Everything Must Go (November 2006)
October 27, 2007
“‘You know how you wanted them to say it out loud back then?’ Another breath. ‘I’ll say it now — we all wanted it to be you that died. You should have died in that tub.’”
Excerpt from Everything Must Go
The basic story is that Henry Powell is blamed for the ruining of his family at the tender age of seven. After this life-altering event, the family goes down hill. Mom develops a Valium addiction, the older brother becomes angsty, and dad just distances himself from his feelings. I’m not giving away plot twists here, merely the story line. As a result Henry is burdened with the guilt of this, and spends his life trying to make it up to his parents. It’s sort of sad to see the pathetic progression of his life, or a lack thereof.
Everything Must Go is an easy read and doesn’t provide much strain on the brain. This is sadly a double-edged comment. What that means is that though easy to read, it is adversely not that intriguing in its plot line. I got the gist of it about 150 pages in. It’s like the bizzaro Rudy. It’s Rudy if he didn’t get into Notre Dame. All the sappy depression, but no upswing at the end. It sort of just levels out on itself. Say you started at a happy scale of 5. the book brings you down to negative ten, then manages to crawl back up to about a zero. The ending left me somewhat deflated, though that comes down to personal opinion.
I will admit its a sadly detailed look into the life of those who don’t quite make it. Those people that don’t make it out there and do something with their lives. Not even anything extraordinary, but even those who go out and blend into the median. Henry is a character that sits outside the bell curve, cursing it for its comfortableness and at times holstering his guilt as a badge of honour. It’s a story about love and duty, no matter how misplaced either must be. I appreciated that though depressing, Henry stands out as a man of his word above all else. He is a sad and simple man, but he is honest and truthful… even if that makes him sound like a psycho throughout some of the book.
Elizabeth Flock also managed to incur in me one of the longest “cringe moments” of my life. In my Social Psych class, we were taught that men and women respond differently to the same situation. For instance when someone is doing a speech, and failing horribly at it, men will cringe and look away. Women tend to lean in and pay more attention, trying to offer silent support. It was this look-away-and-cringe effect that flowed within me for about a third of the book, though at differing times. I can’t explain why, but anyone who reads this one through will understand.
It wasn’t a bad book, though I think I may have missed the point. I am also wary of any book that actually comes with “discussion questions” in the back.
5.5/10
Categories: Book Reviews
Tagged under: 5.5/10, book, Book Reviews, Elizabeth Flock, Everything Must Go, Reviews