Jeff Zentner, you have my heart. I’ve been reading a lot of contemporaries lately because, let’s be honest, I’m behind on my reading challenge (what else is new?) and I read through this genre a lot quicker than I do fantasy or sci-fi. So I picked this book up expecting maybe a cute romance or a nice, touching book on grief or healing (because Carver, the main character, loses his three best friends in a car accident that resulted from Carver sending his friend who was driving, Mars, a text), but I got something special here. So I really need to talk about this. Because I’m tired of the blurbs calling Zentner a John Green. Jeff Zentner is his own genius and while calling him a John Green might be seen as a compliment, it’s just not enough.
Rating: 5 Shells
JEFF ZENTNER I AM JEALOUS OF YOU.
There’s a difference between writing and writing. You know how Sophisticated Adult Readers wrongly think YA is immature (thanks to books like that one star book I shall never name again) because of some generalization that every book is written like Twilight? Or you know how you’ll read a book and the plot is nice and the characters are good but the writing is just there? You literally can’t read this book without admiring Zentner’s writing. Go ahead, try. I dare you. I got jealous of his writing skills like every other page. Zentner can put any feeling into the most accessible metaphor. I mean, check these out:
The sky feels like a hammer hanging above the earth on a frayed cord.
I hate the stillness of home-alone-when-you’re-not-supposed-to-be. Everything sounds way too loud. The refrigerator clicking on and off. Clocks ticking. The clink of glasses as you remove them from the cupboard. Heartbeats. The rush of blood in your ears.
ISN’T THAT SO ANNOYING??? LIKE, HOW CAN YOU PUT THAT EXACT FEELING INTO WORDS?? His writing isn’t just trying to convey a feeling, Zentner’s words literally are that feeling. It’s incredible. There’s also one metaphor that I didn’t mark down but Zentner compares a t-shirt sticking to your back to a wet leaf stuck to a window AND IT’S SPOT ON. IT’S PERFECT. Do you see? See how he’s conveying feeling with these masterful metaphors? His writing style makes me the most envious in the best type of way. Sometimes he replaces dialogue with narrative, and I’m sure there’s a literary term for this but I don’t know it (or maybe it’s not a technique but something Zentner does so well that it just seems like it needs a name). My point is, he knows exactly when to employ that to make it most effective. It’s not like when lesser writers than he stop dialogue and have the narrator fast-forward through the conversation for you because it’d be boring to read or because it’s more convenient. No, the way Zentner does it is evocative and purposeful. Take a look:
“Can I ask you something?” I ask.
“Of course.”
…I tell him I believe we are stories of breath and blood and memory and that some things never finally end.
I tell him I hope, after we’re gone, there’s a day when a great wind fills our stories with life again and they rise from sleep; and that I write the best story I can- one that echoes in the void of eternities at least for a time.
…I tell him I hope.
I had to cut out more beautiful words to shorten it, but do you see? Dialogue could have worked there, but look how much better it reads, how much harder it hits to read it as narration. This isn’t just writing here, people. It’s smart and purposeful and Zentner has a true understanding of language and feelings.
I’M CRYING, BUT NOT BECAUSE ZENTNER IS FORCING ME TO.
The thing about Zentner’s grasp on language is that it makes for some really compelling scenes. And it’d be so easy to say that a book where the central conflict is the death of the main character’s three best friends is only written to make you cry, but that just doesn’t feel right. It’s gonna make you cry, but it’s not a tearjerker. The saddest moments come from the prettiest writing, which is exactly how I love for a book to make me cry.
HEY NANA BETSY, YOU HAVE MY HEART.
Every character here comes from totally different circumstances. It reminds me of when we read The Great Gatsby as an English class and my teacher left us with one question: who are we to judge other people’s situations? Who are we to say Gatsby should move on or to say that Daisy is The Worst? It’s all about perspective, we said in class, and understanding these different perspectives. And I appreciate that a lot about Goodbye Days, the menagerie of perspectives and the layers given to each one. Nana Betsy has my heart for her faith (which is handled so well) and her love for Blake. None of the characters are one thing. Mars’ dad may seem cold-hearted and cruel, but he’s only hurting and pushing through life the only way he knows. Some characters are less likable at first, and others (Nana Betsy <3) are wonderful. I like that Zentner captures so many different backgrounds and personalities and layers to the characters. They never once feel tropey or cut-out from your basic teen movie. Every character is given depth and understanding, especially when they seem like they don’t deserve it, which is a wonderful message to spread.
I have already purchased The Serpent King by Zentner and have added his 2019 book to my TBR. I want more of this writing, more of this feeling. Does it count as merely reading when you can physically feel the book in your soul? I don’t know, maybe that’s what reading is and it’s just that not every author can get it right. But Zentner gets it right here, in every aspect. When I finished, I kept going to pick this back up. Not because the ending wasn’t satisfying, but more because there is so much for me to learn here and one read through simply isn’t enough. I want to read this and reread this and tell all my friends to read it. I want to email Zentner and call him out because HOW CAN ONE MAN WRITE LIKE THIS? I want to ask him how he came to grasp language so well and how I can do the same. Anyways, it’s everything you’d look for in a contemporary. It’s that, but with writing so graceful it’s maybe something else entirely.
What did you think about Goodbye Days? Anyone up for starting a fan club for Jeff Zentner with me? Can anyone PLEASE send me an ARC of his next book Rayne and Delilah’s Midnite Matinee PRETTY PLEASE?
For the most part, you don’t hold the people you love in your heart because they rescued you from drowning or pulled you from a burning house. Mostly you hold them in your heart because they save you, in a million quiet and perfect ways, from being alone.
Books by the Water 