Review of BIRNAM WOOD by Eleanor Catton (New Release)

 3.5 Stars

The last Eleanor Catton novel I read was in 2013 when her The Luminaries won both the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction and the Man Booker Prize.  Birnam Wood is 400 pages shorter, but I think it could be even shorter.

Birnam Wood is an idealistic, anti-capitalist gardening collective which plants crops on unused or abandoned land, often without permission.  One of the founders, Mira Bunting, discovers a farm in Thorndike that has been temporarily abandoned and decides to check it out as a place to expand operations.  The farm, belonging to Owen and Jill Darvish, is in the process of being purchased by Robert Lemoine, an American billionaire who has chosen it as the site for his survivalist bunker.  Lemoine offers Mira money for Birnam Wood’s operations, claiming that his investment might expedite his application for New Zealand citizenship.  Tony Gallo, a wannabe journalist and former member of the collective, doesn’t trust Lemoine and argues that the arrangement goes against the collective’s ideals, so while some members begin planting on the farm, he sets out to investigate Lemoine to uncover his real motive. 

An uneven pace is an issue.  The novel begins very slowly.  The first third of the novel gives a lot of backstory on the various characters.  There’s a lot of telling, rather than showing, so it feels like an information dump.  This is not a way to grab the reader’s attention.  Tension does ramp up in the second third, and the last section is definitely suspenseful.  With a great deal happening, the ending feels rushed.  (In keeping with the Shakespearean reference, I’d expected the book to have five parts.)

None of the characters is particularly likeable.  Everyone has his/her motives and proves to be willing to manipulate and deceive others to advance personal agendas.  For instance, both Mira and Shelley, partners in Birnam Wood, are not above keeping information from each other.  Like Macbeth, each character is ambitious but blind or willfully ignorant because of a certain degree of hubris.  Jill Darvish certainly acknowledges that she and Owen courted a man’s business and approval even though they had always known that he was not a good person.  People try to appear to be ethical but will justify unethical behaviour if it’s in their self-interest.  Tony, for instance, accuses the collective of selling its soul, but he is desperately in search of an exclusive story that will bring him fame.  There is a definite villain who is absolutely amoral, but no one is guilt-free in how events unfold.

The plot is action-packed.  Besides unscrupulous manipulation, there are clandestine activities, surveillance drones, phone hacking, mercenaries, armed chases, obstruction of justice, and murder.  Greed and corruption abound.  The picture of society that is given is not a positive one:  wealth tends to guarantee safety from prosecution for wrongdoing; profit takes precedence over preventing global catastrophes like climate change; and even philanthropic groups have to bend their principles in order to survive. 

The style may not appeal to all readers.  Sentences of 200 words are not uncommon.  Tony is a mansplainer so we are subjected to his tirades.  Trying to follow the discussion at Birnam Wood’s hui is excruciating!

Readers approaching this novel must be prepared to move past its tedious opening section. 

Note:  I received a digital galley from the publisher via NetGalley.