Family Book Swap: The Book of Form and Emptiness

Title: The Book of Form and Emptiness

Author: Ruth Ozeki

via Target

Ruth Ozeki's novel tells the tale of Benny Oh, an early teen boy who is dealing with his father's sudden death and his mother's hoarding compulsion.  To complicate matters, Benny's hearing voices.  All of the objects around him - a book, a wall, a pair of scissors - are speaking to him.  Through his adventures at a psychiatric hospital and the public library, he makes some interesting human friends, too.

The Book of Form and Emptiness came into our lives this summer through new avenues.  It was the summer reading book for our child's college, then my wife chose it for her book club.  So now all three of us have read at least most of it - not sure the kid ever finished it.

It's an engaging read.  Perspective shifts frequently and oddly.  Sometimes it's Benny, sometimes his mom, sometimes a librarian.  The book itself becomes its own character and, in fact, most of the story is told from its point of view.  For this and other reasons, the novel is a book lover's book.  On page 388, there's a shift to second-person narrative which I always find unsettling but within context, it makes sense.  Goodreads classifies the novel as magical realism which got me to wondering about the fine line between that genre and schizophrenia, one of Benny's diagnoses.  Interestingly, I learned that magical realism developed, primarily among Latin American authors, as a vehicle for writing about mental illness without actually naming it. 

Our progeny found it tough going at times and I can understand why.  The story of Annabelle, Benny's mother, gets especially heavy as we watch her life spiral out of control.  Some in my wife's book group found the ending too tidy, which I can also appreciate.  But for me, overall, the story works.