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ka_cam's review
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
mysterious
reflective
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
A meditative, reflective, moody and sometimes playful genre-blending history/memoir/hagiography/scrapbook/and more following a young gay man as he accompanies an elder gay man is dying. From different generations both share Puerto Rican heritage and a brief overlapping stay at a psych facility. Weaves oral, written, visual archives with an interpersonal relationship and personal reflections in a way I found compelling and thought provoking, also learned some queer history. Loved the ruminations on the very porous boundaries between ‘reality’ and memory, archives, history, psychology, and storytelling. The power of being recorded and excercising power over what is recorded and what is erased- challenging binaries of known/unknown and truth/fiction. Encourages the reader to recognize and appreciate the past, the ways it is present, our received and constructed narratives or lenses, and the ways we can leave space for what we we never truly know about the past and those who live/d in it. Some of the thoughts can come off a bit trite, and I can see how it wouldn’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but I enjoyed!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism, Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, Death, Sexual content, Xenophobia, Chronic illness, Mental illness, Sexual assault, Suicide attempt, and Terminal illness
Moderate: Toxic relationship, Domestic abuse, and Child abuse
takecoverbooksptbo's review
challenging
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
A mixture of Calvino's polyphonous Invisible Cities, Mendelsohn's myserious memoir of queer New York The Elusive Embrace, and the touching diasporic dissonance Noor Naga's autofiction If an Egyptian Cannot Speak English, Justin Torres' Blackouts is a multifaceted love story.
There are so many different types of love explored in the novel: friendship, romance, familial love, carnality, love of art, romanticization of the past, care work, among many others. While it's not a clear-eyed novel whose beginning-middle-end structure is immediately satisfying, the miasmal atmosphere and haunting presences of the book resonate far beyond its conclusion.
In a way, Torres gives us a ghost story, but, in another way, Blackouts could be considered a truthful synopsis of our mediated existence. A novel of ideas, it asks, what is biographical or personal truth when it can only ever be revealed through the cleaning-up process of storytelling? Is the past meaningless in the face of an inexhaustible present? Or, alternatively, is the past the only thing that can bestow meaning, given that our personhood can only be defined by the collage of memory and documentation that exists to tell us who we are? Torres doesn't embark on the journey to answer these questions, but to get the reader to think about them, to meditate upon our fragile bodies in relation to the deep time of our actions.
Blackouts is a remarkable book, but it's certainly not for everyone. At times, its elliptical structure gets in the way of the story being told, and the characters floating through the narrative seem too vaporous to picture without the substantial archival material bound up with the text. Having said that, I think most who pick it up will find something to love.
There are so many different types of love explored in the novel: friendship, romance, familial love, carnality, love of art, romanticization of the past, care work, among many others. While it's not a clear-eyed novel whose beginning-middle-end structure is immediately satisfying, the miasmal atmosphere and haunting presences of the book resonate far beyond its conclusion.
In a way, Torres gives us a ghost story, but, in another way, Blackouts could be considered a truthful synopsis of our mediated existence. A novel of ideas, it asks, what is biographical or personal truth when it can only ever be revealed through the cleaning-up process of storytelling? Is the past meaningless in the face of an inexhaustible present? Or, alternatively, is the past the only thing that can bestow meaning, given that our personhood can only be defined by the collage of memory and documentation that exists to tell us who we are? Torres doesn't embark on the journey to answer these questions, but to get the reader to think about them, to meditate upon our fragile bodies in relation to the deep time of our actions.
Blackouts is a remarkable book, but it's certainly not for everyone. At times, its elliptical structure gets in the way of the story being told, and the characters floating through the narrative seem too vaporous to picture without the substantial archival material bound up with the text. Having said that, I think most who pick it up will find something to love.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Forced institutionalization, and Terminal illness
Moderate: Infidelity, Homophobia, Sexual content, and Toxic relationship
Minor: Medical trauma, Abandonment, and Mental illness
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