A Little Life is Hanya Yanagihara’s second novel, which after reading it should send shudders down the spine of other writers. It is truly remarkable how someone can have this much talent after only two books. I wonder if she knows it or even feels guilty about it. Ms. Yanagahara, I may suggest you start to find some empty mantle space because I expect you to win some major awards with this book)
The story revolves around four college classmates. You have Willem the handsome actor, JB the artist, Malcolm and architect, and Jude which most of the story revolves around. In these 720 pages Ms. Yanagihara slowly but thoughtfully spins a tale that you will never forget. Without giving too much away Jude is a damaged human being. He has had horrible and I mean horrible things happen to him throughout his childhood causing him to have a physical injury from it, as well as being saddled with a serious mental issue. He is one of those characters where you feel sorry for him on one page and then on the next page you want to shake him and tell him to literally snap out of it. You are not alone. The characters in the novel do the same and don’t often achieve the desired results. It doesn’t force them to give up on Jude but it alters their friendship in serious ways.
A Little Life is also a love story between two of these four friends. It is a complicated love that each partner questions why are really together. Is it a relationship of pity or one of true love? This is where Ms. Yanagihara could have slipped up and made it a trite affair but instead shows the complexities of the love between two friends and the difficulties that this particular relationship has. It is as complicated as Jude’s earlier life was.
You truly want Jude to be happy but as the story progresses you start to see that is probably something that will never happen. The damage done to him as a child has left him with a feeling of not being worthy of happiness. He always expects the shoe to drop with whomever he meets. Imagine dating someone like that? His friend Willem falls in love with him and he is a quite the opposite. Things have rolled along nicely with him with the exception of an earlier tragedy. The difference between them is one can move forward while the other can’t let go of the past.
By the end of the book which does not end the way you expect it to, you are left to feel that all these characters in this impressive book are a little bit of al us. Life is a fragile thing. We are tossed into at birth and what we do to each other along the may or may not have damaging affects to other people. Sometimes you can see it right away but most of the time you have no idea what it did to that person. A Little Life is a cautionary tale on when in doubt, just be nice because you just never know.
