Quicksand: A Novel Hardcover – March 7, 2017

We live in a day and age in which a teenager taking a gun and shooting his classmates at school is not an uncommon thing, at least in the United States. Still, it shocks us every time. We want to know why, and the explanations roll in: mental illness, bullying, a history of being abused at home, a thirst for fame and recognition. Still, somehow none of those, or even all together, are enough for most people to comprehend why this keeps happening."Quicksand", as this book was named in English, is a good attempt at trying to provide a nuanced context to a school shooting. It makes it even more intriguing that it happens in Sweden, a country that unlike the US has had very few of these crimes. Our first person narrator is Maja, a 18 year old that's accused of plotting the shooting, in which four people died, along with her boyfriend, Sebastian. Since Sebastian died in the massacre too, Maja is left to face the consequences by herself. The evidence against seems clear, but is she really culpable?The book is told in a non linear fashion with jumps between the trial of Maja, her rather uneventful time at jail, the time leading up to the shooting and the days right after it. Author Malin Persson Giolito said in an interview she wrote all this as if they were separate novels, and then cut and pasted the pieces, and you can tell because the narration is not as fluid as it could be. It deliberately withholds information so we keep wondering what actually happened and how guilty Maja really is. I like mysteries so I don't have a problem with that, but the road to get there drags a little in some parts. When Maja is telling the story of the time before the shooting, it's very engaging; on the other hand, the court proceedings get to be increasingly dull and frustrating, because you don't know what they're talking about. Except for the last part, when the Defense takes its turn and we have enough information about the incident, the chapters regarding the trial are one of the worst parts of the novel.Maja is often an unreliable narrator, and she's hardly likable through most of the novel. I hated her attitude, her self-pity and the way she so harshly judges everyone, often unfairly. She even judges us, the readers, speaking directly to us and arrogantly assuming what we are thinking of her and the case. It bothered me how much she focused on physical attributes, talking about how fat someone is, what a bad hairdo they had. There's an attempt at being sassy by nicknaming some of the characters, like "The Perm" or "Pancake" (again, due to physical attributes), but this felt very repetitive and ultimately annoying, especially when refering to the prosecutor. There's a point to this, of course. We are meant to realize that Maja is hiding behind a tough attitude to protect herself, and ultimately, us finding her unlikable is supposed to make us more inclined to find her guilty. This is brilliant, in a way, to makes us face our own prejudice. But on the other hand, and this is just personal taste, I always find it very hard to follow and relate to a character that I dislike. Even when understanding this about Maja, it was hard to bring myself to care about her predicament, even less to feel sorry for her.The other problem of the book for me was the weak built of the relationship between Maja and Sebastian. This story between the two of them is supposed to be pivotal for us to understand Maja's actions, but we are never given a real glimpse of what was it that drew her to him aside from the initial rather superficial attraction. Sebastian remains, until the end, a character we just can't connect with, because we never get to find out who he really is.Despite this issues, I would recommend this book as a very thought provoking read and one of the better approaches to the subject of school shootings I've seen.

We first meet Swedish high school student Maja as the only person in a classroom who has not been killed or injured by gunfire. All indications are that she fired at least two of the shots during the incident, so she is arrested and put on trial.The novel consists of her musings, recollections, and first-person accounts of her imprisonment and the trial. She is the daughter of wealthy but conventional, superficial, and somewhat neglectful parents, and her attitude toward them and toward her classmates is perceptive, but snide and superior, even toward the girl who is regarded as her best friend--I kept thinking of the main character in the 1990s animated series "Daria," highly intelligent but unrelentingly sarcastic in her words and private thoughts.Her on-again, off-again boyfriend, Sebastian, is the neglected, scorned, and self-destructive son of one of the most famous (and by all appearances, one of the most sociopathic) men in Sweden.They are two lost souls, indulged in a material sense but lacking adults in their lives who could provide a genuine and caring "safe space" and some mature guidance for them.Maja is not a pleasant or admirable character, but I found her to be an interesting one. Although I could have used some information on some of the specifically Swedish references, such as what the implications are of saying that someone lives in a certain part of Stockholm, the translation into English reads well and sounds like something a "Daria"-type might say.

To provide the framework for why I am writing this review, I must state that I did not exactly choose to read this novel for fun. I chose it as part of my job. I did not read any of the reviews already written on it since I wanted to have as much of a "blank slate" experience as possible. That being said, my overall impression is... Not bad.I can't give this book the full five stars because I see room for improvement with some of the ways that the characters were developed. However, since much of the first-person narrative is stream-of-consciousness, I will admit that the novel is intentionally limited by this choice. Giolito gives us a narrator who isn't entirely likable and seemingly deliberately does so. Maja is frustrating. There were points where I wanted to throttle her, and I think Giolito set us up for that as readers. Still, Maja isn't the most convincing teenager. Her narrative voice sometimes seems like it is coming from someone older. Perhaps this is due to the fact that Maja has spent nine months in prison and has had time to reflect.The book is engaging for the most part, although some readers might get frustrated by the lack of dialogue. For as much narrating as she does, we don't get a lot of dialogue between Maja and the other characters. Maja has been silenced, perhaps by choice, perhaps by the society that constructs, judges, and condemns her as "Murder-Maja."At any rate, I think this is a riveting crime drama that is accessible for young adult readers. Just prepare yourself to want to drop-kick some of the characters in this novel before you crack it open.

gut und schnell

La obra es fácil de digerir, empatizas con el personaje principal. La última parte deja de profundizar. Es un buen libro para el fin de semana.

Assisti á série Quicksand na Netflix e interessei-me pelo livro que lhe deu origem. Lê-lo foi um prazer e a forma de escrever da autora, com uma ironia às vezes cortante, e com uma análise inteligente do meio social sueco, de classe média alta, onde os personagens principais se movem, a meu ver mostra que ela conseguiu dar profundidade a eles e ao tema abordado. Recomendo a leitura.

A fascinating look at a teenage girl who is accused of being complicit in a mass shooting at her school. Part of the book covers her time in jail awaiting trial and then the trial. The book also looks at the events that led up to the shooting. Even though she admitted having taken part, I was still rooting for her.