Book 70 - Shirley Jackson"Hangsaman"

[jazzy_dave]

Shirley Jackson "Hangsaman" (Penguin Classics)




This is a weird book, in the very best sense of the word. Natalie Waite is a young woman about to go off to college. We are introduced to her in her family setting, with her intellectual and domineering father, her boring and normal mother, and her unimportant brother. All of these descriptives are Natalie's point of view because there is no escaping Natalie's point of view in the book. Though it's not told in first person, there is almost no difference between the omniscient narrator and Natalie's point of view. It's an extremely interior book. And Natalie has a weird mind.

At first her mind seems "normal" in the sense of being quirky but I thought that most readers would identify, especially if they remember the teenage years, the fantasizing and odd thoughts that come to mind at that formative age. When Natalie goes off to her small liberal arts college and is faced with living with hundreds of other young women of varying character and morals, things devolve quickly. She develops an odd relationship with a girl named Tony (I actually couldn't tell if Tony was real or imaginary) and things get weirder and weirder.

I loved it.

The book isn't scary, but it's slightly creepy to witness someone's mind changing (disintegrating?) so rapidly. This book deserves to be talked about, such as a reading group.