Neverworld Wake

I have loved Marisha Pessl’s two previous books – “Special Topics in Calamity Physics,” and “Night Film,” so I was excited to read her latest. Even though it is my least favourite of her books so far, it is still a really good read. To be honest, Pessl is always a little out of my comfort zone and, yet still,she draws me back.This novel begins by introducing us to Beatrice Hartley, who is still mourning the suicide of her boyfriend, Jim, when they attended the prestigious Darrow-Harker School. While there, Bea was pulled into a group of the most popular kids and, suddenly, she is invited back into their orbit. However, during the night out, there is an accident and Bea, and the others, find themselves trapped in a nightmarish world, where they are stalked by the a rather creepy man, known as the Keeper, who informs the unwilling group what they need to escape.Along the way we meet the rest of the group - Whitley, Cannon, Kip and Martha, and follow them, and Bea, as they begin to reunite to discover what happened to Jim and see if they can escape the bizarre situation they find themselves in. As such, this is a little bit of everything – it will appeal to those who enjoy crime, or books about privileged schools, with a little bit of science fiction thrown in. So, not my favourite by quite a long shot, but still better than most other authors and a new title by Pessl will still get me pressing that pre-order button without even knowing the title.

I just finished Neverworld Wake after staying up all night to finish it. Its a tale about the deceit of memory, the faces we put on and the lies we tell ourselves. Bee and her school friends appear to live a privileged life, bathed in sunshine until her boyfriend Jim dies mysteriously and the friends drift apart. They come together a year or so later, and tentatively connect again until a knock on the door changes everything. They are actually in a form of purgatory and have to work through what really happened to Jim before one of them can return to life. The catch is they have to choose which person. I loved this book, its dreaminess and intensity capture what its like to make friends and fall in love for the first time and the lies we tell ourselves to keep it going.

Cool concept but just not written to my liking. I like many other fantasy books much better.

Great book, took me a little while to get into it but once I was it was amazing.

Love the writer's work.

Wow. Officially one of my favorite books this year. Completely unexpected, supremely unpredictable and absolutely crazy! I knew this was some sort of YA mystery-thriller, but I never thought it would take such an astonishing turn. Marisha Pessl takes you on one thrilling ride that knows no bounds. So many crazy twists and turns, every time you think you've figured it out...BAM! Sorry buddy, try again.This story follows protagonist, Beatrice Hartley, who is back in her Rhode Island hometown, attending Emerson college, living with her parents, helping them at their café and nursing her grief after the sudden death of her boyfriend and first love, a year ago at Darrow-Harker School.Beatrice had tried to forget that fateful day, when her boyfriend, Jim, mysteriously died. Everyone ruled it a suicide, but Bea knew that there was no way Jim would opt out and she was also certain that their friends knew more than they let on about that night. Since his death, Bea had completely detached herself from her friends, an elite group that had taken her in even though she came from more humble backgrounds and was not as privileged.That summer, Beatrice receives a very random text from her best friend Whitley, who invites her over to her house (mansion) to hang out just like old times. Beatrice is very tempted to go, because Jim's death is still nagging at her and she needs to know what happened to him in order to put that chapter in her life to rest. She decides to go to and see her friends again, even though her parents think it's a very bad idea.Upon her arrival, the group - consisting of Kipling, Martha, Cannon and Whitley - is slightly surprised she showed up, but quickly accept her with arms wide open that felt a bit...forced. You could sense there is tension and that the dynamic has shifted in the group in the year that's passed, but everyone was trying to act normal. They go out to a concert, and spend the night drinking and dancing without a care in the world. On the drive back home, it is raining heavily, and Whitley, who was driving, loses control of the car and almost collide with a tow truck. After the scare, they get back home drenched in rain and feeling a bit subdued. As they are drying off, they get a knock on the door and an old man speaking in old English introduces himself and tells them..."You're all nearly dead. Wedged between life and death. Time for you has become snagged on a splinter, forming a closed-circuited potentiality called a Neverworld Wake."The rules of this world are explained to them. He informs them that the driver of the tow truck is dead, and that 4 of them will also have to die, and only one can survive. They have to vote who that person will be, and it has to be a unanimous vote. Until they decide, they will be living the same day over and over and over again, in a constant time loop straight out of Groundhog Day. There's only one way to break that loop, during the last 3 minutes of their day, they will be given the chance to make their vote. Until they can reach a consensus, the loop will repeat itself, with the day playing itself out endlessly from the moment they hit the truck. Every day, they will wake up at the exact moment they hit the truck.In that time, they are able to leave, go home, see their families, live their lives normally, until they go to bed, and then they wake up repeating the same cycle, with their loved ones completely oblivious to their plight and no memory of the day before. Every one in the group deals with this news in their own way, some becoming violent, others in denial, Martha trying to study the science behind the Wake phenomena, but Bea...Bea wanted to solve Jim's mysterious death.These loops were insane. I mean, absolutely insane. Think the violence of "A Clockwork Orange" kind of insanity. The group goes into a rampage, stealing, lying, thieving, seducing and turn into absolute monsters. When they all end up collapsing...and we are never sure how much time has passed or how many Wakes they've lived, Bea confronts them and tells them of her need to find out what happened to Jim. Enter Martha, who has figured out how they can move through time and space during the loop. They use that new knowledge to try and find out what really happened that night, and the deceptions and lies begin to reveal themselves, breaking the group apart, then bringing them back together, defeated and desperate.This is where Pessl's true skill shows as she is able to really navigate the readers through all the confusing timelines, clues and complex bits and pieces in a way that was always easy to follow and understand. As we race towards the end, and the true events of that fateful night is revealed to us, we think we have it all figured out and reach acceptance, only for Pessl to pull the rug from under us with another explosive twist.Everything we thought we know, the stereotypes that we set ourselves and other people go out the window. That is one of the many things Pessl tries to convey with this story. I will leave you with one of my favorite quotes from the book that really sums up that thought:"We swear we see each other, but all we are ever able to make out is a tiny porthole view of an ocean. We think we remember the past as it was, but our memories are as fantastic and flimsy as dreams. It's so easy to hate the pretty one, worship the genius, love the rock star, trust the good girl. That's never their only story. We are all anthologies. We are each thousands of pages long, filled with fairy tales and poetry, mysteries and tragedy, forgotten stories in the back no one will ever read."

Maybe it’s just because I’d finished Marisha Pessl’s ‘Night Film’ (which I loved, and definitely recommend!) but I didn’t like this book.It felt, in comparison to ‘Night Film’ a watered down version of her writing. I understand that this is YA and NF was Adult, but I just couldn’t get into it.The concept was interesting, but ultimately fell flat.I also noticed how Pessl reused certain attributes from her previous books, such as the wilderness school and a character with three fingers. I’m aware authors do this, but I felt more aware of it so soon after reading NF, and this just made me conscious of how much it seemed like a poor rendition of one of my favourite books.Maybe I self sabotaged myself with this one, and should have waited to pick it up so soon after ‘Night Film’.But then again, I just didn’t enjoy the story in general. It was boring and predictable. The ending was too obvious. Neither did I like any of the characters, who felt 1-dimensional and only there to advance the story.

Eigentlich hatte "Neverworld Wake" die besten Voraussetzungen, ein Highlight meines diesjährigen Lesejahres zu werden: Ich mochte die beiden bisherigen Romane der Autorin (vor allem "Night Film" fand ich toll), lese hin und wieder gern ein Buch aus der YA-Kategorie und liebe Zeitreiseromane in so ziemlich allen Varianten. Leider ist "Neverworld" nicht nur kein Highlight, es ist das mit einigem Abstand schlechteste Buch, das ich in 2018 bisher gelesen habe – und ich hatte in den letzten Monaten schon einige üble Fehlgriffe!Abgesehen von der vielversprechenden Grundidee mit der Zeitschleife (nicht neu, aber immer wieder faszinierend) kann ich dem Buch absolut nichts Positives abgewinnen. Eine derart (bl)öde Umsetzung des Zeitreisemotivs ist mir selten untergekommen – da helfen auch Actionszenen, Gewalt und unzählige, ach-so-geheimnisvolle Andeutungen nichts. Wer die Wache letztlich lebendig übersteht, wie es zu der Entscheidung kommt und warum, war für mich ungefähr so spannend wie der sprichwörtliche Sack Reis, der in China umfällt. Das dürfte vor allem an den Figuren gelegen haben, die durch die Bank bis zum Schluss eindimensional geblieben sind, konsequent hölzern agierten und zu keiner Zeit lebendig wurden; selbst die Ich-Erzählerin blieb bis zum Schluss vollkommen farblos.Für mich ein Totalausfall. Dass ich bis zum Ende durchgehalten habe, lag einzig daran, dass ich Bücher ungern abbreche und dieses hier zum Glück relativ kurz ist. Trotz der Enttäuschung werde ich Pessls nächstes Werk mit ziemlicher Sicherheit lesen. Ich hoffe aber, dass sie sich dann wieder auf ihre Stärken besinnt - das YA-Genre gehört definitiv nicht dazu.

Ganz zum Schluss, nach fast 320 sich dahinziehenden Seiten, kommt Marisha Pessl zu dem, was sie mit diesem Buch offenbar ansprechen wollte: den unschätzbaren Wert von tiefen Freundschaften, echten Verbindungen zwischem Menschen, selbst über den Tod hinaus, die Mühe, die man sich geben muss, um Menschen wirklich zu kennen, das große Glück, am Leben zu sein...und beinahe wird der Leser, der bis dahin durchgehalten hat, durch die paar Seiten, die dann noch folgen, für den Rest entschädigt. Aber nur beinahe.Warum nur, habe ich mich gefragt, musste die Autorin diese Sinnfindung verpacken in einem so unendlich ausgedehnten und zu einem großen Teil erratisch dahin erzählten Schmarren?Mehr als einmal hatte ich unterwegs das Gefühl, ihr wäre der Erzählfaden verloren gegangen bzw. sie hätte ihn einfach irgendwo hängenlassen, um einen vermeintlich spannenderen oder beeindruckenderen aufzunehmen, leider, ohne irgendwo anzuknüpfen.Normalerweise gehe ich in Rezensionen, vor allem solchen, die ein Buch nicht so gut davonkommen lassen, gerne mehr ins Detail, um meinen negativen Eindruck zu begründen. Hier merke ich aber, dass ich schon wieder die gleiche schlechte Laune bekomme, die ich schon während des Lesens hatte. Ich versuche daher, nur zusammenzufassen.Die Story von „Neverworld Wake“ lässt, das kann nicht ausbleiben, natürlich an einige Parallelen mit „Before I Fall“ von Lauren Oliver denken. Vielleicht hat Marisha Pessl eine möglichst große Distanz dazu gesucht. Mit dem vorgenannten Buch jedenfalls hat „Neverworld Wake“ wirklich nur gemeinsam, dass die Protagonisten nach einem tödlichen Unfall etwas zurechtrücken müssen, bevor sie davon erlöst werden, den gleichen Tag stets wieder und wieder erleben – oder in diesem Fall ertragen – zu müssen. Das Cover lässt vermuten, dass Pessls „Neverworld“ ein magischer, meditativer Ort ist, an dem die Figuren wachsen und reifen. Leider ist das Cover völlig verkehrt gewählt. Vielmehr müssen sie haarsträubende Situationen bestehen, und zwar gleich mehrmals, immer wieder – schließlich können sie sich erschießen lassen, zu Tode stürzen oder ihre Mitmenschen demütigen – am nächsten (selben) Tag geht es für sie einfach weiter, und die Mitmenschen der normalen Welt haben diesen Tag noch nicht erlebt. Diese zuweilen praktische Lösung wird von den fünf Protagonisten und von der Autorin für meinen Geschmack bis zur Schmerzgrenze ausgenutzt.Geht es zunächst darum, einen Konsens zu finden, wer aus der "Nerverworld" ins Leben zurückkehren darf, wird die Handlung schnell noch bereichert durch einen hanebüchenen Kriminalfall, denn plötzlich ist es Aufgabe der Clique herauszufinden, warum ihr genialer Freund Jimmy ums Leben gekommen ist. Die Aufklärung ab der Buchmitte spottet jeder Beschreibung.Die Autorin lässt die Person, die am Ende überleben und in ihre normale Welt zurückkehren darf (wer das ist, wird der Leser leider sofort zu Beginn des Buches richtig erraten) zum Schluss hin gewaltige Worte finden über ihre Zeit in der „Neverworld“: „Little did anyone know the real reason that I'd survived: I had lived a century inside a second. I had died thousands of times, learned about and loved four people in a way few ever had the chance. I had called a place home where details such as life and death didn't mattter, where what did matter were the trembling moments of connection in between.“ (316) Das klingt sehr schön, und es ist wahr, dass in der „Neverworld“, weil es ja eben egal ist, ziemlich viel gestorben und wieder auferstanden wird. Den Rest habe ich aber leider in dem Roman nicht entdecken können. An keiner Stelle wurde für mich vorstellbar, dass die Protagonistin die vier Personen, die sie einmal als ihre besten „Freunde“ bezeichnet hat, irgendiwe liebenswert finden oder gar lieben könnte. In mehreren Rezension wurden die vier Personen als „Karikaturen“ bezeichnet, das trifft es, finde ich, ziemlich gut. Was hier unter Freundschaft verstanden wird – die doch, so habe ich es verstanden, am Ende das Entscheidende ist - wird ganz gut deutlich in folgendem Dialog:„You stole it from me. I know you did. It was one of your notorious thefts. Wasn't it?“„Bee, I'm so sorry-“„You never think. Little do you know how your most haphazard gestures inflict such pain. It hurts to be your friend. It always has. But I still love you.“ (261)Und mal ehrlich, wer redet denn so?Zum Schluss ist zu sagen, dass die Geschichte um Beatrice, Whitley, Kipling, Cannon, Martha und den gemeinsamen Freund Jimmy, der im Jahr zuvor gestorben war, mit den einzelnen familiären Hintergründen dieser zumeist superreichen, vom Leben gelangweilten Jugendlichen das Potential zu einem wirklich guten Roman gehabt hätte. Ohne paranomalen Hintergrund, unmotivierte Krimihandlung mit geradezu idiotischen Szenen und Neverworld hätte sich vielleicht tatsächlich eine Geschichte über unwahrscheinliche Freundschaften und die vielen menschlichen Facetten erzählen lassen, die es erst zu entdecken gilt.

Wo ist nur die brilliante, kluge, vor Ideen und Wissen sprühende Autorin von „Special Topics in Calamity Physics“ geblieben? Schon das zweite Buch „Night Film“ war eine überambitionierte, wenig überzeugende und schließlich nicht gelungene Geschichte. „Neverworld Wake“ und damit die Hoffnung, die Autorin des ersten Buches wiederzufinden - konventionell, flache Charaktere, eine altbekannte, abgenutzte Grundidee, zwischen Leben und Tod den immer gleichen Tag erleben zu müssen. In der zweiten Hälfte entwickelt sich dann etwas mehr Spannung um den Tod des jugendlichen Helden - nur damit die Geschichte schließlich in der profansten, langweiligsten aller Möglichkeiten aufgelöst wird. Enttäuschend, langweilig, überflüssig.

This book is amazing! It became an ultimate favorite of mine. The writing is so good and there is so much complexion and development in its characters. I even cried when I finished, go read this book!!

Good novel.The message,content was powerful.The mystery,imagination of a new world was brought to life.

Didn't realize it was YA when I started reading...I loved Night Film and STICP so naturally I was already on board....in fact, I didn't actually realize it was YA until after I had finished and started reading other folks reviews and I'm still not convinced it is totally YA. It's a great premise and unfolds with a pace that allows that we are a society that has seen Groundhog Day and doesn't labor on the minutiae of the purgatoria of living the same day over and over...so the pace is quite brisk. Some excellent explorations here of guilt and the darker natures of humans: what would YOU do if you had an endless supply of reset buttons at the end of your day? Smart urban (?) fantasy with great characters. Highly recommend...

Wow. Officially one of my favorite books this year. Completely unexpected, supremely unpredictable and absolutely crazy! I knew this was some sort of YA mystery-thriller, but I never thought it would take such an astonishing turn. Marisha Pessl takes you on one thrilling ride that knows no bounds. So many crazy twists and turns, every time you think you've figured it out...BAM! Sorry buddy, try again.This story follows protagonist, Beatrice Hartley, who is back in her Rhode Island hometown, attending Emerson college, living with her parents, helping them at their café and nursing her grief after the sudden death of her boyfriend and first love, a year ago at Darrow-Harker School.Beatrice had tried to forget that fateful day, when her boyfriend, Jim, mysteriously died. Everyone ruled it a suicide, but Bea knew that there was no way Jim would opt out and she was also certain that their friends knew more than they let on about that night. Since his death, Bea had completely detached herself from her friends, an elite group that had taken her in even though she came from more humble backgrounds and was not as privileged.That summer, Beatrice receives a very random text from her best friend Whitley, who invites her over to her house (mansion) to hang out just like old times. Beatrice is very tempted to go, because Jim's death is still nagging at her and she needs to know what happened to him in order to put that chapter in her life to rest. She decides to go to and see her friends again, even though her parents think it's a very bad idea.Upon her arrival, the group - consisting of Kipling, Martha, Cannon and Whitley - is slightly surprised she showed up, but quickly accept her with arms wide open that felt a bit...forced. You could sense there is tension and that the dynamic has shifted in the group in the year that's passed, but everyone was trying to act normal. They go out to a concert, and spend the night drinking and dancing without a care in the world. On the drive back home, it is raining heavily, and Whitley, who was driving, loses control of the car and almost collide with a tow truck. After the scare, they get back home drenched in rain and feeling a bit subdued. As they are drying off, they get a knock on the door and an old man speaking in old English introduces himself and tells them..."You're all nearly dead. Wedged between life and death. Time for you has become snagged on a splinter, forming a closed-circuited potentiality called a Neverworld Wake."The rules of this world are explained to them. He informs them that the driver of the tow truck is dead, and that 4 of them will also have to die, and only one can survive. They have to vote who that person will be, and it has to be a unanimous vote. Until they decide, they will be living the same day over and over and over again, in a constant time loop straight out of Groundhog Day. There's only one way to break that loop, during the last 3 minutes of their day, they will be given the chance to make their vote. Until they can reach a consensus, the loop will repeat itself, with the day playing itself out endlessly from the moment they hit the truck. Every day, they will wake up at the exact moment they hit the truck.In that time, they are able to leave, go home, see their families, live their lives normally, until they go to bed, and then they wake up repeating the same cycle, with their loved ones completely oblivious to their plight and no memory of the day before. Every one in the group deals with this news in their own way, some becoming violent, others in denial, Martha trying to study the science behind the Wake phenomena, but Bea...Bea wanted to solve Jim's mysterious death.These loops were insane. I mean, absolutely insane. Think the violence of "A Clockwork Orange" kind of insanity. The group goes into a rampage, stealing, lying, thieving, seducing and turn into absolute monsters. When they all end up collapsing...and we are never sure how much time has passed or how many Wakes they've lived, Bea confronts them and tells them of her need to find out what happened to Jim. Enter Martha, who has figured out how they can move through time and space during the loop. They use that new knowledge to try and find out what really happened that night, and the deceptions and lies begin to reveal themselves, breaking the group apart, then bringing them back together, defeated and desperate.This is where Pessl's true skill shows as she is able to really navigate the readers through all the confusing timelines, clues and complex bits and pieces in a way that was always easy to follow and understand. As we race towards the end, and the true events of that fateful night is revealed to us, we think we have it all figured out and reach acceptance, only for Pessl to pull the rug from under us with another explosive twist.Everything we thought we know, the stereotypes that we set ourselves and other people go out the window. That is one of the many things Pessl tries to convey with this story. I will leave you with one of my favorite quotes from the book that really sums up that thought:"We swear we see each other, but all we are ever able to make out is a tiny porthole view of an ocean. We think we remember the past as it was, but our memories are as fantastic and flimsy as dreams. It's so easy to hate the pretty one, worship the genius, love the rock star, trust the good girl. That's never their only story. We are all anthologies. We are each thousands of pages long, filled with fairy tales and poetry, mysteries and tragedy, forgotten stories in the back no one will ever read."

Spoiler-y Song Selection: Trace the Lines by A Lot Like BirdsAfter letting it set in for a couple of days, I'm landing at a solid 4 stars and sticking with it. I don't know how to really compare this book to anything else I've ever read. I was so immersed in this story and this world that I couldn't pull myself away. I found myself questioning if this was a thing that really happened - what if every time some tragic accident/act of violence happened where only one out of many survived, the survivor was determined by an endless cycle of negotiating and reliving one day until everyone decided whose life was most worth living? I definitely recommend this book. It is a true one-of-a-kind and something that will stick with me for a while. Even if it's a kind of different that you don't end up enjoying, it's worth a shot because it's not a huge time commitment.SPOILERS AHEADI only didn't give it 5 stars because I'm one of those people that hopes that there might be an unhappy or tragic ending in like 9/10 books that I read. I expected Bee to end up committing suicide after she was spared. I was kind of disappointed that she was the one chosen to survive. Most people would be infuriated, but I felt like it could have just ended with them all fading away in the icy water because our main character and narrator hadn't survived. I assumed when Martha disappeared, it was because she was the one who had been saved.

This was a huge waste. The author had a great premise to work with and totally wasted the opportunity. She kept tossing out totally nonsensical stuff. Real people wouldn't act like that. At times it sounded like her characters were on drugs and had forgotten how to think. I hung in there, hoping against hope that there might be a story in there, somewhere. There wasn't. Save your time and money. Get a good book and enjoy.

This is an incredible story! Beautifully written, interesting characters about whom I cared, twisting plot continually surprising me, much wisdom throughout, still I'm not an academic so I fear I don't have the proper terminology/language to adequately describe its appeal. Obviously shorter and less complex than her first two novels, which I love too and have gifted numerous times as presents, but still compelling enough for readers like me who are (much) older than a "young adult." There are so many thought-provoking ideas jammed into this book that you might need two sessions with your book club! So, if you buy this book for your son, daughter, grandson, granddaughter, nephew, or niece, definitely borrow it off their bookshelf and read it yourself, better yet buy it for your self and let them find it on your bookshelf. And if you end up agreeing with me on how enjoyable a read is, pick up Carlos Ruiz Zafon's first four books which are also "marketed" for young adults but as intriguing as his Cemetery of Forgotten Books tetralogy.

I didn’t even know this was out there until I was browsing on Amazon, and what a pleasure to find. I adored NIGHT FILM and while this is YA it’s sure to delight anybof Pessl’s fans - dark, creepy, a delightful mystery/thriller full of complexity (actually she could have gone further and I wish she had).I didn’t want to leave this strange world.

While not as engrossing as her first two novels, this was an enjoyable read. I would think it would appeal to young adults and would be worth the time spent reading. I think "Night Film" is Marisha Pessl's best, with "Special Topics in Calamity Physics" close behind. But I will definitely be looking for her next book when it comes out.

"Life does not belong to you. It is the apartment you rent." - The KeeperThis is a story that follows Beatrice who lost the love of her life in a mysterious accident and a year later decides to reconnect with their friends to find answers. Only to unlock a multitude of secrets. 5 lives, a tragedy, a mysterious stranger, 1 survivor. Vote, vote, vote. I highly recommend this story; I could not put it down.

I didn't realize this was a YA book until I read the author's acknowledgement at the end, but it doesn't matter, really. I was a big fan of Pessl's previous novel, Night Film, even if the ending was rather anti-climactic. This book shares that flaw. It's almost as if she got to a certain point and said, " Shit! I need to finish this but I am so booored. Let's just slog through to the end. "Overall, disappointing. I hope Peesl returns to adult fiction for her next book, and figures out how to make her conclusions as riviting as her setups.

Pessl continues to impress me with her writing and the depth of thought.What initially starts off as an adventure in the luminal between death and life becomes so much more, with beautiful insights into the nature of life as the book wraps up.Highly recommended.