The Nix by Nathan Hill

⭐⭐

I would grade this book a 2.5 out of 5 stars. This is between a "meh!" and an OK. Several of the blurbs mention the phrase "the great American novel," sadly I do not thing this book will achieve that status.

However, despite my relatively poor rating, there is much to commend it. Mr Hill is a very good writer and comes up with many quotes eg. "We can tell ourselves we’re not special because we weren’t born with it, which is a great excuse,” and "Sometimes we’re so wrapped up in our own story that we don’t see how we’re supporting characters in someone else’s." and "you shouldn’t think of it as your mother abandoned you. Instead, perhaps think of it as she gave you up for adoption slightly later than usual.” All thought provoking, incisive literary gems. 

Yes Mr Hill is a good writer, what he needs is a good editor. I often enjoy a sojourn down a side adventure, however Mr Hill takes too many and describes them using as many words as possible. It's as if he has a word count to hit and is padding out the book as much as possible, similar to a student struggling to reach minimum length on an essay. The reader has to invest heavily for little return. Pages and pages are spent on a peripheral character's avatar's fall from grace and death in an online game and Alan Ginsberg's various interpretations of the mantra word "ohm." 

There are several other areas where the book is engaging. It is a good snapshot of American society 1960s-2010s. It is a biting satire of several areas of modern culture including modern journalism, consumerism, political spin doctoring, collegiate politics and modern day entitlement. The plot, while not a seat of your pants thriller has enough intrigue to keep you steadily turning the pages.

The characters are multi dimensional and develop and change over time. in the book, as in life good guys/ bad guys and happy endings/sad endings are not distinctive black and white but more a sort of drab grey, and always subjective. I am OK with this.

In short an engaging OK book that could have been elevated to a good book with some prunage.