February’s pick was Sequoia Nagamatsu’s, How High We Go in the Dark – a dystopian novel with encapsulated vignettes that are loosely connected with each other with themes of the human spirit, death, grief, and technology. The novel spans years, decades, centuries from the first chapter all the way to end – however, each chapter still maintains a small connection with the rest of the book and the themes of course, remain prevalent.
Each of the chapters read like a short story on their own – which is important to note. I think when I first approached this novel, i read it like…well…a novel. I think this has to be read a little slower and take each chapter as its own short story to really grasp the impact of each chapter. The delicate depictions of grief through death, commercialization of death, humanity’s impact on the earth are all carefully crafted throughout the novel through real human individual level examples, rather than macro level examples (which when put together, we can draw our own ideas of humanity spanning thousands of years).
The ending of the novel…was…different. A little unexpected. I can see how the author tries to offer a solution to loose ends throughout the novel but I am unsure if it was something that was required to begin with. I won’t say more as to not spoil anything.
While I recommend this book to anyone interested in these topics, take your time with it. Really let each chapter sink in. It’s one of those novels that really makes you ask yourself questions like “what would I do”, “how would I feel in that situation”, “is this how I feel”? It is bleek from start to finish – probably not a read you want to take on when you are going through your own struggles.
Overall, probably a 7/10 for me.