I picked this audiobook up on a whim. I needed something to listen to while I was working and the synopsis sounded interesting. I saw some good reviews from people that I know and thought I’d give it a whirl. I have heard a lot of praise over the years for Lisa Lutz. In the end, hopefully this book is not indicative of her work in general or I don’t think I’ll pick up another.

To put it simply this was a book with a good idea that was made to be completely nonsensical. The story features approximately five narrators along the way and all of them are basically identical. I didn’t find anything that separated the characters from one another in personality or behavior. They also introduce us to too many other characters. Half the time I had no idea who we were talking about because they mention about fifty people but only ten of them are actually important so I have no idea who anyone else is.

There’s also a lot of filler in this book. Most of the first half of the book was loooooong conversations about teenagers hooking up, who was popular, and what everyone was wearing. I swear, if Gemma went on one more rant about her outfit I would have screamed. And it just went on and on and on. Literally nothing happened for several hundred pages except sex, clothes and parties.

I don’t mind a book that’s a slow burn but this was a snail’s pace. I didn’t even realize that the revenge plot was in motion until about four pranks into it, and Gemma blatantly calls it out. I remember thinking, “Oh, we’re already in motion with this? I had no idea!”

Ms. Witt was utterly useless. She acts like she stumbles on some deep, dark secret. But it must not be too big of a secret because eight different students tell her about it and at least half the staff knows about it too. This secret is also supposed to be indicative of an embedded institutional attitude of “boys will be boys”, but it’s only been going on for five years and when the rest of the staff find out about it they are horrified. So I would hardly call that an institutional issue.

Also, I have no idea why this was portrayed as some horrible abuse on women. Yeah, the boys are talking about their sexual conquests, pitting the girls in a contest that they don’t know about. It’s not right, it’s gross, but teenage boys are functioning at a maturity level of barely above caveman. You can force feed them as much feminism as you like, he’s still going to act like a rabid animal. Because he is. There was a single instance in the book of a girl being coerced into a sexual act she didn’t want to perform, the rest of the girls were either in a relationship (or thought they were, lying for the win) or were completely willing. So, shouldn’t the real lesson here be that randomly hooking up with boys gave them fodder to act like animals and girls should value themselves more than that? That’s the message I would want my daughter getting. The only valuable thing that Mr. Witt does in this book is tell the girls that they don’t have to perform sexual acts unless they want to, and all the girls act like this is some shocking revelation to them. That’s rather sad if that’s true of teenage girls these days.

Finally, the ending was completely ridiculous. It went to a place that made no sense at all. The girls had already won. They had made an end to the contest. They had punished the boys involved. But then we go to the absolute extreme anyway. Why? You already won. It’s not smart to keep fighting a war that has already been won. And in the end the girls complained a lot about the boys not taking responsibility, but they ended up doing something far worse and took no responsibility either. This book did nothing to further any conversation about bullying, feminism, or sexual relationships between teenagers. It was just bad.

The Swallows takes a look at the sexual antics taking place at a small private school. Antics that are allowed to continue even as underage girls are rated and shamed and end up leaving the school when the hoard decides to turn on them. It’s pretty awful stuff and the title is exactly what you might think it is as well as a little something more.

All the things get stirred up when a new teacher arrives at the school. She has the teens fill out an anonymous questionnaire and notices some disturbing answers that send her on a mission to find out exactly what “The Dark Room” is and why so many fear/hate it. One thing leads to another and the young ladies realize they have a way to fight back and fix the power imbalance and when it happens it is a glorious thing. Though I wish it had been darker and nastier but I’m a terrible person who definitely reads too much horror, haha.

This book was one of those infectious reads that make you stop everything to keep reading/listening. I knew revenge was ultimately coming because I might’ve sneaked a peek at a review or two just to be sure and I was there for it. My only real complaint was the huge cast. It’s too large for this book, if you’re asking me, and especially if you are listening on audio because many voices sound too similar. And everyone has a side-story. There are teachers, students, groundskeepers, a parent or two. I had some trouble keeping up with names and histories and connections and hookups and other dastardly deeds, I cannot lie. Even with that said, it was a still a strong enough gossipy story that I never felt the need to shut it down forever. I’ll always wish the ending had been longer (it felt SO rushed), bleaker and meaner but I know all books can’t end the way Cockblock by C.V. Hunt did!

As I gazed at my students, I had the same thought I always had on the first day. They looked so young and innocent. Then I found a dead rat in the bottom of my desk drawer and remembered the tenet I had learned over the last eight years. The young may have a better excuse for cruelty, but they are no less capable of it.

 

For someone looking for omens, it’s odd how many exit signs I chose to ignore.

 

If a century of tradition were the only thing my time at Stonebridge brought to an end, I’d be okay with that. It’s the two deaths that keep me up at night.

How can I talk about The Swallows without ruining the experience? Not easily, and verbosely. Let's see if I can manage it.

Structurally, it's a boarding school book—a bunch of well-off (and/or scholarship) kids livingly largely without parental supervision and guidance, getting away with all sorts of things while the adults responsible for the supervision turn a blind eye, are honestly oblivious, or are complicit in the goings-on. At the end of the day, the real power is wielded by the students—a small sub-set of them, anyway—and there's a split between those wanting to exercise their power for their own pleasure and benefit (largely male at the expense of female empowerment, self-respect, self-esteem, and dignity) and those, well not wanting that.

Largely the book focuses on a small group of female students sick and tired with the status quo (offended and angry, actually) who set out to expose the cabal and the horrible games they play with people in a way to salt the earth so it can't be repeated. This seems like a tall order, but what choice do they have? They also have male students sympathetic to their cause and are willing to help out.

But also, there's a teacher (or more) not willing to go along with this, and who knows something's going on, so she does what she can to track it down to find ways to stop it (either herself or via student/faculty proxies). Her name is Alex Witt and she's just arrived at Stonebridge Academy following an ignominious departure from Warren Prep. It takes her very little time to determine that something is rotten at Stonebridge and that a couple of her students are trying to do something about it. Instinctively in agreement with them, Alex does what she can to encourage the individuals to find one another and use the strength their numbers and collaboration can bring. One student described her as:

...my friend, my ally, my confidante. She charmed, teased, amused, incited, and befriended us.

 

Alexandra Witt was the pied piper of Stonebridge Academy.

Chapters are told from the perspective of Alex or some of the other faculty or various students—primarily from the perspective of Gemma Russo (the student quoted above). Gemma was well on her way to a time as a firebrand, but with nudges and aid from Alex, her crusade picks up momentum until upheaval comes to the existing conditions and then all bets are off (see that last line of the opening quotation). Essentially, Alex is John Keating without the stand-up or poetry, making Gemma Neil Perry, I guess.

The book starts off as offbeat, with Gemma as this strange instructor in an alien environment, trying to escape her legacy and to maybe find a little peace while the students are running around pretending to be revolutionaries. But it shifts at a certain point, and while still occasionally comic and never anything but fun to read, it sheds the comedy in favor of earnest emotions and motives and dangerous situations. You don't notice it happening, but after a certain point, you'll notice the ground has shifted. Lutz pulls that off really well.

There's a lot of subtle work to the plot and the prose, and some that's pretty obvious. But even the obvious is done well. There's a reveal toward the end of the book that caught me so off-guard, but was so perfect I think I laughed out loud. I think this is technically streets ahead of Lutz' previous work.

It's a very different kind of humor than we got in The Spellman Files, but it's probably as funny as Lutz has been since the third book in that series—but it's mixed with the harsh realities of The Passenger and the feel of How to Start a Fire. Lutz puts on a clinic for naturally shifting tone and using that to highlight the important stories she's telling.

There's not a poorly designed or written character—I can't say I liked all of them, or even most of them (many of them could use a few days in a pillory while fellow students threw rotten fruit or whatever at them)—but as players in this particular drama, they're great. I was repeatedly torn between things happening too quickly, and yet not quickly enough—which I take as a sign that she nailed the pacing.

Because I'm really nervous about oversharing here, I'm going to wrap things up—but this is one you really should be reading. If it's not on one of my Top 10 lists of 2019, I'll be pretty shocked. I can't think of many that I'll put ahead of it at the moment.

From the funny and dark beginning, to the perfect and bitingly ominous last three paragraphs The Swallows is a winner. Timely and appropriate, but using tropes and themes that are familiar to readers everywhere, Lutz has given us a thriller for our day—provocative, entertaining, and haunting. This is one of those books that probably hews really close to things that could or have happened and you're better off hoping are fictional. Lisa Lutz is always a very good author, The Swallows is Lutz at her best.

Starting over at a new job is difficult enough without the added stress of a questionable discharge from your past position and the knowledge that you only received this second chance due to family connections.  In The Swallows, by Lisa Lutz, Alex Witt is an unconventional teacher who is far from enthusiastic when she agrees to take over the creative writing classes at Stonebridge Academy.  Lutz tells the sordid story of a private school with a history rife with cover-ups and a long tradition of misconduct by both faculty and students.  The novel’s rotating first-person narrators include Witt and Finn Ford, two teachers at the Academy; and Gemma and Norman, two students involved in the shattering exposure of the school’s secrets.  When a database ranking the female students on their sexual prowess is discovered, a plot of revenge evolves into a full-blown gender war that ends in tragedy.  The men in the story are depicted primarily as callous chauvinists or impotent followers, while the women personify forces of repressed rage and simmering resentment. Occasionally exaggerated and obvious, The Swallows nonetheless remains a timely story that reflects some current headlines in this #MeToo era. It is a tale about how social media and technology can help disseminate rumors and exacerbate prejudicial views under the protection of anonymity. Lutz explores potential consequences for those seeking to preserve misogynistic traditions when their victims are compelled to fight back as their voices remain unheard. A departure from her more light-hearted Spellman Series, this new novel will garner plenty of attention from Lutz’s fans who may (or may not be) pleased by this more serious release.

Good for: Fans of Lisa Lutz (Spellman series and The Passenger); suspense tales with academic settings; strong female protagonists; contemporary themes; #MeToo topics

You may like this book if you liked: The Secret History, Donna Tartt; A Separate Peace, John Knowles; Little Tales of Misogyny, Patricia Highsmith; The Secret Place, Tana French; Misogyny: the New Activism, Gail Ukockis

Thanks to the author, NetGalley and Ballantine Books for an advance copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.

Alex Witt left a position at a prestigious boarding school under mysterious circumstances to come to the near-bottom-of-the-barrel Stonebridge Academy - which, I'm sorry, but are there really boarding schools that have as bleak a reputation as this on? Graduates are described as barely getting into decent schools, if any. Sorry, side bar.

Witt is quick to discern that underneath the usual prep school atmosphere nonsense that there's something wrong with the culture of the students. Forced into teaching creative writing, she finds the answers to a routine questionnaire troubling, full of references to oral sex, objectification, and something called 'the Darkroom'.

Searching for answers she inspires students Gemma and Norman, and others, to act against the toxic culture of silence and manipulation. Additionally, faculty member and aspiring novelist Finn Ford provides perspective.

The reaction against a regressive and dangerous culture in a school setting made me think about 'Lucifer With a Book', but that may have just been shared boarding school genre tropes. This had a really great pace, and is much more than a #metoo novel. I would have liked to hear more from some of the other students - but that may have interfered with the great pace I just mentioned.

It was interesting that this had a Vermont setting, since I live in Vermont and border a community with a prep school - but I didn't find much resonance there. Again, if there's a weakness to the book it's that the chosen point-of-view characters are interesting, but other than Witt herself, they don't shed much light on the broader community of the school.