WINNER OF THE 2019 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR FICTION NATIONAL BESTSELLER “Electrifying” (People) * “Masterly” (The Guardian) * “Dramatic and memorable” (The New Yorker) * “Magic” (TIME) * “Ingenious” (The Financial Times) * “A gonzo literary performance” (Entertainment Weekly) * “Rare and splendid” (The Boston Globe) * “Remarkable” (USA Today) * “Delicious” (The New York Times) * “Book groups, … Weekly) * “Rare and splendid” (The Boston Globe) * “Remarkable” (USA Today) * “Delicious” (The New York Times) * “Book groups, meet your next selection” (NPR)
In an American suburb in the early 1980s, students at a highly competitive performing arts high school struggle and thrive in a rarified bubble, ambitiously pursuing music, movement, Shakespeare, and, particularly, their acting classes. When within this striving “Brotherhood of the Arts,” two freshmen, David and Sarah, fall headlong into love, their passion does not go unnoticed–or untoyed with–by anyone, especially not by their charismatic acting teacher, Mr. Kingsley.
The outside world of family life and economic status, of academic pressure and of their future adult lives, fails to penetrate this school’s walls–until it does, in a shocking spiral of events that catapults the action forward in time and flips the premise upside-down. What the reader believes to have happened to David and Sarah and their friends is not entirely true–though it’s not false, either. It takes until the book’s stunning coda for the final piece of the puzzle to fall into place–revealing truths that will resonate long after the final sentence.
As captivating and tender as it is surprising, Susan Choi’s Trust Exercise will incite heated conversations about fiction and truth, and about friendships and loyalties, and will leave readers with wiser understandings of the true capacities of adolescents and of the powers and responsibilities of adults.
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As soon as I finished . . . [I was] desperate to talk about the novel with anyone else who’d read it. A startling, perplexing, fascinating book by a writer I’ve long been―and will always be―eager to read.
Trust Exercise is a brilliant and challenging novel, an uncanny evocation of the not-so-distant past that turns into a meditation on the slipperiness of memory and the ethics of storytelling. Susan Choi is a masterful novelist, who understands exactly where we are right now and how we got here.
Packed with the kind of shrewd psychological insights that make you sit up straighter, Trust Exercise is a frequently brilliant novel that draws you in slowly and carefully and then becomes increasingly hard to put down. I don’t want to give too much away, so all I’ll say is that the book is full of twists that are thrilling without being manipulative or melodramatic. I am sure I am far from the only one who had to put aside everything else while I raced to the end.
An ingenious, morally complex exploration of how our youthful entanglements, cruelties, and traumas shape the rest of our lives. Choi’s writing is dazzling in its control and precision; this witty, sharp, unsettling novel grabs you and won’t let you go.
Wow. Way to turn a book on its head. I liked the first part, it was filled with quirky characters in an intense, clique-y, incestuous world. And then, the second part blew it all up. The second half of the book was astonishing.
In America in the early 1980’s, students at an exclusive arts school, and in particular a freshman named Sarah, navigate the pitfalls of high school. Sounds like a simple premise for a novel, one explored in many ways. However, Trust Exercise by Susan Choi does interesting things with formatting and basic structure. It won great acclaim and received scathing reviews.
For me, the multi-layered novel forced me to think of things differently.
Readers begin in this exclusive arts school where nothing is as important as ART. We meet the seemingly brilliant Mr. Kingsley and learn some of his teaching methods. His students labor to elevate themselves and win recognition. A traveling troupe from England brings a different perspective.
But none of it is as simple as that. But then again, are first loves, friendships, coming to understand oneself, or even objectively and honestly examining memories ever simple?
The title refers to a theatre technique, but also it feels like a description. The reader must trust the author to tell the story in an understandable way, and the author must trust the reader will bring an open mind to the story.
I gave this book a 3 because I don’t know what I just read. I was confused the whole way through. It was confusing, but interesting? Like why was I intrigued? Some parts kept me interested and some parts I fell asleep. This was just weird.
I am not sure what I just read. I haven’t stopped thinking about it since I read it. I am not really sure whose story was true and whose wasn’t.
I loved everything about it—the language, the characters, but mostly I loved the conceit of the thing, the structure, which I can’t really explain without unacceptable spoilers. It reminded me of another recent favorite, Asymmetry: both narratives are pulled taught by an urgent mystery, not about the plot but about the nature of the novel itself, of storytelling, of point of view. This is pretty meta, which for me means there’s a fine line between exalted and abysmal; I think most meta novels plummet off the wrong side of that cliff. Not Trust Exercise.
Wow. This was really an interesting book. It is intellectually rigorous as well as original, thoughtful, observant and timely. The points of view (3 I believe) tell stories that overlap, repeat and advance and retreat in time.
The story of Sarah and David in the beginning is a cutting description of high school – for kids highly talented in the arts. The conflict isn’t immediately set up, but by the second section this work of art becomes one that really engages the reader in thought. I highly recommend.
An intelligent and gripping novel that highlights the ways in which we can carelessly impact the lives of others and the ways that figures we trust can let us down. I’ll say no more lest I spoil anything – but the dramatic shift halfway through was brilliant!
This novel is a work of genius and should be a future classic. It has the most audacious narrative shift I’ve read since John Fowles’s The Collector. Plus, it includes the phrase ‘a virtuoso feeling-state lasagna.
What a wickedly clever, formally inventive book Trust Exercise is. I was blown away by Susan Choi’s literary vision, not to mention her sensitivity and wit.