Hanya Yanagihara - A Little Life

When four classmates from a small Massachusetts college move to New York to make their way, they're broke, adrift, and buoyed only by their friendship and ambition. There is kind, handsome Willem, an aspiring actor; JB, a quick-witted, sometimes cruel Brooklyn-born painter seeking entry to the art world; Malcolm, a frustrated architect at a prominent firm; and withdrawn, brilliant, enigmatic Jude, who serves as their center of gravity.
Over the decades, their relationships deepen and darken, tinged by addiction, success, and pride. Yet their greatest challenge, each comes to realize, is Jude himself, by midlife a terrifyingly talented litigator yet an increasingly broken man, his mind and body scarred by an unspeakable childhood, and haunted by what he fears is a degree of trauma that he’ll not only be unable to overcome—but that will define his life forever.

Comment: This book had been in my radar for a while, but always some kind of detail would prevent me from getting it. I was also a little uncertain about it because I knew it would be a hard book to read. However, recently, it became possible to request it at the library and I've finally took the plunge.

Four friends meet while in college and while living in a not great apartment but even though they are from different backgrounds and with different personalities, they get along well enough and their friendship will last. Still, of them all, Jude St Francis is the most reserved one, someone who clearly has secrets but who is, at the same time, the most dedicated and humble of friends and everyone forgives him for not sharing too much. As the lives of the four friends go on through the challenges of what it means to be an adult, Jude becomes a person who is reliable but who can't seem to see the brightness of life even when everyone around praises him for what he does and for who he is. Life isn't easy for anyone for does Jude's past affect him so much, even with the blessings he has achieved?

Before anything else, I should say that, for someone who has not yet read this book, ALL TRIGGERS apply. This is a story that certainly should be considered to include all the possible trigger warnings.

I had heard about this book several times before even thinking about reading it and along with the hints of how heartbreaking and difficult it was, most readers also commented on how well written it was. I know now that the author has 3 books published and I actually bought To Paradise by her too, and then, by chance, this one became available at the library. All these thoughts were in my mind when I requested it but I was mostly eager to read what so many said was a well written book.

Now that I have finished, some days ago, my mind still goes back to some emotions and scenes and  will have to say that yes, it is heartbreaking. It's hard to read. It's full of unfair and unnecessarily depressing situations, with the main character having suffered though practically all the possible tragedies a character can endure. Yet... it was beautifully written if one only focus on the wording, the sequence of sentences and of how the author planned the exposition of the content, with a delicious bittersweet balance of showing and telling that so many authors cannot accomplish.

This said, I don't have many words or the skill in the English language to truly explain why this book moved me and why it bothered me at the same time. My final grade means only one thing: I liked and devoured this almost 700 pages door stopper in 2 days (I had to work, otherwise it might have been just one!) but it was, in my opinion, too depressing and tragic without enough positive and uplifting situations/scenes to counter balance the awful. I can understand the author wanted to convey a message, wanted to write this story specifically this way since life is not easy nor with happy endings for the vast majority of the population, but... she could have toned down the bad.

The plot is actually quite simple, we follow the four friends as they go on with their lives, with a huge emphasis on what happens through Jude's POV, while several things cause him to think about his past, which we are told as if it's a small tale, there are no flashbacks for instance. Several things are more inferred than explicit but the content is distinctly terrible. How not to feel pity and anger on Jude's behalf for what he went through and for what others made him feel? Jude must be one of the most ill treated characters in fiction and the awful trauma never left him, really. I think the author showed a very realistic picture of what it means to overlook what trauma does but the message that it is consuming should have been partnered with a better notion of how important it is to do something about it, namely seeing a therapist and trust the process.

There are many happy-ish scenes in the story and positive situations and emotions, but this is not a happy book. This does not have a happy ending and what probably saved it was how good the writing is and how easy it is to understand the philosophies, the thought process behind some passages. I liked reading the book even if the content wasn't likable. I don't think there is any doubt mrs Yanagihara is a talented and skillful writer. But I confess I'll wait until diving back to her work, if everything is this agonizing.

Grade: 8/10