Cheryl is the epitome of teenage piety, her purity running deep and steadfast with a stubbornness indicative of any 17 year old. Jason is everything his father isn't. Impulsive, worldly and antisocial he forges his own way blindly and wholeheartedly, trusting in the love and bond he shares with his girlfriend Cheryl.
This story is about them, and wholly not about them. It is at once a coming of age tale and a commentary on society at large. Focusing on relationships - and especially the familial kind - Hey, Nostradamus explores the complexities of the connections forged through necessity and life experiences. The difference between families we are born into and cannot fully escape, and those we seek out to spend our lives with. It is about innocence, and guilt. Avoidance and acceptance, and above all the overriding presence of Something Else. Of God, of spirituality, or simply of the contemplation of such ideas.
Coupland, as always, has an art for weaving religious or spiritual tones throughout his work in an accessible and unchallenging way. He manages to make the reader question thoughts of morality, sin, innocence and human behaviour without bogging down the narrative. Despite heavy subject matter, -destruction, catastrophe and violence are, as is common for Coupland - evident early on in the novel, the text remains a quick and easy read as it deals with dark subject matter in a frank and instinctively human way. This honesty allows the reader to be honest about their own emotions and beliefs, forming a bond between text and reader without enforcing ideologies onto him or her. It is the honesty and the boldness, never sugar coating events or feelings, that makes Coupland such a wonderful author to read. His tales however outside your realm of circumstance become feasible or relatable in the very reactions characters have to them: ones that by little stretch of the imagination could have been yours.
Furthermore the style of the novel is such that we are part of each narrators mind - starting with Cheryl who speaks so calmly and retrospectively - who draws the reader in with compassion and intrigue alike.
A wonderful balance between family relations, the darkness of a world under siege and the guilts of growing up and accepting or rejecting your parents teaching, "Hey, Nostradamus" is a truly excellent read and a great marker of famous Coupland style.
This story is about them, and wholly not about them. It is at once a coming of age tale and a commentary on society at large. Focusing on relationships - and especially the familial kind - Hey, Nostradamus explores the complexities of the connections forged through necessity and life experiences. The difference between families we are born into and cannot fully escape, and those we seek out to spend our lives with. It is about innocence, and guilt. Avoidance and acceptance, and above all the overriding presence of Something Else. Of God, of spirituality, or simply of the contemplation of such ideas.
Coupland, as always, has an art for weaving religious or spiritual tones throughout his work in an accessible and unchallenging way. He manages to make the reader question thoughts of morality, sin, innocence and human behaviour without bogging down the narrative. Despite heavy subject matter, -destruction, catastrophe and violence are, as is common for Coupland - evident early on in the novel, the text remains a quick and easy read as it deals with dark subject matter in a frank and instinctively human way. This honesty allows the reader to be honest about their own emotions and beliefs, forming a bond between text and reader without enforcing ideologies onto him or her. It is the honesty and the boldness, never sugar coating events or feelings, that makes Coupland such a wonderful author to read. His tales however outside your realm of circumstance become feasible or relatable in the very reactions characters have to them: ones that by little stretch of the imagination could have been yours.
Furthermore the style of the novel is such that we are part of each narrators mind - starting with Cheryl who speaks so calmly and retrospectively - who draws the reader in with compassion and intrigue alike.
A wonderful balance between family relations, the darkness of a world under siege and the guilts of growing up and accepting or rejecting your parents teaching, "Hey, Nostradamus" is a truly excellent read and a great marker of famous Coupland style.
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