Aquarium

by David Vann

A lyrical and moving new novel from the author of Legend of a Suicide.

Twelve-year-old Caitlin lives alone with her mother -a docker at the local container port - in subsidized housing next to an airport in Seattle. Each day, while she waits to be picked up after school, Caitlin visits the local aquarium to study the fish. Gazing at the creatures within the watery depths, Caitlin accesses a shimmering universe beyond her own. When she befriends an old man at the tanks one day, who seems as enamoured of the fish as she, Caitlin cracks open a dark family secret and propels her once-blissful relationship with her mother toward a precipice of terrifying consequence.

In crystalline, chiselled yet graceful prose, Aquarium takes us into the heart of a brave young girl whose longing for love and capacity for forgiveness transforms the damaged people around her. Relentless and heart-breaking, primal and redemptive, Aquarium is a transporting story from one of the best American writers of our time.

• ISBN10: 0434023337
• ISBN13: 9780434023332
• Publish Date: 5 March 2015 (first published 1 January 2015)
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 10 August 2021
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Cornerstone
• Imprint: William Heinemann Ltd
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 272
• Language: English

Reviews

[Amber (The Literary Phoenix)]

This book is at once extremely well-written, and extremely disturbing. The characters are rounded and troubled and struggling with all the depths of their souls. I deeply disliked listening to this book, but I just had to keep listening because I needed to see if something better came for Caitlin.

I’m not going to tell you if something better came or not. You’ll just have to read this book. Content warnings: sexual descriptions, child abuse (physical and emotional), underage sexual relationships, trauma, elder abuse (physical and mental), homophobia. Even without having triggers from any of these things, this book was unbelievably hard to stomach. Caitlin’s relationship with her mother, in particular, was incredibly difficult to read. There was about 10%-20% in the middle that made me want to stop reading. This is not the kind of content I want to read recreationally. But these stories, no matter how difficult, need to be told. Not every story can be shiny and beautiful.

The way David Vann writes is evocative and detailed. His storytelling – however heartbreaking – is incredibly good. I wish I had started with a different book, because I genuinely hated this one. I didn’t want to hate it, because there were breaths and moments that were beautiful amongst the trauma. Humans are not perfect. Life is not a fairytale. More than any of those things, Aquarium reminded me that I am immensely privileged.

I wish that David Vann had been a little less descriptive in some ways. While I liked the surface aspects of Caitlin and Shalini’s relationship, I really, really didn’t need to read the (abstract) descriptions of their encounters. There’s two definitive types of characters in this book – the immediate family (Caitlin and Sherri), and the outsiders who help the family as much as they can. There’s so much tension and fear between Caitlin and Sherri that while you want them to heal, it’s so heartbreaking and concerning to watch them, it’s difficult. I liked Shalini and Steve and Grandpa better, people on the outside who saw the pain and fracture and tried to help in whatever way they could.

All that said, because of the violence and the anger woven within the plot of this book, I find it’s a very difficult one to recommend. I think I respected it’s existence, but I didn’t like it. I would recommend finding something else written by David Vann and giving that a go, something less intense and disconcerting, I guess? I’m willing to try something else, but this definitely isn’t a book I’ll be re-reading.

[Michael @ Knowledge Lost]

Caitlin is a twelve-year-old leaving with her mother in subsidised housing next to the Seattle airport. Every day after school she visits the local aquarium where she spends her time studying the fish. She dreams of becoming an ichthyologist when she grows up. One day she meets and befriends an old man by one of the fish tanks. This new friendship leads Caitlin to a dark family secret and causes her once blissful relationship with her mother to fracture.

I have great respect for David Vann as a writer; while I have only read Dirt previously, I have found his ability to write family dysfunction mesmerising. Dirt was a very uncomfortable read and when Goat Mountain was released in 2013 I was not emotionally prepared to tackle another Vann novel. Goat Mountain still sits on my shelf waiting for me but I could not resist picking up Aquarium and reading it.

David Vann frequently writes about the domestic life, exploring the way family members react to each other and often lead to arguments. Within Aquarium, Vann looks at how destructive secrets can be and how the suffering of a parent can greatly affect their children. Parents often have this idea that they need to protect their children from the horrors of the world, which is fair enough. However, what happens when a family secret comes out? In Aquarium, Caitlin’s mother is unable to handle the situation leaving her to try and navigate this big revolution alone.

Aquarium is a coming of age story of a twelve year old being thrust into adulthood and trying to navigate the world alone. Without the family drama, Caitlin has enough to worry about with the changes in hormones and her body. However do not confuse this with a young adult novel; David Vann tackles some dark themes (although this is more accessible than Dirt) and Caitlin is reflecting on the situation later in her life. This allows for a nice blend of maturity and naiveté to come through in the writing.

While this was not as dark as I expected, I think Aquarium is a great introduction to David Vann. I still need to read Goat Mountain, Caribou Island and Legend of a Suicide before I can give a more informed opinion but I recommend Aquarium if you want to try Vann out. If I compare this novel to Dirt, it is a light read about the family life but, in reality, it is a dark grim bildungsroman that deals with abuse and sexuality. Emotionally prepare yourself when going into a book like Aquarium; it is worth the journey.

This book review originally appeared on my blog; http://www.knowledgelost.org/literature/book-reviews/genre/contemporary/aquarium-by-david-vann/