Review of 'A Constellation of Vital Phenomena' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
Exquisite. What a beautiful, powerful maelstrom of emotions; I want to go right back to the beginning and read it again. I want to be with these characters; want to learn from them, study their decency despite impossible circumstances; keep admiring them.
The story itself spans about four days in 2004, with lots of flashbacks to the previous ten years and, thanks to omniscient third-person narrator, occasional flash-forwards: brief peeks into the future of some characters. These surprised me: at first I found them annoying, but soon grew to find them comforting; reassuring. There are many characters, all of them intertwining in different ways, not always aware of how their orbits intersect. Much like real life. And they are all so human, so real. So believable.
(Side note: It’s both eerie and fitting that I read this on the same day as [b:The Dog Stars|13330761|The Dog Stars|Peter Heller|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1388122817l/13330761.SY75.jpg|18538203]: …
Exquisite. What a beautiful, powerful maelstrom of emotions; I want to go right back to the beginning and read it again. I want to be with these characters; want to learn from them, study their decency despite impossible circumstances; keep admiring them.
The story itself spans about four days in 2004, with lots of flashbacks to the previous ten years and, thanks to omniscient third-person narrator, occasional flash-forwards: brief peeks into the future of some characters. These surprised me: at first I found them annoying, but soon grew to find them comforting; reassuring. There are many characters, all of them intertwining in different ways, not always aware of how their orbits intersect. Much like real life. And they are all so human, so real. So believable.
(Side note: It’s both eerie and fitting that I read this on the same day as [b:The Dog Stars|13330761|The Dog Stars|Peter Heller|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1388122817l/13330761.SY75.jpg|18538203]: an uncomfortable reminder that we don’t have to look too far to find postapocalyptic dystopias. They’re all around us and always have been. Unlike Dog Stars, the characters here are complex and flawed and believable.)
