I was looking forward to this book based on the blurb. I loved the movie and TV show “Fame,” and that’s what I was expecting this to be a bit like. However, but I found myself skimming through a lot of this book. I really didn’t connect with any of the characters, and I found it hard to even care about the outcome. Paragraphs were too long, and the shifts felt choppy. There was a lot of over-detailing, and that stalled things, as well. It just wasn't a book for me.

Disclaimer: I received a complimentary copy from NetGalley, but I wasn't required to leave a positive review.

As an educator, this book shook me. The initial scene in the auditorium left me reeling and unsure whether I wanted to finish the book as I was very uncomfortable. The book does suck you in and leave you wanting to learn a lot more about what is going on and why. Could be worth the read, but left me feeling a little off as an educator.

5 Show more
Review 4.5 stars
This is a book that has some structural tricks up its sleeve, similar to books like FATES & FURIES and ASYMMETRY. So you need to proceed with caution when reading anything about it. Just saying it plays with structure feels like a bit of a spoiler, but in this case (like both the books I mentioned before) I think it's good to know because some may find the first section of the book grating enough to quit, not knowing what they are losing by bailing early. Like the other two books, I'd recommend you get at least halfway through before you decide to jump ship.

Now that I've said all that I have the tricky job of trying to tell you all the ways this book thrilled me without being able to actually tell you about the book. TRUST EXERCISE feels like it's in conversation with Choi's last novel, MY EDUCATION. It feels like there are ideas around the power dynamics between men and women, between teachers and students, that she is not done working out. It feels like the right time to do that, the book is timely in a way that makes me worry about seeing too many reviews with hashtag-metoo attached to it, but it really does feel like it's of this particular moment. It is about the narratives women give themselves about the relationships and encounters with men that can leave them with scars of all sizes. It's about the intensity of being a teenager, the depth of feeling and experience that happens without a full understanding of what it means and who you are.

There is some particular joy in this book for theater kids, who will recognize the tight-knit community theater kids form that includes its own dramas and jealousies. It is also a book about the way writers process and change the world and does so in a way that feels fresh and not just another writer-writing-about-writers retread.

I noted in my review of MY EDUCATION how very sharp and amazing Choi's prose and observations are, and I noticed it once again here. Sometimes she has a sentence that makes you gasp from the truth and perfection of it. The style of the prose, overall, can be a bit confounding. It's purposeful, this is a book that makes the reader work, a book that is always aware of just how much it knows that you don't. It can take a little time to get your head straight sometimes, and an entire section switches pronouns just to remind you of its little trick in a way that some may find infuriating but that I adored. (I have a feeling there is a decent number of people who will find the entire book infuriating but I will continue to passionately love and defend it. I love this exact kind of difficult book.)

I am seriously considering re-reading this entire book. (After finishing I immediately reread the final section, which was 100% the right decision.) Even better, I am considering re-reading MY EDUCATION and then re-reading this book. I have a tendency to race when I enjoy a book, I can't let myself slow down and feel it and this time I would like to savor every bite.

Their first day, Mr. Kingsley slid into the room like a knife- he had a noiseless and ambushing style of movement- and once they’d fallen silent, which was almost immediately, had cast a look on them that Sarah still saw in the back of her mind.

There isn’t a drama as electric as that between students of the Performing Arts, as is evident based on the characters in this novel. This is 1982, the students attending CAPA (Citywide Academy for the Performing Arts) are some of the most talented from all around, there to hone their acting skills under the tutelage of one Mr. Kingsley. Kingsley, a gay man with a husband, a lifestyle most of the class has never been exposed to. They immediately are in awe. The problem is Mr. Kingsley crosses the boundaries by meddling in their personal lives as much as their stage ones. The students all ‘longed to live up to his brilliance and equally feared that it couldn’t be done.’ The teens are not quite children but definitely not adults. Exercises meant to engage the senses beyond sight, plunging them into darkness is a catalyst for David and Sarah to begin a sexual relationship, but as one expects from people not quite mature enough to know how to corral the emotional aftermath, things sour. The coldness seeps in as the students deal with Ego Deconstruction/Reconstruction. Much of the time Kingsley seems to play more at therapist than acting coach, but maybe it’s one and the same.

Embrace pain, ‘anguish can be made into music’, learn to be true to your authentic emotions, stand up for yourself. It will all hurt less when you’re older! Learn self-possession, control your ego, ego is wildly useful if you can master it. The problem is Kingsley guides the students to relate their own lives to the ’emotional authenticity’ that acting requires. Teens aren’t ready for that mature honesty, applied in real life situations and why does his ‘intrusion’ outside of school feel like something Sara, for example, welcomes? Then the English People come and Sarah becomes more a theatre (remember, it’s theatre not theater according to him) exile, Mr. Kingsley no longer investing his time, attention nor guidance upon her life. So many of the students manipulate, but they all often seem to be playing parts to fit in or to stand out. Kingsley is the master, using his adult eye upon the lives of his ‘players’. The only authenticity seems to come from Sarah’s confusion and hurt, or does it? There is Karen, dating the much older (and of questionable morality) Martin of the “English People” set, Martin (whom David later admires as his mentor) who has much more of a story in the second half that made me wonder, was I not paying attention enough in the first part of the book? As a reader I felt like I was stretched all over the place and couldn’t fully grasp what the heck was going on. Then something happens to Sarah and no one is there to ‘safeguard her welfare’, no one to chase after her as she both wishes for and fears happening in equal measure. Certainly David isn’t available!

Rush to the future, Part Two of the novel and everyone is all grown up. We meet Karen waiting for her old friend ‘the author’. About that author and CAPA alumni, just how much of her story is authentic? How much of the beginning of the novel is true? How much of what we recall with our memory about our own tortured youth is genuine? Honestly, I still don’t know. I think I lost the plot by the second half and end. Just when I think I grasp things, Choi changes direction and I am still not sure what this novel is about.

There is intelligent observations about emotions, youth, relationships but I think the novel just wasn’t straight forward enough for me to be fully engaged. I have to feel a little less dizzied by the characters, I think I drifted away too often. It was good but I didn’t really care enough about the characters. However, there is very clever writing within, this is a heck of a line, “Maybe it was unfair of Karen to see Sarah and David as twin narcissists, each fixated on the other’s ancient image and seeing in that hapless teenage lover some lost part of themselves they still wanted back.” Wow! I need to read a different book by Susan Choi, because she possess a keen intelligence, it just didn’t work for me here.

Publication Date: April 9, 2019

Henry Holt & Company

Love it or hate it, people will be talking about Susan Choi’s Trust Exercise. This is not an easy read. Some readers will appreciate the narrative complexity while others will be frustrated by the daring structure Choi employs. As a former band kid, I enjoyed the early backdrop of the performing arts high school, as well as the love story that unfolds.

This is a hard book to review, but suffice to say things are not what they seem in the first part of the book. I knew this going in and was still surprised by the turn things took, and agreeably disoriented by the about-face. It was actually something of a relief - the tone of the first half is coldly distant at times, describing the emotion of the teenage experience somehow without any actual emotion. I don't want to overstate the "twist" (this is a literary novel after all) but Choi is doing really interesting things here, and the experience of being toyed with by her is not entirely unpleasant. 3.5 stars.

I just could not get through this. I made it about halfway and once the story (jarringly) took a major shift in timeline and narrator and things still did not improve on the enjoyment front I abandoned the book. If I hadn’t received an advance copy for reviewing purposes I would have jumped ship earlier. Although I enjoy books set in academia and the author, Susan Choi, clearly demonstrates that she can be clever, Trust Exercise did not hold my interest in the slightest.

The plot of Trust Exercise centers on David and Sarah, two high school drama students at a performing arts high school. It begins in the early 1980s when the two are freshmen and they develop a romantic relationship after an incident during an exercise in their theater class. The first half mostly chronicles this budding relationship in a plodding manner.

The prose is dense and complex and Choi opts for style over substance for the most part. David, Sarah, their drama teacher Mr. Kingsley, and most of the other characters come off as tired and cliched and it was hard to get invested in any of them. I don’t have any problems with unlikeable or even detestable characters (I just thoroughly enjoyed Sam Lipsyte’s The Ask and consider myself a pretty big Irvine Welsh fan) but I do have beef with boring characters, and much of the folks populating the universe of Trust Exercise struck me as uninteresting. Pair this with a meandering narrative and you end up with a DNF from me.

2/10

I could not get interested in this book. The plot and writing was belaboured and tedious. Paragraphs went on for several pages. The characters were not engaging and frankly were annoying. The story is told in several parts, but they seemed disjointed. Unfortunate, as Choi's previous writing is highly recommended.

DNF. Not for me. I found the writing style very disjointed, and it failed to get me interested in either the story or the characters.

Love this book! I was sold as I started with the tale of two teens who begin an inevitable romance during their time at an arts high school; midway through the book I got a big surprise that convinced me even more to love it, and then another surprise near the end - I appreciate it when an author is able to so nimbly move the story around, and I don't want to say more to ruin it!

This novel didn’t really work for me. The writing style here - short, staccato sentences felt like something more at home in a hard-boiled noir novel. And, ultimately, the plot of the story felt likewise a bit awkward in the last third to half of the book. I didn’t quite connect with this book or it’s characters.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2634659879 I loved the performing arts high school setting in this book, and I loved Choi's way of shifting the narratorial point of view so we see the characters from various angles and perspectives. There are some satisfying surprises along the way -- I would avoid reading the book description and reviews of this book so it can truly surprise you. The characters are complex and satisfying, and I was fully immersed in the story. This is my second Susan Choi novel, and really do love her work.

I liked the first third of this book, but then failed to connect with the characters enough to want to see it through to the end.

This book was okay, It was sweet in some aspects, but I found the story to be somewhat boring and I didn't need all the filler.

Susan Choi once again has written a literary multilayered morally ambiguous novel. A story line of youthful mistakes that carry through life experiences.A book that requires slow thoughtful reading a challenging read well rewarded,#netgalley #TrustExercise #HenryHolt.

The narrative shifts were jarring, and not in the exciting way, where the following sections deepen the story in unexpected ways. I just felt disconnected from the story more and more as the book went on.

Thank you to Henry Holt & Company and Netgalley for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

Boy, oh boy - where to start? Unfortunately, I have no real positive things to say about this book. I have had it for weeks. Within the first 10 pages I knew this was going to be something I would struggle with. The best way I can describe it is trying to read a book while it's under water. It's never quite fully in focus and I felt like I was only picking up every other word or so. To explain it another way - there is way too much superfluous language and also it doesn't read how I would normally talk. I felt like I was reading a translation of another language. Susan Choi obviously has a talent for the written word, but I wouldn't say she writes for the reader, she writes for herself and the literary critics. (I could be way off base here, and I don't mean this in a mean way, but when 2 or 3 words work, why do you need to use 10? To show off?)

I thought this book would be kind of like Fame - young kids (Sarah and David) who fall in love in the 1980s at a prestigious art school. Not even close. I feel terrible saying this, but don't waste your time. There are too many amazing books out there.

A very unique and unusual story that should probably read twice in order to grasp all the nuances and innuendo. Confused and confusing characters, revising what you thought you knew half way through. What happened after the shot to The Girl? Was that another euphemism or metaphor or another's reality? Claire...who is Verna at the office and why did she recognize Claire are just a few of the many questions I have
Ultimately this seems to be a story of preconceived notions of who a person is by stereotyping or creating the person one needs at that time in his/her life.
I think
Who knows
A great read
Thank you to verbally and the publisher for this arc in return for an honest review

Wow, this one didn't work for me at all. Given how much I read I guess it's surprising that it doesn't happen more often.

Susan Choi's newest book, Trust Exercise, is a marvel of language and imagery, but on the whole, I found it confusing, a bit meandering, and once Choi flipped the script on the plot, I wondered whether what I was reading was actually happening or if it was a figment of the characters' imagination.

The book took place in the early 1980s at the Citywide Academy for the Performing Arts. The first-year students are ready to being learning Stagecraft, Shakespeare, the Sight-Reading of Music, and, of course, acting, where their charismatic teacher, Mr. Kingsley, puts them through a variety of trust exercises, challenging their sensory perceptions and awakening their emotions.

Two students, Sarah and David, fall for each other, and begin a passionate yet mercurial relationship in full view of their fellow students. But neither of them are ready for the ramifications of a relationship, and they're not prepared for the manipulations of their peers—or Mr. Kingsley, for that matter. In an effort to drown out the pressures of everyday life, Sarah makes a decision which has major ramifications, ramifications that ripple long into the future.

And then Choi speeds up the timeline and sets the book in the future, and the whole narrative goes hazy, so you're not sure if what you read actually happened, or if Choi simply wants you to question the storyline. But that's not her only gimmick, as she throws yet another twist into the plot that once again left me shaking my head.

Susan Choi has been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and certainly there's no doubt about her writing ability. But unfortunately, Trust Exercise never worked for me. I have seen some really positive reviews, however, so it may work for someone else.

NetGalley and Henry Holt & Company provided me a copy of the book in exchange for an unbiased review. Thanks for making this available!

I received an advanced reader’s copy in exchange for an honest review

This whole story was creepy and gross. I’m sure that was the author’s intention, but the payoff wasn’t worth the ick. Cringe-filled.