plane crash | Seattle Book Mama

Sunrise is just the sort of bizarre yet brilliant novel I’ve come to expect from author Tea Obreht. My thanks go to NetGalley and Random House for the invitation to read and review. This book is for sale now.

Our protagonist is Nina, a nanny on vacation with her boyfriend, Ben. Ben was the pilot of the plane flying over the Northern Rockies; Nina bailed, and Ben is nowhere in evidence. She’s landed in a river, and is remarkably free of major injuries, but she’s cold, scared, and alone. There’s no search and rescue within hearing or sight, so she knows it’s up to her to reach help.

Friends, it’s gonna take a long time.

The book is divided into 5 sections. The first is described above; the next three feature earlier residents of Sunrise, the ghost town Nina eventually reaches; and the last circles back to Nina. The sections are tied together at the end, but not in the way any other author would do it.

The first section feels tedious at times, limited as it is to Nina’s internal monologue. She walks, she rests, and she spends a good deal of time deciding whether she’s hungry enough to allow herself one of the handful of protein bars she possesses. How many days is this going to take? She has no idea. As Nina trudges, she ruminates, and in doing so, we gain more knowledge of her past and her relationship with Ben. Had this been any other author, I might have abandoned the whole thing; reader, I am very glad that I persevered, because the last ten percent of this book makes it completely worth it!

This is the third of this author’s books that I’ve read. The first was Inland, which remains one of my favorite galleys to date. The second, The Morningside, is not as powerful as the other two, including this one, but it’s still well worth reading. Sunrise, however, is the first one that’s made me stand up and cheer.

Those that have the patience for unconventional plots, and that appreciate a protagonist that’s full of surprises and badass feminist moxie, will have a hard time finding a more satisfying novel. Highly recommended!

howtowalkaway 3.5 stars, rounded upward.

Maggie swallows her misgivings and agrees to let her boyfriend, Chip, give her a ride in a small plane. He’s taken lessons, but doesn’t have a license yet. Naturally, he crashes. And naturally, he walks away without a scratch, but Maggie is paralyzed and burnt to a crackling crisp.

My thanks go to Net Galley and St. Martin’s Press for the DRC. This title is now for sale. I missed the release date and am sorry about that; I struggled with how to rate this title and how to review it. More on that in a minute.

Most of the story is set at a hospital, where Maggie is treated for burns and receives physical therapy to help her learn to move again. It’s painful and it’s horrible, and on top of that, nobody will let her have a mirror. Once she has one, she wishes she hadn’t looked.

“I would forever be a person that other people tried not to stare at in the grocery store. I would forever be someone who made other people uncomfortable.”

Maggie develops a crush on her physical therapist, a handsome, abrupt, unfriendly Scotsman whose poor bedside manner is surpassed only by his outstanding skill at helping Maggie learn to maneuver her body. At the same time, Chip—who for no reason I can understand, has not been arrested or cited for flying unlicensed or for stealing an airplane—goes all to pieces, turning his few hospital visits into a pity party for himself.

The story is quixotic in its combination of romance, medical information that is sometimes more detailed and gruesome than I want to read, and a beginning that is more an adventure or disaster tale than romance. 14% of the way in I flipped back to the cover, the tiny, almost unnoticeable plane flanked by giant floral bouquets, and I didn’t get how this story went with that jacket. I think the beginning scene with the plane, the toxic boyfriend turned fiancée, and the crash should have been edited down and presented as a prologue.

When Maggie is astonished to see a “lady firefighter”, I roll my eyes and check the copyright to make certain this isn’t a re-release of a title from the 1960s.

I originally designated this galley as my lunch and midnight snack companion, but soon it became obvious that there were too many detailed descriptions of bodily functions, particularly related to the bowel and the bladder, that I didn’t want to dine with.

The parts I like best here have to do with Maggie’s sister Kitty, who left suddenly many years ago and has been estranged due to a mysterious conflict with her mother. Kitty’s character is developed wonderfully and injects light and humor into the narrative.

The other characters at times seemed overdrawn. Chip is too obnoxious; I already hated him when he patted Maggie’s fanny and told her to get onto the plane. As ugliness is added to more ugliness, I find myself rolling my eyes and saying, yes, he’s a dick, I get it already. Maggie’s mother (is there a novelist out there that is comfortable with a protagonist and her mother having a solid relationship?) is too shallow, too obviously obsessed with surface beauty, and although there is some small redemption for her in the end, I want to see more than one attribute given this character, and I want it sooner.

And there’s the wealth, the privilege, and the wealth wealth wealth. When Maggie’s father brings a printer to her hospital room so he can crank out articles for her to read; when her mother hauls in curtains and lamps and redecorates the hospital room; a thousand times I find myself highlighting passages and arching my eyebrows. The hell?

The romance itself, however, is a winner. As I watch the electricity pop between Maggie and Ian, I can’t help smiling. The romance is what most readers are here for, and I find it heartwarming and satisfying. It’s a quick read, and although I had no trouble putting it down, I also had no trouble picking it back up again, which is not always true of the galleys I review.

Recommended to Center’s faithful readers, and to those that like a light romance.