Welcome to another review on Armed with A Book, friends! Today I am sharing about Bewilderment by Richard Powers. You might know the author from his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Overstory. I haven’t read it yet but after reading and reflecting on Bewilderment, I am definitely going to prioritize my TBR. Bewilderment is the story of a dad and his son as they adjust to life after the mom passes away. With an active imagination and compassion that has no limits, Robin is a sweet nine year old trying to understand the world around him. Let’s get started with the synopsis and then dive into my review.
I never believed the diagnoses the doctors settled on my son. When a condition gets three different names over as many decades, when it goes from non-existent to the country’s most commonly diagnosed childhood disorder in one generation, when two different physicians want to prescribe three different medications, there’s something wrong….
Theo Byrne is a promising young astrobiologist who has found a way to search for life on other planets dozens of light years away. He is also the widowed father of a most unusual nine-year-old. His son, Robin, is funny, loving, and filled with plans. He thinks and feels deeply, adores animals, and can spend hours painting elaborate pictures. He is also on the verge of being expelled from third grade for smashing his friend’s face with a metal thermos.
What can a father do, when the only solution offered to his rare and troubled boy is to put him on psychoactive drugs? What can he say when his boy comes to him wanting an explanation for a world that is clearly in love with its own destruction? The only thing for it is to take the boy to other planets, even while fostering his son’s desperate campaign to help save this one.
Content Notes include depiction of death of a parent, car accident, suicide, death of a loved one, animal cruelty, bullying.
Thoughts on Bewilderment
Bewilderment is one of those books that you read and then the more you talk to people about it, the better you understand it. This is a short book and yet it has so much packed into it but that is how life is too – there are so many aspects that interact together to make a person’s experiences and memories. The political landscape, the hardships of academic life, coming to terms with the loss of a parent and wife, societal pressures and perceptions all come together in Bewilderment.
Bewilderment does not set out to answer big questions but it does get the reader thinking about every aspect of the story. Every question that I encountered through this book left me feeling bewildered if I focused on it for a while. Perplexed at the state of the world, confused by the choices that people make.
On State of Mind
Theo, the father, is a young astrobiologist, studying the universe for signs of life. Using advanced computing and imaging, his research aims to predict whether a planet has life based on the constituents of the atmosphere. Stories about the planets scattered across the universe are a way for Theo and his son. Robin, to connect. When his wife, Aly, passes away and school becomes a struggle for Robin, there is a lot of pressure from Robin’s school to get him on some kind of medication. However, Theo does not want to put drugs into his nine year old and that is one of the first questions that Bewilderment – Rather than focusing on the treatment of children’s mental disorders like anxiety, OCD, PTSD, whose numbers grow every year in the US, is someone looking at the root cause of them and why they happen? Why are they more prevalent? We have definitely gotten better at identifying them but the treatments are usually pharmaceutical drugs and private companies are often driven by profit. Monopoly in the healthcare sector is always something to be weary about.
Rather than letting Robin take drugs, Theo enrolls him in a unique program. His wife used to be close to a scientist studying brain imaging and Artificial Intelligence, trying to guide people to imitate an emotion or state of mind. The treatment helps Robin and Theo notices numerous changes including the fact that Robin seems closer to his mom and interacting with her. This later forms another important question that the book poses – What repercussions do alternate treatments that focus on brain plasticity have on the patients? Are there withdrawals from those too? Can they be harmful?
On Personal and Worldly Causes
Robin is a special kid – he has his mother’s love for animals and wants to raise awareness about endangered species. He loves birds and is motivated to learn everything there is to know about them by self-directed study. His classmates don’t understand him and he is an easy victim of bullying. Sometimes he is able to take it in his stride but this isn’t always possible. He convinces Theo to homeschool him and I felt so proud for Theo for doing that.
The world likes to put us in boxes, lay out a rough plan of who is going to be through the curriculum but with geniuses and truly passionate people, these guidelines only hinder. This is another question Bewilderment makes the reader ponder: Whether what we teach at school is really what we should be teaching? Does confining our views to just some topics limit our understanding of the world?
As a parent, our responsibility lies with our child and Theo is a wonderful example of a single father doing his best between all the chaos. His own research in astrobiology is an integral part of the story. I am sure it is no surprise that we need high resolution powerful telescopes to take detailed photos of the planets out there. Without those images and actual proof of what the atmosphere in other worlds look like, our predictions are no better than fantasy. However, there is only so much money that can be spared for these projects and when we can’t seem to tackle the problems we have on earth, can we set something aside for the future? Bewilderment is a reminder of the delicate balancing act that life is continuously striving for.
Reading Experience Summary
Bewilderment is a beautifully written book. It takes the reader on a journey not only on Earth with Theo and Robin but also let’s un imagine and visit far off planets where life may or may not exist in their unique manner. This is a delicate story about a boy who feels connected to his mother after losing her to a car accident. It’s about a father trying to do the best for his child and recognizing that he has a potential and empathy that can make a difference to the world if we all had the same attributes.
The world that Richard Powers creates is a haunting landscape with the truths of life and the sadness of mortality engrained deep within it. I am sure that if I reread this book, now or anytime in the future, I will understand it even more. This book has already been longlisted for The Booker Prize 2021 so I am not the only one loving its message.
Will you pick up this book?
Bewilderment is available in stores. Be sure to check your local library and order it through there to help this book reach more readers.
Amazon Print
Amazon Kindle
Many thanks to the author for providing me a complimentary copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
Bewilderment reminded me of three other books – The Smallest Light in the Universe by Sara Seager, a memoir by the astrophysicist author, We Are Satellites by Sarah Pinsker which was about a brain implant and Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr which also questions the world we are leaving behind for our kids and future generations. Do check out these books if you haven’t already!
About the Author
Bio and author photo from Penguin Random House Canada site.
RICHARD POWERS is the author of twelve novels. His most recent, The Overstory, won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction and the 2020 American Academy of Arts and Letters’ William Dean Howells Medal for the most distinguished American work of fiction published in the last five years, and was a finalist for the Man Booker Prize. The Overstory has been on the New York Times bestseller list for 63 weeks to date, with more than one million copies in print across all formats. Powers is also the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship and the National Book Award, among other accolades.
Thank you for reading this post about Bewilderment! It is a unique story and I hope you will enjoy it if you pick it up!
Cover image: Photo by Vincentiu Solomon on Unsplash
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