I hardly survived disentangling myself from Hanya Yanagihara's "A Little Life".
I cannot say if this book is "technically" great literature or not, since the emotion overtakes structure, images, style. The raw, often sublime lyricism is certainly overwhelming.
It is hard to finish this novel without scars. Given the story, "scar" is an appropriate word.
The four men who inhabit this "Bildungsroman (?)" will haunt me for a long time. The writer drags the reader into the fatal spiral wherein the Orpheus descending reaches the abyss. This remains also one of the most poignant love "epics" I have ever read. Jude = Tristan. There is almost too much pain. The weight of the pages feels like lead. The price paid for the floating good, marked for extinction, is too high. Former hurts never heal.
The strength of this very urban, contemporary novel also lies in its almost absolute rebuttal of the imposition of the mediocre. Being mercilessly absolute comes with a price. The four friends might look successful from the outside, but they are frail, damaged souls.
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