Book Review: Elephant

Elephant by Natalie Rodriguez is a coming of age story about Matty Smith who went through inexplicable experiences that left him mentally unstable. There has been a tragedy in his family that he couldn’t remember. Then, a mysterious accident leaves him hospitalized. Not knowing the truth, he only has his own grandmother and friends to enlighten him, except they kept the truth from him. With unsettled mind, incessant attacks of anxiety, depression, and PTSD occupy his daily life, and the vagueness of the series of unfortunate events that happened to him isn’t helping. Will he find out the truth for himself? And if he does, will the truth make him suffer more?

When I read the book, I had no background of the author - didn’t know if it this was her debut novel, didn’t know what connections she had, didn’t know a thing about her, except that she wrote the book. Then when I started reading, I was instantly captivated by the writing style. I thought, this couldn’t be her first novel. The vividness of details and descriptions and the metaphors in her narrative made me pause for a while and check out her background. Then I found out she’s in the entertainment industry and that she was an award-winning writer and filmmaker! And that explained why it didn’t make me feel like I was reading a book - it felt more like I was watching a movie.

This book has mixed vibes – a cross between Christopher Pike and Stephen King. Screen-wise, it was like Black Mirror that didn’t revolve around technology. Truth is, it didn’t feel like it was written by a girl. It was hard to understand because of all the weird things happening, but it was one of those books where you just had to keep reading even if you were clueless about it. All the actions and emotions seemed like they were real, and almost as if the author experienced them herself. You could easily tell she has good visualizations while writing the book. In fact, this is a story that will be more appreciated as a movie, or a television series.

Overall, I’m giving this 5 out of 5 stars. The storyline was insane, but I couldn’t stop reading because I had to find out the missing pieces. This psychological suspense and mystery drama would probably be more appreciated by male readers, or those who are interested in mind-boggling stories. I’ve had a rollercoaster ride of emotions in reading this and you will too. Warning: there are no rainbows, unicorns, and butterflies in this story.