George is just a guy. He doesn’t know what he wants to do with his life and goes through it, like most people, checking boxes: go to college, get a series of arbitrary jobs, get into a relationship, move into a series of crappy apartments, etc. And the book follows George from his teens to his late 30s as he bumbles around, has adventures. And that is the book. Of George.
Sounds riveting, eh? And yet… it actually is. It’s really good. Kate Greathead’s written a brilliant novel with The Book of George.
The book is structured so that each chapter is about a certain age in George’s life - ie. Chapter 1: George, 12-18, Chapter 8: George, 29, etc. - and it’s interesting to see an episode of George at that age and then jump a year or two in the next chapter to see how his life has changed. The promise of constant change is part of what makes the story so compelling to read, especially as these are the years when most people’s lives change quite frequently on a year-by-year basis.
But the book is also not really about George - at least not entirely. He meets the love of his life Jenny - although, George being George, he doesn’t realise this until it’s too late - in their early 20s and they stay together for more than a decade. Over the course of the book, we learn about as much of Jenny as we do of George and she really becomes, not just the co-star, but the real hero of the book.
George isn’t a bad person. He’s unfocused, a bit lazy, self-involved - he’s got the potential to do anything and he pretty much wastes it time and time again. He’s like a modern everyman, or resembles a person that most people have probably met.
But he’s not a good boyfriend either. Jenny supports him financially while he writes his novel (guess if that ever goes anywhere), and basically mothers him because she is in love with him. George doesn’t really have the same strong feelings towards her, but, being a wastrel, stays with her for years and doesn’t even consider proposing. One time when he goes back to his childhood home to, in theory, pack up his stuff, he spends the whole time playing his old Game Boy while Jenny does the actual work.
George doesn’t do anything too hateful to really make you turn on him but he increasingly becomes a tragicomic figure the older he gets while I ended up slowly rooting for Jenny more and more, hoping she’d leave him and do better for herself, because she deserves someone better than idiot George.
The story covers a number of fairly unremarkable events - George’s parents divorce, he goes on a college road trip with his pals, has health issues, has crummy jobs, and at one point stumbles ass-backwards into a small fortune (guess whether he manages to hang onto that or not). So it’s to Greathead’s credit that she’s able to effortlessly keep the reader’s attention with her fabulous prose, keen sense of pacing and strong storytelling to make these (mostly) everyday scenes play out like high drama.
That said, a couple of the chapters failed to pop for me - when George and Jenny go apartment hunting in New York and then later when they go to a wedding. And, while there is nothing that exceptional about George or Jenny’s lives - which feels kinda the point, if you view this as a portrait of modern Western relationships - the fact that it’s about ordinary people’s lives makes the novel less impressive in the sense that there’s nothing that memorable about the story overall. No one scene or character really stands out as unique and I get the feeling that this isn’t going to be a book that’ll stay with me. Which is fine though - books don’t need to be re-readable to be good; being good once is more than enough.
The ending is surprisingly strong too - endings are so hard to get right so extra props to anyone who manages to stick the landing. I really liked how Greathead wrapped things up for both characters and I totally agree with the choices she made for both of them, so that you feel like they’ve grown and are headed to better places in their lives after the final page.
The Book of George is well-written, grabs - and holds - your attention and George and Jenny are a fun couple of characters to follow through their young adult lives. I won’t waste time pointlessly guessing what kind of reader would enjoy this book but if any of the above piqued your interest, then have at it - I took a shot at this one and didn’t regret it at all. A wonderful contemporary read.
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