Cover Image: My Year of Rest and Relaxation

My Year of Rest and Relaxation

Pub Date:   |   Archive Date:

Member Reviews

The best book I read in 2019. I still think about this book years later and now Ottessa Moshfegh is an automatic buy from me when they release new books.

Was this review helpful?

This is a very strange idea for a book, but it kind of works. It was easy to read, but also gives insight into the main character's depressive mindset.

Was this review helpful?

This was the perfect read during pandemic quarantine! The main character is totally messed up, has no relationships of any value, and all she wants to do is sleep (which I could relate to at the time). Despite being basically unlikeable, I still wanted to know how she would navigate her small and somewhat sad existence.

Was this review helpful?

My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh tells the story of a young woman who decides to spend the year 2000 holed up in her apartment and isolated from the world. She tries to hide from her life, but her best friend keeps bothering her and so does her feelings for her pseudo-boyfriend and for her recently deceased parents.

The nameless narrator is living in that glam NYC Sex and the City setup at the turn of the millennium unfazed by the excitement. She has her friend Reva who she seems to loathe for being upbeat about the future. Reva tries to keep her friend engaged with the world, but her friend is not having it. When Reva experiences a loss, the narrator still can’t find enough empathy to be selfless in the situation. She remains a curmudgeon with the thoughts of her father and her mother dying within months of each other still haunting her. Other than Reva, she only really contacts Trevor who’s usually sleeping with another woman when she calls and acts like he doesn’t have time for her like she doesn’t have time for Reva. To vent her problems, she goes to her aloof therapist who dishes out questionable treatment methods. Finally, the narrator takes extreme measures to really get the rest and relaxation she wants without the distractions after seeing Reva and Trevor move on without her. When she’s satisfied, she finds herself emerging from her submersion as the city is hit with the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

The narrator is that great unlikable character who acts in ways that are upsetting and annoying yet it’s understandable. Though the book came out a few years ago, the book is enjoying a resurgence as the world grips with the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic and being forced into weeks of “rest and relaxation.” It also shows that excitement for the future at the turn of a new decade, like now in 2020, and how all that hope can go down like it had in 2001 because of a national traumatic event. The narrator is working hard to ignore the news and enjoy TV reruns while laying on the couch like many are now with the worry around the novel coronavirus. She has everything going for her: her Columbia University degree, her art gallery job, and her rent-control Upper East Side apartment, but she can’t handle it and wants to escape the life she’s unsure she wants.

Overall, the story is well-written and highlights the unlikable character and her selfish desperation. It’s an interesting read for today’s times as 2020 is becoming a year of rest and relaxation for some who choose to see the widespread quarantine that way.

Was this review helpful?

Excellent book for the more adventurous reader. The author is well known for her gritty writing and this is definitely a part of her collection that is worth reading. Looking forward to sharing this with patrons that enjoy this type of literature!

Was this review helpful?

Got to this too late to be useful but was thoroughly impressed by how unique the main character's voice was. Such an absorbing read.

Was this review helpful?

Hot mess of a protagonist but the surprising thing was, I didn't hate her. Definitely rooted for her the entire way. Excellent writing made a huge difference here. Had the writing been utter crap, this story could have felt very heavy and slow. Would definitely recommend.

Was this review helpful?

This felt like a long journey to reach a simple point. The narrator was such a horrible person and an absolute train wreck that it was hard not to keep reading.
I received a free e-galley from netgalley.com.

Was this review helpful?

*Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!*

I had read a lot of great reviews for this book and I was so intrigued to know I would love i as much as everyone seemed to. Overall, I believe that I did. It's a book that I don't really have a comparison to, which is great! Our main character simply wants to drug herself up into a constant sleep and she happens to find a doctor bad enough to give her these medicines. What happens next? A lot. This reads as a character study and almost a social satire. After all, who hasn't wanted to avoid life and simply sleep?

Was this review helpful?

In My Year of Rest and Relaxation, our intrepid heroine daily takes enough psychotropic drugs to numb a small nation, lays on the couch, watches a lot of videotapes (it's the year 2000), occasionally shuffles down to her local Bodega for a few coffees, all the while she contemplates studiously the status of her life and then tries to suppress it like an uncontrolled fire.

While we are voyeurs to the daily idiom of our narrator's life, it gets repetitive. Quickly. You could have cut 150 pages from the book, roughly the amount of time she spends laying on the couch and popping pills, and get, more or less, the same story. The sheer amount of feelings she is swallowing is impressive. A veritable who's who of drugs culled from a pocket drug guide and the DSM-V. To the layperson, the amount of meds listed is breathtaking but from the view of someone who is on psychotropic drugs herself, I began to wonder, 50 pages in, "Why isn't she dead yet? She should be dead." I'm on the highest dosage of several the drugs our heroine is on and the interactions can be deadly. Yes, the heroine's relationship with the easy pen and pad of the quack psychiatrist an almost solid argument of Munchausen Syndrome but c'mon here. However, you could seriously argue, the point of these actions, in the end, is not self-destruction; she does not want to die. She just wants to sleep.

"I went home and went to sleep. Outside of the occasional irritation, I had no nightmares, no passions, no desires, no great pains."

Our heroine is an unreliable narrator, her blackouts are mentioned but not expanded on which is something I would have really like to have seen examined.

Despite the few flaws, I would recommend My Year of Rest and Relaxation because it is a mediation of the intersection of feminity, mental health, pop culture, and self-reflection as well as self-loathing. The heroine delivers deadpan commentary on such things and yet there is the pain to her observations, one that anyone simply breathing in current climes would and could relate to even though the book takes place, and cumulates with, 9/11. Our heroine is not vapid or vacuous as her barbed commentary and brutal and keen observations on the world and people around her when she's conscious, is extraordinary. It is not, however, for the faint of heart as on one hand, you want to love her like her friend Reva (who is vacuous and vapid and self-obsessed), but knowing our narrator would tell us to fuck right off, like she often tells Reva, and somehow, we'd be the better for it.

Was this review helpful?

I enjoyed reading this book even though the main character and the plot was kinda "out there." But I liked the author's writing style and was compelled to keep reading even though not much was happening, except for internal changes to the protagonist.. It's an odd little book but I liked it, and I especially liked the way it ended. I would recommend it to those who like offbeat fiction. I'm now curious to read the author's other works to see how they compare.

Was this review helpful?

I heard mixed things going into this book, mostly that people either hate it or love it. I luckily fell in between - the main character was unlikeable, but I appreciated how beautifully the book was written. I love self-aware books, ones where the narrator or character know themselves deeply, and have a sense of how the world works around them. What's interesting about this one is that despite how well our narrator knew about the intricacies of social behavior and how she fit into all of it, she got the whole thing wrong when it comes to how to gather meaning out of life. And she realizes this at the end, rather quickly, but still. Moshfegh's undercurrent of gendered social critique was also very apparent,which is always appreciated in mainstream popular fiction. There were times when I was pretty frustrated at having to listen to an overprivileged and borderline pretentious narrator, and her closest friend was just infuriating. But pushing past the shallowness of those parts made it a challenge, and I found some meaning behind it all.

Was this review helpful?

I preferred Ottessa Moshfegh’s brilliant Man Booker Prize shortlisted ‘Eileen’ overall, but her second novel ‘My Year of Rest and Relaxation’ is another dark book about a depressed young woman who decides she needs to hibernate and sleep for a year before she can get on with the rest of her life. Moshfegh’s biting satire is as caustic as bleach although I am starting to wonder if it’s possible for her to sustain a whole career based on this style.

Was this review helpful?

Brilliant cover design. Moshfegh is relentless in her depiction of a so-called "unlikeable" heroine. I felt the pace dragged a bit.

Was this review helpful?

Raced through this book.
It's fun and completely different.
Imagine if you could sleep for a year!
Was just sad that it finished.

Was this review helpful?

As someone who suffers from bipolar depression, anxiety- I sometimes wanted to shake her! I'd almost say, 'trigger warning' for those who have been on any of the medications this girl's on, but parts reminded me of my old self. The narrator had this humor that was both entertaining and frustrating and sometimes crude. My kind of psychological fiction, although maybe a little intense and real at times. This is the first Ottessa novel I've read, but I'm intrigued. The ending. The irony. My heart sank.

Was this review helpful?

This book was a really fascinating read. The main character is so detached from the world, so profoundly depressed, yet reading this book was not depressing. It's such an intriguing concept for a work of literature; reading it was like visiting an art museum. I think some people feel like they are encased in gelatin, they are there but not fully there. A stimulating read, loved it!

Was this review helpful?

Moshfegh is a rising new voice in the annals of literature.
The narrator of the book seems to have all the trappings for a successful life. She is bright, attended an Ivy League school and doesn't have to be concerned about money since she is the recipient of a substantial inheritance.
Yet, she is so emotionally devastated and life is too difficult for her. She decides to attempt to sleep through the year literally. Her never ending supplies of pills are provided by a psychiatrist who perverts the profession in every sense of the word. Her college friend, Reva, is her shallow tie with humanity.
The mood that surrounds the book is eerie and one that will stick with you long after you have finished it.

Was this review helpful?

Outstanding. This subversive and daring piece of work surprised me by its invention, rigor and depth. How could I be so compelled by a story that seemed so narrow? And so amused too? Moshfegh’s voice is exceptional, and distinctive, but whereas her first novel seemed to me heavyhanded, this book sees her developing and enriching her abilities. Recommended.

Was this review helpful?

This was a super quick read for me, which is probably the best thing I can say about it. It's not that I didn't "get" what Moshfegh was going for here; I'm aware that her writing at times verges on the weirdly absurd minutiae of life and that sometimes the pointlessness of it all is the point, but I just wasn't feeling this. It's all a little too Iowa writers workshop for me, if you get my drift - provocation for provocation's sake, "look how much DEPTH there is despite the surface being so shallow!" kind of pretentiousness. Generally speaking, not my bag.

The narrator was completely unlikable, which isn't the biggest dealbreaker - the problem here is that I couldn't even muster the energy to hate her. She was boring, selfish, banal, and I didn't give a damn about her tragic past or her fucked up present. I just wanted her to get on with it. The narrator had more money than sense, her unrest seemingly a result of, I dunno, never really having to work for much in her life and wanting to do something "edgy" like sleep through an entire year with every drug under the sun because life was just too much. It's the kind of privileged bullshit that makes me roll my eyes in real life, taken to the extreme.

Because I don't want to be completely negative, Moshfegh's writing is engaging, and as I mentioned, so well-paced that I finished this in a couple of days. But sometimes that's not a good thing - it shows it didn't challenge me, I didn't linger on anything, there was no meaning behind it. Not everything has to be deep and meaningful, but if it's totally meaningless, what's the point?

Was this review helpful?