Alexander Maksik - You Deserve Nothing

Rating: 5/5

Review:
Brilliantly insightful

I thought this was a fantastic book. I wouldn't normally have bothered with it because I didn't like the sound of it at all - it has an off-putting title, it is set among wealthy teenagers in an American International School and has a plot synopsis which sounds like Dead Poets Society written by a French existentialist - but I am lucky that a friend whose judgement I trust recommended it to me. It turned out to be one of the best-written, most thoughtful and most intellectually and emotionally engaging books I have read for a long time, and I found myself as gripped by it as by a really good thriller.

The story is of an inspirational teacher and his relationships with his students. Alexander Maksik manages to make this both fresh and enthralling. He tells the story through three first-person narratives, the teacher himself and two of his students, one male and one female. All three voices are brilliantly done: distinctive, convincing and with real insight into their characters, and every character in the book is wholly believable. I thought he showed exceptional insight into the sheer thrill of being an inspiring teacher and into being a thoughtful 17-year-old with that nagging sense that other people have the answers but you don't. What really makes the book stand out, though, is the way the characters wrestle with ideas, idealism, the tension between what you want to be and what you find you can be, and the difference between our public faces and private interiors. I found this utterly riveting and extremely moving in places.

The prose is excellent. It is readable, unfussy and unpretentious, and sometimes very affecting. It would be too much of a spoiler to say exactly why, but in context I physically winced at the sentence "Then I heard the toilet flush, the deep groaning of liquid being sucked down into the bowels of the building." The book is peppered with unobtrusive gems of wit or insight, and Maksik also paints a subtle portrait of an institution which, very recognisably, professes to care deeply for its students but regards weekly sessions with a stranger who has recently done a brief counselling course as far more valuable than genuine human companionship and warmth.

Even if you can't bear the idea of reading about wealthy American teenagers in Paris, are allergic to French existentialists and shudder at the thought of a school-set book, I would urge you to give this book a try. I have a lot of sympathy with all those views but I thought it was absolutely outstanding. Very warmly recommended.