3.5, rounded down to 3.

I had very much looked forward to this book, and there is a lot to like. At the end of the day, I didn't feel particularly satisfied after 466 pages - it was a heavy, time-consuming meal but I leave the table feeling I wasn't fed enough, and feeling a bit underwhelmed and more than a little disappointed.

I would still recommend this book to a variety of people, but not without some caveats, the main one being, it's a book with A LOT of main characters, split up mostly between the 1850s and 2019. However, once you finish this book you don't get much of an ending for most of those characters considering the time you've been investing, almost 500 pages.

Many thanks to NetGalley and to the publishers for a digital ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Envision is an excellent writer, and this was very good. Did not connect with it as much as their other works, but still very good.

I absolutely loved reading this book. This first appeared on my radar as a footnote in another book about San Francisco dating back to the 1800s. The synopsis caught my eye... I love stories that get told through different characters' perspectives, and when told via different timelines as well. When done well, it can be magic. Jonathan Evison's novel, Small World, was exactly that.I adored his writing, loved sitting with these characters in moments of their lives, some big but also small. It was a beautiful weaving of how paths cross, even in tiny ways, and a beautiful reminder of how little movements our ancestors made can play a big role in where and how we live our lives. For me, this book absolutely hit the spot. 5/5

Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC, in exchange for my honest and unbiased review.

Jonathan Evison’s Small World tells the stories of a train’s passengers in 2019 and their mid-nineteenth-century ancestors after a disastrous crash. There’s Walter Bergen, a veteran train conductor on his last run before retiring, and a descendent of Irish twin orphans. Malik, a young basketball star, is the descendent of a slave. Then there’s Jenny, a corporate consultant whose ancestors were Chinese immigrants, and Laila, a Native American, fleeing her abusive husband. Small World chronicles 170 years of American nation-building from many points of view across place and time. This inventive work explores the immigrant experience, and that of the modern era in the United States.

I read and reviewed Jonathan Evison’s last novel, Legends of the North Cascades in 2021 and really enjoyed it, so I was eager to read Small World. I was not disappointed. He did a masterful job juggling complex, multiple narratives and then connecting them throughout generations.

To mix things up, he wrote these storylines differently. For example, Nora’s chapters are letters to her long-lost brother, Finn, a great way to not only share her story, but her emotions. Coincidentally, Finn struggled with despair. “For six nights he slept beneath the prairie sky, gazing up at the unfathomable firmament, the stars splashed across the bowl of night. He took no solace in the night sky. The loneliness was crushing, as though he could feel the weight of the heavens pushing down on him.”

It’s a sizeable cast of characters, but they are well drawn and unique. Although most chapters are short and interesting, he sometimes provided too much detail about events. The play-by-play of a ball game, for example, was over the top and quickly lost my interest. I also found the climax of the novel to be unsatisfying. The book is overlong (480 pages), and some storylines don’t conclude, like an ellipsis at the end of a sentence. Still, the book is meaningful and well executed. 4 stars.

Though the title references how the world is a small place, the novel is expansive in its story of the railroad linking the east and west coasts and the people who lived during the building of that railroad. Spanning 170 years, it begins with the stories of the Chinese and Irish immigrants who worked on the railroads, the former slaves who saw the north and west as a haven and the Indians who found their land stolen and their lives crushed by the invading white man. There’s a lot packed into Evison’s book with a myriad cast of characters. There are also multiple timelines with one focused on the original families during the expansion of the western frontier and their descendants who all converge in 2019 as they board a train in Portland, Oregon.

As the characters cross paths along the way, we are reminded that the world often seems small. It’s like meeting someone from home when traveling and commenting on “it’s a small world.” But the characters’ stories are all interconnected and it’s the masterful way that the timelines and subplots are interwoven that makes this book so special. There’re not just the early railroad workers, the slaves, the orphans, the displaced Indians and the golddiggers, but also their descendants, who populate the book and crisscross one another’s lives along the way.

Each family must deal with prejudice, hostilities and exploitation. It is the characters’ strength that allows them to persevere. And it’s not just the historic characters who deal with adversity, the contemporary characters are not spared. They are dealing with their own issues and struggles.

Epic in scope and rich in detail, each storyline showcases people struggling to survive and make their lives better. The descendants of the early characters all converge on a fateful train ride that ends disastrously. So, how small is the world when so many disparate paths cross at a single moment in time. And who can fortell the impact one person can have on another.

Small World
by Jonathan Evison
Pub Date: January 11, 2022
Dutton
Thanks to the author, publisher, and Netgalley for the ARC of this book. This is an amazing work of fiction. Multiple characters but you will not have difficulty keeping them straight. It is an American story of hope and hard work. A story of disappointment and death. The author does a masterful job of tying all the stories together.
4 stars

On the eve of his 50th birthday, Jonathan Evison decided he was going to write the Great American Novel. The result? Small World— a novel that explores the American Experiment through the eyes and generations of many families: Irish immigrants who helped lay the transcontinental railroad from the east coast, Chinese immigrants who connected it from the west. Through the eyes of slaves who were forced here, and through the indigenous who were all but eliminated. Evison explores America through its greatest resource: diversity. I recently spoke with Jonathan Evison about Small World. Here’s our conversation:

https://www.kmuw.org/podcast/marginalia/2022-01-25/jonathan-evison-on-achieving-the-american-dream-and-the-great-american-novel-in-a-small-world

"It's about the journey," one of the characters tells his son as they are about to get on the train. Unfortunately, I agree with the son's appraisal that the train is too slow. The opening chapter of this book sets us up with the knowledge that there is going to be a disaster involving a train. Cut to backstories of about a dozen characters - passengers and their ancestors - who have stories within a story unfolding. Too many pages between each corresponding section means the tension can't be sustained. We are just hopping from person to person, and by the time we get back to them we have to remember what their story was.

After finishing this book, I definitely understand the significance of the title “Small World”. This book is very well written. I found it surprising, often, that the author was able to portray so many different cultures in what feels like a personal way. At the beginning, it takes a minute to get used to so many voices. It works itself out eventually.

This was such a wonderfully written book. The characters were rich and interesting and I liked that they were all tied together. My one complaint is that I loved all the stories so much I would have liked more of each. I feel like entire books could have been written about each storyline. Despite that, I would definitely recommend this book. It's a great read.

I started this one and it was a little too long & winding for me - longwinded & I couldn't get into the story.

Jonathan Evison’s A Small World is a masterful epic. He takes the question What Is The American Dream? and artfully follows different families and their descendants, connecting all of them brilliantly. I highly recommend this book.

Fascinating look into the lives of people from different times and places whose ancestors meet in the present day. Lots of literal and figurative twists and turns.

A well written tale that covers 70 years with a train accident that brings these various people together. The Irish orphan twins of Nora and Finn are the long thread in this tale. They are separated, not tole where each other is located. Through the device of several unrelated people, one learns what is happening in their lives and their later relatives.
Definitely read Small World as this is really a small world after all.

If you want a book that will support the six degrees of separation theory, Evison’s latest book does that. And even though you know what’s going to be the climax from the first chapter, the real story is the history of some of the people who were on the Amtrak train when it wrecked on the way to Seattle. Walter, the train’s engineer is on his final run before retirement. Following his story, we learn he is a descendent of Irish immigrants. Malik and his mother are descendants of an escaped slave. Jenny Chen, a corporate executive and her family are descendants of a Chinese immigrant and Laila is a descendant of California Miwok Indians. It sounds like it could be confusing and yet, Evison is able to make the story into a page-turner as readers learn about the heritage and hopeful future of each of these people.

Set in the 1850s and today, Small World is an American saga of four family lines that intersect briefly, yet profoundly, during an Amtrak trip to Seattle in 2019. A diverse set of characters (Irish, Native American, African-American and Chinese) set out to make America’s promises of freedom and opportunity become reality. Set mainly in Illinois, Iowa, California and Oregon, Evison vividly describes the landscape, the political climate and the daily lives of his characters in the 1850s and the struggles of their descendants today.

Sister and brother Nora and Finn Bergen are immigrants from Ireland, trying to escape famine and death and sorrow only to encounter more of the same in the new world. Finn is restless and travels throughout the west always searching for something. His descendent Walter spends his life travelling as well, as an engineer for Amtrak. Othello is a slave who escapes while in Illinois. He tries to live a life as a free man but must always live in fear. His descendent Brianna is working hard to stay out of poverty and keep her son Malik on a path to college through his talents at playing basketball. Luyu Tully is a Native American who yearns to live freely and safely among nature as her ancestors once did. Her descendent Laila needs to find a safe place to live to escape a violent relationship. Wu Chen is an immigrant from China seeking prosperity and love. Jenny is his descendent who is financially successful but at the expense of spending quality time with her family. The characters are sympathetic; the reader will be invested in their lives and cheer for them and cry for them. They are written with such depth that each family line could have a novel written just about them.

Evison explores the myths and realities of the American Dream, both past and present. He explores love and loss and risk and longing through each of his characters. They are all trying to escape the past and are searching for something: a place to call home, a connection to the world around them, peace, love or something unknown. All want a better future for themselves and for their children and children’s children. What Evison asks is were they successful? Is the American Dream just a myth? Is it attainable? What do we leave for our descendants? How far have we come as a nation in the treatment and economic advancement of immigrants and minorities? Evison shows that this nation was built by people of all backgrounds and we are standing on their shoulders.

I recommend this for readers who enjoyed The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House for the opportunity to read and review the egalley of Small World before publication.

Jonathan Evison's Small World is certainly the Great American Novel. Wide in scope with unforgettable characters spanning almost 200 years, I am constantly amazed by his storytelling talent. Every book so different. His characters feel so real as do the settings. This one is a full satisfying saga and I know I will think about the characters for a long time as I do with all of his work.

This book is told from multiple points of view across a broad span of time. With the theme of the establishment of the railroad making the United States a "small world." The characters are so compelling and somehow Jonathan Evison weaves all of the story lines together seamlessly.



Discussed on Ep 145 of the Book Cougars ppodcast

Jonathan Evison has done it again. This is an absolutely epic novel that I really hope becomes a movie. I want to live in it... which means... yes, I want to design it. But that's not why I loved it. After reading Legends of the North Cascade last year I found Evison's writing something that intrigues me. He's a fellow Pacific Northwest resident and clearly a lover of nature and history, but what he does is hone in on the dynamics of a situation to reflect how it shapes people's responses to one another. The characters aren't there to simply shift or change like an archetype of "The Hero's Journey" they're left to react to their environments and each other based on their pasts. It's a very real and very honest way to set characters on their path and it isn't always resolved in the standard way book publishers or readers expect.

Small World follows the evolution of the transcontinental railroad and generations that span 170 years as the west is built. It's big in terms of scope which is why I'm surprised I loved it so much. I was afraid that I wouldn't connect to the characters and it would be more like taking a ride through time but instead, it felt like I lived through it. There is just enough grit in each storyline to tug on your emotions and it felt like going through my own ancestry line in a way with curiosity and empathy. I'm convinced it's simply his writing that makes a book like this work because many authors would have failed in this premise if done differently.

I can't wait to see if this becomes a sweeping cinematic saga sure to be a classic, but until then, I'll highly recommend it to everyone!

Thank you to everyone at Penguin and Dutton for letting me read this amazing novel!!! I loved every minute!

3.5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC

I thought this would be right up my alley (multi-generational, multi-viewpoint historical fiction), but while I liked it, I didn't love it. I suspect it is because a few things came together too unbelievably, but maybe it simply lacked some depth. I liked that he wove together so many strands (immigrants from different countries and wealth levels) but I just didn't buy how so many came together in the present.