Book Log: The Silenced

[penmage]

The Silenced by James DeVita

Marena, raised by her revolutionary mother, has always believed in speaking your mind and standing up for what you believe in. But her mother is dead now, condemned a traitor executed after the Zero Tolerance party came to power. Her crime? Thinking for herself and speaking out.

Now, as conditions in the government compound where Marena lives get more and more oppressive, Marena has to make a choice. Will she stay silent, keep her head down, and stay safe? Or will she make a stand, even if it means risking her life and the lives of everyone she loves? Marena knows one thing for sure: if she doesn't stand up, no one will.

I love a good dystopian novel as much as the next person--probably more. But this one never came together for me. For one thing, I can't envision the chain of events that led to the Zero Tolerance party coming to power. It's clear that James DeVita doesn't actually care about what led to this turn of events--he just wanted to fictionalize Sophie Scholl's courageous protests, and he wanted to put it in a futuristic setting so that instead of historical fiction, it would read as a "this could happen to you."

But it doesn't work. It's such a thinly veiled retelling of Nazi Germany--with futuristic lingo and technology, of course, and some small differences in technique, and also in extent--but it's impossible not to recognize Nazi Germany in the Zero Tolerance party. But I understand how the Nazi party came to power. There were a whole mess of political issues, not to mention the aftermath of WWI and what that did to the German psyche. As a historian, I've studied the past, and I understand--not how people could do these things, but how this sort of situation could come to pass. James DeVita was not interested in putting in the work to make this a believable dystopia, and so it's not believable. It feels like he cribbed it from the Holocaust--and he did.

Even worse, it's not until towards the very end of the book that I felt a clear sense of danger or feared for Marena's safety or life. Most of the time, when she resisted--it didn't feel immediate. There were a few sections of her memories that were written in first person, and I couldn't help but wonder how much more immediate the book would have felt if it had all been written in first person.

The plot was flat. I guessed a few of the most important plot twists early on, and much of the book felt like one long slog until they were revealed. And the rest of it--even if I didn't anticipate it, it was because I just didn't care enough to try.

The one redeeming factor in this book is the genuinely interested Helmsley Greengritch, who is the only character in the book who fascinated me and felt like a real person. I believed that Greengritch believed in what he was doing, unlike pretty much everyone else in DeVita's dystopia, and watching him along his journey was interesting.

DeVita very proudly admits this in the author's note at the end, that he wanted to rewrite Sophie's story. I don't think that's something to be proud of. If you want to write Sophie's story, give her the dignity of her name, and if you don't, write your own book--don't crib off of history.

If you want to read a book about the Holocaust, only futurized and with different names, this book is for you. If you want to read a ripoff of Sophie Scholl's courageous story, only without any actual Sophie in it, this book is for you. If you want to read a book where the author thinks he's so damn clever for coming up with terms like "loyalty correction", and claims in an afterward that he has achieved the same level of heroism as Sophie Scholl herself by the very act of writing this book, then this book is for you.

If you don't want any of those things, you probably do not want to read this book.

Comments

[strange-selkie.livejournal.com]

The conceit (all meanings applied) of this book offends me in something like three different ways, but I'm not really awake right now. I trust your judgement, and I'll steer clear.

[penmage.livejournal.com]

This book made me really angry. It was poorly written, arrogant and offensive. I was fuming about it for so long afterwards that I had to discuss it with N, who usually just listens to my book rants quietly until I'm done. But I read him parts of the authors note on this one, and he got angry too.

[strange-selkie.livejournal.com]

When will people learn that filing the serial numbers off Holocaust stories is bad?

[etoilepb.livejournal.com]

Or that there are ways to convey some of the same essential themes (about motivation, duty, right / wrong, and so on) without going back to the same story from history over and over again?

[strange-selkie.livejournal.com]

It's true. I think this is why so much of what's published these days reads like fanfic of something that came before. And new history keeps happening -- that's the nature of humans and time -- and authors keep revisiting the familiar rather than exploring the new.

[penmage.livejournal.com]

Also--there are ways of exploring a totalitarian dystopia that are interesting and compelling and say things about where we're going instead of where we've been. And of course, the old adage about those who don't learn history are doomed to repeat it. There is value in looking to the past to find the future.

But this is not that. This is, as the author says himself in the afterward, a retelling of a story that does not need to be ripped off and retold.

[siadea.livejournal.com]

OK, way not cool. Some things you just back away respectfully from, and that is one of them.

[akamarykate.livejournal.com]

Ugh. I mean, the ripoff angle is certainly enough to keep me away, but to add arrogance on top of it...this is why I bounced hard off of certain very popular nonfiction writers in two fields (paleontology and medieval history) that I love. There's a certain attitude some authors convey in their introductions/author's notes that make me slam a book closed, and it sounds like Devita has that in abundance. Thanks for...um...warning us away?...taking one for the team?

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

and claims in an afterward that he has achieved the same level of heroism as Sophie Scholl herself by the very act of writing this book

...whoa.

[beingblueagain.livejournal.com]

I don't want to read this book--at all--but that's a pretty cover. Is there a design cred?

[penmage.livejournal.com]

It is an attractive jacket, but even that peeves me, because it's ripping off the Sophie Scholl imagery of the White Rose.

But me and my rabid rage at this book are going to take a backseat for a minute. There is definitely a design cred, but I don't know what it is, because the book has gone back to the library from whence it came.