Everything Matters! (2009)

Ron Currie Jr. (God is Dead) weaves a wonderful tale of human connections and the timeless existential dilemma, in a style that blends unapologetic realism with raw insight and a dash of the fantastic.

A boy is born with specific knowledge of humanity's impending demise via comet, and spends his life struggling in various ways to fight fate and to deal with the apparent uselessness of everything. It's told from multiple perspectives and has an interesting narrative structure. Most importantly it is an honest book, exploring simultaneously the despair of knowing our end (which, let's face it, we all do anyhow) and the amazing fact that even in the face of that despair, even against its inevitability, still "everything matters" - beauty, sacrifice, family, love.

Definitely one of the betters books to have come out in recent years. ( )

What a bizarre novel. I think had I read it vs. listening to the audiobook, I wouldn't have enjoyed it nearly as much. ( )

While I did end up liking this book, I really felt the middle section kind of wandered all over the place. Without wholly giving anything away, that 'wandering' made more sense as things moved along, but I still didn't think the end saved the book entirely.

Definitely a book where the enjoyment wasn't so much in the journey as it was where you were at the end of that journey. ( )

REVIEW ALSO ON: http://bibliomantics.com/2012/12/21/happy-apocalypse-cassie-la-explodes-over-the...

Everything Matters is told from multiple perspectives of the Thibodeaux family: worrisome mother, workaholic father, drug addicted brother, insane uncle, savant Junior, the love of Junior’s life Amy and the omnipresent 2nd person narrator(s). I have yet to find a second person perspective so well written and so relevant to the narrative style since this book. Although Junot Diaz comes a close second, particularly in his newest short story collection This Is How You Lose Her.

Junior is the only person in a good deal of the novel who knows the world is going to end when he turns 36. He discovers this in utero when an omniscient voice tells him all about it. Did I mention this book is also slightly unbelievable in terms of plot? Well it is, there, I told you. The government eventually catches on and super genius Junior is brought in to help save the world. Like you do.

Even though it’s less realistic, Everything Matters has an incredibly uplifting if depressing message: everything matters. You probably got that from the title.

There are poignant points scattered throughout the novel where the omniscient narrators explain how the smallest thing could have the biggest impact. Think the butterfly effect, but on a more social level. This happens to person A which effects person B who does this to person C, etc. These were perhaps my favorite moments. I could have read a whole novel with this singular narrator, but it was an interesting change of pace to read the other POVs as well. Especially because if one sucked you didn’t have to read it for very long (coughBRANCHAPTERScough).

The main focus is on the importance of family over the end of the world, as in the end of the world should conceivably put what’s important into perspective. Junior ends up (without giving too much away) doing everything for his father, working to save him. In a giant plot twist toward the end of the novel (no, Junior is not Dan Humphrey), and a spectacularly depressing conclusion the whole purpose of the novel finally comes into perspective.

You’ll laugh, you’ll cry… Just kidding, you’ll cry out all your tear ducts and you won’t laugh unless you’re a horrible, horrible person. This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang but a whimper. The whimpering of you as you cry yourself to sleep.

Just remember, in any apocalypse: Keep calm and carry on my wayward son. ( )

The ending took my breath away. ( )