Cummings sums it up pretty well. If you are looking for a hearty, well participated book club gathering (beware of your audience due to profanity), this is your book...although you may not be popular afterwards.