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A review by trish204
Mr. Thursday by Emily St. John Mandel
2.0
I must admit, I decided to read this short story last night when I couldn't sleep and wanted something short. The reason why I chose this particular short story was that I've heard a lot about this author's novel and while the blurp so cannot get me interested, it was intriguing to see how many of my GR friends loved it. So as a way of helping me decide whether to pick up the novel or not, I read this.
The story is that of a man buying a car. Simple enough thing, right? Oh, but great events turn on small hinges as Mr. King likes to point out and this story is not as straight forward as it appeared in the beginning.
While there was a slight twist to it in the third act, it felt weird. In a does't-really-fit kinda way. I felt that the story about the car itself was much stronger than the framework that was revealed later. And I wanted there to be ... more? ... something else in addition? Dunno. Just not enough payoff and the worldbuilding was too scant for me as well.
Moreover, the writing style, while not being bad, was nothing much to get excited about (I might have grown a little grumpy because of some editing errors and the overall sentence structure that didn't do it for me). Meant to be literary SF, sure, but I read much better.
Nothing bad, but also nothing special to write home about.
You can read the story for free here: https://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2017/03/_mr_thursday_a_short_story_by_station_eleven_author_emily_st_john_mandel.html?via=gdpr-consent&via=gdpr-consent
The story is that of a man buying a car. Simple enough thing, right? Oh, but great events turn on small hinges as Mr. King likes to point out and this story is not as straight forward as it appeared in the beginning.
While there was a slight twist to it in the third act, it felt weird. In a does't-really-fit kinda way. I felt that the story about the car itself was much stronger than the framework that was revealed later. And I wanted there to be ... more? ... something else in addition? Dunno. Just not enough payoff and the worldbuilding was too scant for me as well.
Moreover, the writing style, while not being bad, was nothing much to get excited about (I might have grown a little grumpy because of some editing errors and the overall sentence structure that didn't do it for me). Meant to be literary SF, sure, but I read much better.
Nothing bad, but also nothing special to write home about.
You can read the story for free here: https://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2017/03/_mr_thursday_a_short_story_by_station_eleven_author_emily_st_john_mandel.html?via=gdpr-consent&via=gdpr-consent