I thought I’d give it a shot. But not even halfway through, I began wondering how such a terrible book became an online sensation. The reason is quite simple, in my opinion. It’s a sinister combination of social media, inexperience, and a herd mindset. Combined, these three factors have bolstered many mediocre (or downright awful) books, shows, and movies for nearly two decades.
Social media, the culprit behind many undeserving, so-called legends, seems like an easy scapegoat. But the role it played in spreading the news of My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Otessa Moshfegh is more than that. After all, this is not the first book to be launched in an increasingly online world. What made MYORAR’s rise to the spotlight so unique is the way it got there. It was not talked about on your traditional bookstagrams, or on booktubers’ channels. The first time I ran into it was on TikTok (yes, yes, eyeroll). Intrigued, I swiped onto the creator’s profile, eager to see what other books they’ve been reading, to get a better sense of their reading tastes compared to mine. Lo and behold, they were one of the thousands of booktokers who had begun reading extensively over the spring 2020 lockdown.
To be clear, there is nothing wrong with finding a love for reading later in life. Nothing at all. What may be a problem though is the bubble booktok has created. It is an echo chamber of the same 10 YA books with catchy titles, quotable prose, digestible plots, and unbearable characters: AKA the key ingredients in going viral. MYORAR had all of these, including a bonus one: a “deeper meaning” and critique on society. Unfortunately, the true meaning was probably lost in translation.
Yes, MYORAR has satire, but it’s not well-written. Yes, it touches on real issues in our society, but not in the right way. Again, this isn’t the first book of its kind. Thirteen Reasons Why was criticized for many of the same reasons. MYORAR repeatedly mentions eating disorders, abusive relationships, toxic friendships, sexual abuse, drug misuse and so much more, yet does so in a disenchanted, almost indifferent way. As if these are things that just happen, and we shouldn’t bat an eyelash at them.
For example, the main character is repeatedly sexually assaulted by her much-older boyfriend, but she shrugs it off. She hardly acknowledges it as assault. Her best friend suffers from bulimia, but it is treated as a sort of comedic juxtaposition to the main character’s “perfection.” What’s more, the main character (who remains unnamed) abuses prescription medication to induce a coma, with the hope that if she sleeps for a year she will wake up refreshed and all her life’s issues will have solved themselves. Besides the obvious practical problems with this plan, the fact that in the real world she would have been suffering from terrible side effects (or died) from mixing drugs is completely ignored. The worst part is when she (spoiler!!) quits them all cold-turkey, except one which she quits cold-turkey a few months later. With no side effects, of course. To my dismay, her ridiculous plan worked and the book ends with her sitting on a park bench enjoying the little beautiful moments in life.
If we’re being precise, that is not the last scene of the book. It is actually when a woman presumed to be her best friend commits suicide during the 9/11 attacks. I was just as surprised as you are. The passage is barely two pages long and it has nothing to do with the rest of the plot. It’s just there.
Where does herd mindset come in? Well I’m glad you asked. What does one teenager do when they see another teenager – but this time one with thousands of followers on a book-related page – do? They closely mirror their every move, of course. One or two people begin by reading MYORAR, leave some half-thought review, and suddenly the book is everywhere.
The reason this is worrying me so much is not that I am irked that a bad piece of literature is getting attention. What is good and bad is not for me to decide, after all. What I find concerning is that this book, in particular, places its characters in such traumatic situations, has them make the worst possible decisions, and is then read and lauded as a masterpiece by teenagers. The easy-to-quote passages and fake-deep language and realizations of the main character slither their way into the minds of those who may just be reading for pleasure and don’t wish to be hypercritical of the prose.
This all goes without even mentioning the terrifying romanticization of suicidal ideation and misrepresentation of mental illness. The main character’s self-induced coma is little more than an attempt to end her life and be reborn into a new one. Much like in Thirteen Reasons Why, MYORAR glosses over the fact that one does actually cease to exist once they die, and cannot narrate their legacy from the afterlife. The soft pink palette and pretty cursive writing of MYORAR moodboards circulating online speak for themselves. Some are even tagged as “femme fatale,” though they may be the furthest thing from it. MYORAR is no more than a young woman’s cry for help, and those who relate to the narrator have either missed the point or need professional intervention.
I invite you to read this book and share your thoughts on it. I am a firm believer in open discussion, and that one reader’s trash is another reader’s treasure. I never want to be the reason someone misses out on their next favorite book. I simply wish to be a word of warning to the unsuspecting, as I once was. You see, the plot summary mentions nothing of the rampant misrepresentation of real problems. All it says is that the main character is a privileged girl who’s had enough.
