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Antidote
Antidote | Karen Russell
5 posts | 5 read | 5 to read
From Pulitzer finalist, MacArthur Fellowship recipient, and bestselling author of Swamplandia! and Vampires in the Lemon Grove Karen Russell: a gripping dust bowl epic about five characters whose fates become entangled after a storm ravages their small Nebraskan town The Antidote opens on Black Sunday, as a historic dust storm ravages the fictional town of Uz, Nebraska. But Uz is already collapsing--not just under the weight of the Great Depression and the dust bowl drought but beneath its own violent histories. The Antidote follows a "Prairie Witch," whose body serves as a bank vault for peoples' memories and secrets; a Polish wheat farmer who learns how quickly a hoarded blessing can become a curse; his orphan niece, a basketball star and witch's apprentice in furious flight from her grief; a voluble scarecrow; and a New Deal photographer whose time-traveling camera threatens to reveal both the town's secrets and its fate. Russell's novel is above all a reckoning with a nation's forgetting--enacting the settler amnesia and willful omissions passed down from generation to generation, and unearthing not only horrors but shimmering possibilities. The Antidote echoes with urgent warnings for our own climate emergency, challenging readers with a vision of what might have been--and what still could be.
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TracyReadsBooks
The Antidote | Karen Russell
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Mehso-so

I didn‘t love it…which honestly, comes as a surprise because everything else I‘ve read by Russell I really enjoyed. It has the right ingredients—interesting setting (Dust Bowl), a witch, a sentient scarecrow, a mystery, but…BUT, it‘s ponderous & slow moving, told in multiple POVs which aren‘t all that distinctive, & somehow (impossibly) devoid of emotional depth. I really should have cared about these characters & I just didn‘t. Just a so-so read.

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TorieStorieS
The Antidote | Karen Russell
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Pickpick

Historical fiction steeped in magical realism unfolds here in a pre-technicolor Oz of Uz, NE. Beautifully written with multiple perspectives, the story comes from the titular Antidote, a Prairie Witch practiced in banking memories away from their experiencer, Asphodel, a fearless orphan obsessed with basketball & new love , her uncle, a farmer who finds sudden fortune after Black Sunday, Cleo, a New Deal photographer, a scarecrow & a cat!

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TracyReadsBooks
The Antidote | Karen Russell
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And…I now interrupt all in-progress reading to start this one. Russell never disappoints, always entertains. Look forward to a great read.

Karisimo I started this today too! 3w
27 likes1 comment
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BoleyBooks
Antidote | Karen Russell
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BoleyBooks
The Antidote | Karen Russell
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Tackle the TBR 🤓📚
What are you reading?
#boleybooks #TheAntidote #KarenRussell #bookbeast #netgalley #bookbuds #bookchat

Suet624 Just finished the new Kevin Barry book and I loved it. 3mo
BoleyBooks @Suet624 - Oh, so glad 😊 thanks for bringing that title to my attention. 3mo
Ruthiella I feel like it‘s been a while since Karen Russell had a new book! 3mo
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BoleyBooks @Ruthiella -this was my first book by her that I‘ve read. Do you have a favorite that I should get my hands on? 😊 3mo
Ruthiella @BoleyBooks I‘ve only read her other novel “Swamplandia!”, which wasn‘t my cup of tea. I‘d say try her short stories and see if her style is to your liking. 3mo
mcctrish I love Karen Russel 3mo
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