The Odyssey

Product Information

This strange, beautiful cruise liner of a book interweaves a biting sendup of corporate, work, and wellness culture with an astute exploration of the emotional icebergs that lie below its protagonist’s placid exterior . . . deeply unsettling and unexpectedly moving.” - Lydia Kiesling, author of The Golden State much can be interpreted from each facet of the novel, which ultimately i think is where i struggled. in places, it reads as a classic case of too many ideas and not enough development. certainly, we can decipher ingrid's appetite for destruction as reminiscent of the implications and expectations placed on women in contemporary capitalist society. she chooses to shun a stable marriage for the unconventional, where the possibilities are endless. the chapters flit between her life on sea and on land, the latter making for some of the most compelling reading in the novel. as a character, ingrid is both predictable and out of reach - we are never really sure where we stand with her, nor are we able to fully understand how much of her narrative voice is reliable. Or, to go in more detail, this is a story of a woman of an uncertain age, an alcoholic who left her adoring spouse to go work on a luxury cruise ship. The ship is a grand and self-contained affair featuring every amenity, including your friendly neighborhood cult the woman ends up in. The cult follows a Japanese idea that all things come from and go into nothingness and, to this end, the woman has to submit to a variety of trials, from intense talk therapy to having her finger cut off. Yes, you read that right, her finger. And once she mastered herself, she can advance to becoming a master.

Perceptive, enigmatic and thought-provoking—I couldn’t put it down. Wonderful!” - Amelia Horgan, author of Lost in Work In a very paltry attempt to be fairer to the work.... The book features an imaginative hook and the writing is intentional and intelligent.This book is bizarre and slightly confusing and dark at times, with a pretty unlikeable narrator and unlikeable characters, and I enjoyed reading it so much. I especially liked the way the narrator Ingrid would talk about her past while I as the reader had to kind of piece together what was missing, and I enjoyed how non-chalant the narrator was about some things that happened that she shouldn't have been non-chalant about. One thing I was disappointed by was the fact that the cruise ship setting isn't really explored as much as you might expect, especially not as things start to turn weird and twisted. I would've liked more of it, whether the Japanese obsession of the captain or what was going on with some of the other employees Ingrid knows, as it is a distinctive and unusual setting for literary fiction. As someone who doesn’t generally find cruise ships appealing (and especially so in 2022), I thought the setting of the WA was quite brilliantly done. An entire, carnivalesque world unto itself where Ingrid has endless choices at her fingertips but is also trapped. The ship seems enormous but her own space is small and limited. As the novel progresses, the atmosphere of the WA becomes more dangerous, more hideous, and more satirical. The WA, it turns out, is something more like a cult than an ordinary workplace and the things it asks of its employees become more jarring and horrific. Williams does a good job of establishing Ingrid as the sort of character who will go along with these things. And while I actually really dislike reading books where characters make one bad decision after another, I also didn’t struggle to believe that the employees of the WA would do these things. It reminded me of the cults you read about, like NXIM or even some of the more intense MLMs, that demand utter devotion. Ingrid is a character looking to be utterly devoted to something. Discussing ones self and the extents in which we can go to to not only feel accepted, wanted and seen but to also mend and forgive our past tribulations. What I particularly loved about this theme was how as a reader it was blatantly obvious and appalling when Ingrid would do certain acts just to feel accepted and part of a group, though she never saw how horrific these requests were. It really made me contemplate in our everyday life, what we may do as individuals to feel accepted and seen even when we inherently know they're wrong; a conversation I had never read about before, but one that was done in such a unique and somber way.

Ingrid works on a gargantuan luxury cruise liner where she spends her days reorganizing the gift-shop shelves and waiting for long-term guests to drop dead in the aisles. That is, until the day she is selected by the ship's enigmatic captain and self-appointed lifestyle guru, Keith, for his mentorship program. This book is absolutely one that I recommend going into knowing a little as possible so this review is going to be cautious, with that in mind. The Odyssey is a story unlike one I have ever read and there were many things I adored. To create an entire setting set no where in particular is a concept that is so fascinating and Lara Williams did such an incredible job creating a vivid atmosphere with some of the most beautiful imagery. I also want to point out that this was my first ever read from Lara Williams and her storytelling is exactly what I had expected/wanted from her and more. The only elements that I unfortunately didn't like were at times, I felt completely out of the story due to the repetitiveness of Ingrid's everyday activities. Though I am very aware that this was another commentary within the book - how we can enjoy yet equally tire from the tediousness of an average, everyday routine. People could argue then, that Lara Williams perfectly executed that within her writing, and I whole heartedly agree though at times I didn't particularly enjoy it. As well as this, the blurb mentions that the book is 'hilariously funny' but I personally thought it was everything but. There were moments throughout the story that undoubtedly made me laugh but the tone of the novel was so melancholic and so satirically ironic that no moment for me seemed hilarious.

A Note From the Publisher

It is a book that demands of the reader just as much as it rewards them with. All of the characters were so unique, interesting and flawed that I would have liked to have known a bit more about them. It felt like they floated in and out of the novel and could disappear at any time, perhaps onto land without a real explanation of why they were on the boat on the first place, why they left and where they went. And while Ingrid is British, she uses a lot of Americanisms (i.e., “apartment”, “garbage can”), which is confusing as the reader tries to piece together her character. Stephanie Danler's Sweetbitter meets Donna Tartt's The Secret History in this story of female desire, friendship, lust, and, above all, hunger....This novel will alternately make you laugh, tear up, and text your group chat begging to start a wayward dining committee."—Vogue That is, until the day she is selected by the ship's enigmatic captain and (ill-informed) wabi sabi devotee, Keith, for his mentorship program. Encouraging her to reflect on past mistakes and her desperation to remain lost at sea, Keith pushes Ingrid further than she ever thought possible. But as her friendships and professional life onboard steadily fall apart, Ingrid must ask herself: how do you know when you have gone too far?

This subversive satire on consumer capitalism and the millennial search for meaning is darkly comic existential fiction at its best.” - Culture Whisper (UK) I'm a big fan of an unreliable narrator, and in Ingrid, this is exactly what we get. Williams was effective in creating a protagonist so erratic that I felt physically uncomfortable while reading, jarred not only by the story’s events but by the whiplash of rooting for – and sympathizing with – Ingrid one moment, and then being afraid of her the next. Ingrid works on a gargantuan luxury cruise liner where she spends her days reorganizing the gift-shop shelves and waiting for long-term guests to drop dead in the aisles. That is, until the day she is selected by the ship’s enigmatic captain and self-appointed lifestyle guru, Keith, for his mentorship program.That is, until the day she is selected by the ship’s enigmatic captain and (ill-informed) wabi sabi devotee, Keith, for his mentorship program. Encouraging her to reflect on past mistakes and her desperation to remain lost at sea, Keith pushes Ingrid further than she ever thought possible. But as her friendships and professional life onboard steadily fall apart, Ingrid must ask herself: how do you know when you have gone too far? Peculiarly uplifting … 1946 illustration of a scene from The Diary of a Nobody. Illustration: Culture Club/Getty Images I was intrigued by this book as it was pitched as similar to JG Ballard's High Rise, which it is in some respects, with the closed off cruise ship gradually decaying, but The Odyssey is much more focused on one person's mental state than the cruise ship itself. The blurb compares the book to Ottessa Moshfegh’s, My Year of Rest and Relaxation, Sayaka Murata’s Convenience Store Woman and Sally Rooney’s novels and while it contains similar themes to all three – the dangers of capitalism, alienation and search for meaning and belonging and the descent into madness – I have never read anything like this. Reading this story is a disorienting experience, with the feel of a fever dream that becomes increasingly sobering as Ingrid nears closer and closer to her home: both on land, and within herself.

Couldn’t stop reading . . . Original and intriguing, I’ll be digesting this one for a while.” - Laura Harvey, Copper Dog Books (MA) The end of this book left a lot of questions still unanswered, which I would imagine some people would find frustrating, and while I did a little bit, it also felt fitting for the book; I didn't want to get too many answers because that's not what the rest of the book was like. We all have that fiction trope that isn't for us. That fills us with rage. That, just, ruins everything. This is mine; this book was not for me. I didn't not enjoy the reading of most of it, but then that happened and now, if I'm honest, I'm going with: I really freaking hated this book. As its title suggests, Lara Williams’s The Odyssey is about a journey. Ingrid works on a cruise ship that crisscrosses the globe. The ship, the WA, is as large as some towns and comes complete with acres of swimming pools, restaurants and gift shops where long-term guests have an inconvenient habit of dying.

Retailers:

So, there is this brand of fiction: "I'm disenfranchised and miserable and self-destructive; and join me for awhile and then I'll reveal my inciting incident and you can empathize with me." And, I'm not not here for that. I'm not an entirely unsympathetic human and I have the occasional millennial (Though let's not pretend for a second that this gen invented the trope, okay???) self-pitying instinct, so you know, I get the brand. A Most Anticipated Book of 2022 by The Millions * A Best Book to Read in April by Town & Country and The AV Club * One of 2022's Best Beach Reads by Southern Living