WARNING: THERE MAY BE SPOILERS BELOW
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| “Petrograd. The sound is bronze, and this is a story of bronze.”- The Revolution of Marina M, Janet Fitch |
St. Petersburg, New Year's Eve, 1916. Marina Makarova is a young woman of privilege who aches to break free of the constraints of her genteel life, a life about to be violently upended by the vast forces of history. Swept up on these tides, Marina will join the marches for workers' rights, fall in love with a radical young poet, and betray everything she holds dear, before being betrayed in turn.
As her country goes through almost unimaginable upheaval, Marina's own coming-of-age unfolds, marked by deep passion and devastating loss, and the private heroism of an ordinary woman living through extraordinary times. This is the epic, mesmerizing story of one indomitable woman's journey through some of the most dramatic events of the last century.
This has been a good year for spectacularly underwhelming historical fiction and The Revolution of Marina M is no exception.
First, I want to talk about the prose. I'm sure some would love the way this book was written, but I come from the less is more school of thought and, well, Fitch's writing style is not that at all. The word overwrought comes to mind a lot. It's so purple, so simile-stuffed that reading it makes me tired. Sometimes, I just wanted to rip that laptop away from her and do some hard backspacing. Purple is beautiful in small doses, but when your 800 page novel is written like that it's going to feel a lot longer than 800 pages.
And no where is that purple prose more obvious than in the goddamn sex scenes. My God. Fitch writes sex scenes like something right out of a dime store romance novel.
Also, the main character got on my nerves constantly. As some other reviews pointed out, she has no thoughts or opinions of her own and constantly parrots others. She's always on the side of the morally good and just, and when others aren't as perfect as she is, they immediately get dropped by her. She can't see the forest for the trees. And for God's sake, does Janet Fitch think we care at all about Genya vs Koyla when there's a fucking revolution going on??
The only real way to enjoy The Revolution of Marina M is to only care about the plot and not try and figure out any of the characters. Why are they acting like that? Because the plot demands them to. Why is this happening now? Because the plot demands it. Why is Marina acting like this and this never happened? Because the plot demands it. The best example I can think of is when Varvara shows up drunk and tells Marina's father that she (Marina) helped the Bolsheviks overthrow the Provincial Government, causing Marina to get thrown out of her house. Why Varvara does this is never actually explained, and, bafflingly, Marina is still friends with the bitch. With friends like that...
But then again, Fitch's characters aren't really the best. They're very one-note, and any attempts at devolpment are usually heavy-handed and transparently point to whether or not Fitch wants us to find them sympathetic or not. If she wants us to like them, they become saintly, and if she wants us to dislike them they become a devil.
I once read a review on Goodreads describing a book as being tragedy porn (I believe it was an Ellen Hopkins novel which, yeah, makes sense) and that phrase is perfect for this book. Marina is this beautiful woman whom everyone falls in love with and whom goes through so many hardships, most of which have some kind of sexual component. She's such a lovely victim one can't help but fall in love with her struggle. And so much of her struggle is unnecessary and takes away from the main Russian Revolution story-line- I mean, what does her kidnapping by the Baron in the middle or the cult at the end have to do with anything? It's just filler to endear us to Marina.
I mean, I did really like the Russian history parts. Those were very well done and well researched and were also engaging. I think the fault, though, entirely rests on the character of Marina, even though she doesn't have enough personality to carry a book.
Unless you really love books that put their characters through unnecessary hardships, I wouldn't recommend this book. I'm not even sure who this novel is meant to appeal to- this isn't women's historical fiction a la Kristin Hannah, a Russian historical fiction lover would be bored by it. The only people I could see really getting into it would be the Oprah Book Club types who love this kind of Mary-Sue level tragedy.
4 out of 10
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