Disappearing Earth: A novel Hardcover – Deckle Edge, May 14, 2019

I kept feeling as if I ought to enjoy this first highly reviewed novel more. My favorite fiction reads lately include Valeria Luiselli's "Lost Children Archive," Sally Rooney's Conversations with Friends," Sarah Moss's "Ghost Wall," Miriam Toews' "Women Talking," Nell Freudenberger's "Lost and Wanted," T.C. Boyle's "Outside Looking In," and "Andrew Ridker's "The Altruists." Phillips is a brilliant writer who examines the impact of two missing children on a larger community. I loved the premise; I love that she wanted to do this and clearly has talent. But I couldn’t get out of my head that she’s from Montclair, NJ, and her ‘research’ in Russia consisted of a one year Fulbright opportunity. It’s all fiction — and while she absolutely deserves high marks for language and imagination — it felt like a short story collection when I would have preferred a meatier novel. In the end I wasn’t interested enough in many of the characters and finished the book because I'd bought it — not a positive statement from a compulsive reader. (I did like the end at least). Also, while some might argue I should just be wowed by Phillips' ability to create Russian characters, issues of “cultural appropriation” — which I allude to above — bugged me. If this had been written by someone Russian, I could have at least thought that this is what people in Russia are experiencing. (Are any Russian readers sounding in?) Because it was written by a young American, I kept thinking this is what a smart Harvard grad from NJ is thinking about Russians.

Expecting a beautiful tale of life in Kamchatka during the current environmental crisis, as described by the book's advertising--"a masterpiece," and a "riveting page-turner"--I found the characters hardly distinguishable, and little of the action having any bearing on what promised to be the central theme of two Russian girls kidnapped in the first chapter. There was no real plot, just a number of different women, seemingly all about the same age, involved in pretty uninteresting lives, even though presumably set in an ethnically diverse and interesting part of the world.

Disappearing Earth begins with a shot of adrenaline and ends with a gut punch. In between, it is filled with a forward propulsion of female characters who are intricately affected by the opening narrative: two young sisters who are kidnapped in broad daylight from the Kamchatka Peninsula in the far east section of Russia.To get a sense of what you’re in for, imagine if Jon McGregor’s Reservoir 13 was intermingled with Elizabeth’s Strout’s Olive Kitteridge. In the first book, a girl goes missing; as the seasons unfold and the search goes on, village residents go about their daily living, coming together and breaking apart. In the second book, interwoven stories eventually coerce into a fulfilling whole.After the first chapter, the two young Golosovskaya sisters are no longer the focus; rather, other characters are introduced, each peripherally affected by the disappearance, and each suffering from her own private vulnerability and pain. We meet girls/women who have been spurned by bigots and by the judgments of small minds.These women range from Ksyusha, who is torn between her hometown white boyfriend and a compassionate young man she meets at a native folk dance group; Oksana, a potential kidnapping witness who experiences the pain of loss when her dog goes missing; the mother and sister of Lilia, a teenage girl who disappears years before without a trace; and Marina, the mother of the two missing sisters.Kamchatka plays its own role – a background location that is as mysterious, brooding, alienated and impenetrable as inner psyches of the women. This is a spellbinding, wonderfully imagined book that haunts the imagination.

I don’t know where to start - but I’ll try. After 100 pages of rereading messy paragraphs, trying to trace pronouns to nouns I started flipping pages. The setting and the history is layered on with characters for no reason “remembering” at silly moments. Suddenly a guitar appears or a TV screen projects pictures of the missing children. Where did this TV come from? Back story is piled on and meanwhile the missing girls are missing from the story. I found a smattering of insights but this writer has little faith in her reader so the insights were in bold. I don’t often quit a book midway but I did with this one. I went back to Stephen King on writing yo remind myself how to do it right! If Ms Phillips wanted to write about this region and the society then write that book.

this is one of those reading experiences, all too rare ~~ can't put it down, don't want it to end! the characters and the place, Kamchatka, a place we barely know, come alive and take a reader to these ends of the earth to follow a story of two sisters, disappeared one summer day. we come to know all sorts of people over the course of a year, where their disappearance haunts many, revives traumas for some, and puts into play the lives of women and girls in their families, in a place of few options, yet deeply held rituals, and interconnected kin.

Set in Russia’s Kamchatka peninsula, the story opens with two sisters being lured into a car and disappearing with a stranger. As the chapters unfold, the rest of the book dives into the lives of the women living in and around the area and how they’re affected by the abduction. Although the disappearance is the thread that runs through the whole book, each character’s section is more of a standalone short story, and you’re getting more of an insight into different lives and their way of living.This was hard to review as so many people really enjoyed this book and overall I wasn’t blown away by it. For me what didn’t work quite so well was getting a short time with so many characters, trying to work out their relevance to the disappearance but also being thrown that they were mini stories in themselves, which I did get a little impatient with. I think I was expecting it to revolve more around the disappearance and then being unsure whether I should be taking anything away from the different individual characters in case there was something that directly linked to the sisters.Having said that, there were so many elements of it that I did like. Learning about a region and a society that I didn’t know anything about, if you search for images of the Kamchatka peninsula it’s stunning and the detail that went into writing about indigenous communities like the reindeer herding families was atmospheric and fascinating. The characters being used as a timeline is cleverly done and unique - each character represents a month since the sisters vanished, this structure then builds towards a page-turner of an ending to tie everything up.I’m not sure that I would recommend it to everyone, but if it is of interest then go into it knowing that the author is telling lots of different stories rather than focusing on the investigation.

There is no story, no continuity to it. It is very difficult constantly referring to a Russian cast of Characters at the front when you are reading a Kindle. the Author also goes on about numerous Characters who are not even in the Cast of Characters. The two young girls are abducted in the beginning and by the end we are no wiser.It is the first book I have read for a long time that I could easily give up on.What is the story about?

Rather strange story and an unexpected ending although if you looked at it from a singular person ie the mother the title is apt.

Disappointing. Too many characters and no real plot to successfully link them together. Interesting description of life in the area of Russia in which the novel is set. A rushed ending which didn't link the characters together.

Intricate story, very emotional and fragile. Special cudos to the author for writing a beautiful tribute to Kamchatka, without being native to that place. It rings very true.