Remember You Will Die: A Novel

This book is a FEAT -- the kind of jaw-dropping thing you finish and go, "How did she DO that?" It isn't quite perfect, but it is astonishing.

I love an epistolary novel, and that's what this is; it's told entirely through obituaries, dictionary entries, and occasional other documents and transcripts. (This book is, essentially, a fictional internet research spiral.) Epistolary novels have a few weak points; for one thing, usually they're longer than the same story told in other ways, which means the pacing feels slower and it takes more time to get into the novel. That's true here, but I think Robins managed to make it a strength. This isn't a story you're being told. It's a story you're figuring out.

And Robins is not going to give show more you a lot of signposts to help you figure it out. If you're not paying attention, you're just not going to get the story, the end. (I have no idea what the experience of reading it would be like in that case.) In general, this is not a book that is working with you, which is part of what I enjoyed about it, but that's definitely going to cause some frustration for some people.

The thing that frustrated me is that Robins mostly renames/reskins major historical figures. I get why. She couldn't, for example, use Itamar Ben-Avi because his life story doesn't fit her narrative. But then she does use Anne Frank, and again, I get why. But the combination broke my brain a little.

That's a minor quibble, though. The overall experience of reading this was so interesting, so unusual, so impressive that it's worth five stars. I honestly think it's about as good as any epistolary novel could be, a sort of perfection of the form. show less

I loved the idea and I'm disappointed that this never clicked for me. I get what Robins was aiming for and enjoyed some of the individual character pieces but for an epistolary work the voices never felt varied enough and I didn't get the sense that it had really built to something by the end.

Starts out strong (especially since I love alternative narration styles) and initially the connections between chapters were moving and poignant. I even teared up a little (Roman epitaphs always get me). But as the rabbit hole continues it quickly gets bogged down in its own pretentiousness.

Very beautifully written but honestly felt like a series of disjointed short stories. I mean, when I stopped trying to connect the obits in my brain, it was lovely. But the minute I started to remember all of this was supposed to be a novel, I just got frustrated.

The prose was really nice. The format led me to confusion a few times, but I don't think it mattered. Not as sci-fi as it seems, barring a few sections. A lovely book.