Or a heartbeat.” Evocative sensual descriptions are everywhere in this novel, but they always feel true to the characters. “Holding Eleanor’s hand was like holding a butterfly. The hand-holding, by the way, is intense. Eventually, they begin holding hands on the rides to and from school. Over time, she begins reading his comics over his shoulder. On the first day of school, Eleanor sits down next to him on the bus. Park is a half-Korean kid who’s passably popular but separated from the larger social order of his school both by his race and by his passion for comic books and good music. (Some readers may initially find this unrealistic, but through the novel one comes to have a better understanding of how poverty interacts with abuse to marginalize and oppress.) She’s also poor - she cannot afford a toothbrush or batteries for her Walkman. Every moment Eleanor is home is terrifying and claustrophobic - she shares a room with a mess of siblings and lives in constant fear of offending her abusive alcoholic stepfather, Richie. But you’ve never seen “Eleanor & Park.” Its observational precision and richness make for very special reading.Įleanor is a “big girl” with bright red hair (kids on the bus call her Big Red, and she describes herself as resembling a barmaid) who has just returned to her home in Omaha, after being kicked out for a year and forced to stay with acquaintances. There’s bullying, sibling rivalry, salvation through music and comics, a monstrous stepparent - and I know, we’ve seen all this stuff. It’s set in 1986, and God knows I’ve seen that. I’ve seen the conventions, and I’ve seen them interrogated.īut I have never seen anything quite like “Eleanor & Park.” Rainbow Rowell’s first novel for young adults is a beautiful, haunting love story - but I have seen those. I’ve read a dozen “we brought back the dinosaurs and they are mad” books. Whether I was reading Michael Crichton or Amy Tan or Tom Robbins, there had never been anything like it before in my life. When I began reading contemporary fiction in high school, I remember feeling that each book was an absolute revelation.

Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell