Above (edition 2012)

Above, by Canadian author Leah Bobet, is a truly well-crafted novel, written by an author clearly comfortable with voice, language and imagery. In this dark, modern fairy tale Bobet writes from a very difficult point of view, yet manages to sustain tension that leaves the reader flayed. Her pace and the emotional impact of that pace is relentless. Not an easy read, not a novel you'd wish to pick up for a quick escape into something creamy, dreamy and fluffy, yet Above is very much worthy of your time and attention.

Overall the story deals with the story of Matthew, the story-keeper of a Torontonian underground society, and his tragic love of one of his fellow mutants, Ariel. But to summarize Bobet's tale by calling it a love story is to describe the Mona Lisa as a portrait. Just like the dystopian Toronto she creates, the story has layers upon layers. It is primarily a dark fantasy, yes. But it is also an indictment of barbaric psychiatric practices, of society's inability to deal with the homeless, with the estranged, with the strange. It is a social commentary written with adroitness and insight, and all done with an accomplished story-teller's art.

My only quibble, and it is a middling one, is the classification under which the publisher chose to list the book: young adult. While I can understand the reasoning behind that decision, I also cannot help but feel it was one chosen as an expedience, rather than a true understanding of Bobet's work and its impact. The tale is so dark, and the writing so at the edge of avant guard, that the novel might gain wider and better recognition under an adult classification.

But, as I mentioned, I quibble.

Certainly Bobet's novel is one worth your time. Recommended. ( )

Originally reviewed on A Reader of Fictions.

What on this crazy, polluted planet did I just read? Seriously, I just finished reading this and I have no freaking clue. If this book were a person, it would likely end up in a straitjacket, trapped in the sorts of institutions many of its characters have been at one point or another. Mix together One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Dust Girl, and I think you've got something that roughly approximates Above.

The world depicted herein does have interesting features. For example, there are people with powers, like Jack and his lightning hands. Others are part animal, like Matthew and his scales. Some of these Freaks, those that aren't normal, have formed a community, hidden beneath the earth in tunnels, safe from the doctors and the institutions. They call their community Safe, and Atticus is their leader.

This basic premise could have made an outstanding book, but it didn't. The lack of explanation caused me to get stuck in questioning mode, unable to suspend disbelief. So far as I noticed, there was never once any sort of description of HOW society came to be this way. People don't just suddenly get born with lion feet for no reason. I'm not even asking for much. Just give me something! Really, I would have been a bit more positive towards the book had their been just a sentence telling me that these changes were the result of drugs, chemicals in the food, pollution, SOMETHING.

The character of Ariel, pictured on the book's cover, proved to be another insurmountable obstacle for me as a reader. While I can easily accept some of the curses (or so they call them) that the people of Safe possess, like wielding lightning or speaking with ghosts, I had major difficulty with the animal hybrids. Still, I could accept to some degree at least Atticus' claw hands and Matthew's dad's lion feet. Fine. Ariel, though, I could not fathom. You see, she is not precisely as pictured. She looks completely normal sometimes, entirely human. However, she can TURN INTO A BEE. Her ability differs from everyone else's greatly, and I couldn't deal with the whole conservation of matter issues. Sure, I've read books where I wasn't bothered by things like that (Harry Potter, for example), but this aspect just seemed out of place within Bobet's own world. Why was Ariel so unique?

Matthew is a meh main character, which is unfortunate, especially considering that I still found him to be the most interesting character. Everyone feels flat and I don't get a sense of any real emotion anywhere, even in the scenes that I know were meant to be gut-wrenching. Perhaps this stems from the way Bobet chose to tell the story, as Matthew's autobiography, thus creating a sense of removal from those moments?

Matthew has a momentous crush on Ariel, although it's never put into those terms. I will give the romance credit for not being remotely like any other YA romances. However, that does not make me ship them any more. Again, it's hard to root for them when I have no sense of who they really are. Ariel, especially, does not seem to much care for anyone and would probably be best off alone.

The writing teetered on the edge of dialect but, except for one brief section, remained normal enough that I didn't want to stab my eyes out with one of my stiletto heels. Her long (mostly about forty pages) chapters made my eyes cross. I was constantly flipping ahead to see how many pages of the chapter remained, and the answer was usually too many. Additionally, I did not care for the Tales told at the end of each chapter, a brief story of how some of the key characters came to be in Safe. The characters chosen seemed entirely arbitrary, with some important ones having been skipped and some we never even meet getting a section. Many of these didn't add to the book for me at all. I feel like it would have been stronger to integrate them into the rest of the text.

There were some ideas in Above that I really liked, some shining possibility from amidst the weirdness. I really wish that Bobet hadn't made this a paranormal. As an issues book set in a dystopian future with a crackdown on crazy people (like The Glimpse), this could have been so powerful. The paranormal elements detracted from the serious themes, like the abuse Ariel has suffered and the inhumane treatments perpetrated by the Whitecoats.

About all I can say having finished Above is that I didn't completely hate it. However, I have so little positive to say that I cannot even rate it a meh. Some readers surely exist who can appreciate Bobet's vision, but I am not that reader. ( )

An incredibly complex story about brokenness and healing and safety. I am going to have to think about this one for a while. ( )

Oh, I did not like the way this book was written. At all. It's weird but I actually tend to like it when authors write their novels in strange dialects, I think it adds a certain uniqueness and personality to the characters, for example, in [b:Blood Red Road|9917938|Blood Red Road (Dust Lands, #1)|Moira Young|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1293651959s/9917938.jpg|14692536]. However, the use of it in [b:Above|11250671|Above|Leah Bobet|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1328836141s/11250671.jpg|16177154] was teeth-grindingly annoying for me. The sentences became disjointed and simplistic, it felt like a book for a much younger audience at times because of this.

Also, I felt absolutely zero connection with the narrator. The distance was so great that it took me almost fifty pages to realise that a) the book was written in 1st person, and b) the narrator was male. I mean, if you're a female author and a book has a pretty cover with a girl on the front, then I'm automatically going to assume the main character will be a girl - unless you give me reason to believe otherwise. Actually, this book is narrated by Matthew and I'm struggling to recall ever finding such a bland protagonist. He has a name and he's in love with a girl called Ariel... that's it. That's the extent of his characterisation as I see it.

Ariel, too, is forgettable. She is defined by her beauty, her blonde hair and bee wings (which, admittedly, is pretty cool), but she is meek and uninspiring. I could not care for these characters even if the writing had been more sophisticated, there was just nothing exciting about them. Or the world they lived in either.

Matthew and Ariel are part of a group of "freaks" who've been living underground away from the horrors of the world above. But they are forced to flee when their home comes under attack one night. The book promises "the most dangerous place he [Matthew] can imagine" that lies in Above. But really, what actually happens? This is a very melodramatic statement to make when the world they ascend to seems rather mild and non-threatening compared to some frightening places I've read about.

Overly simplistic writing, not enough drama and dull characters. Yet 1 star seems too passionate for a book that left me unmoved, I didn't hate it, I simply didn't care much either way.
( )

Short review: Charming but challenging.

I'd seen the author at a convention, and adored her, and then saw this book on a couple different lists of younger books with genderqueer characters.

I did have to go back and reread more than one section, I'm not a big fan of first-person narratives, but that might be more of a personal preference than a critique of the book. Also, I got way too attached to a minor character and kept hoping for more of her story (Bea) and not getting it.

It looks like it's going to be an easy book and it's not. It's hard to follow, hard to attach to the characters and it telegraphs its ending like whoa. But it's also sweet, and dealing with people who are loved neither in spite of their flaws or because of their flaws, which plucks at my heartstrings. And the dedication is flat out adorable.

I'd recommend this book, with reservations, but I very very much want to see what this author does next.