The Book of Speculation

I am so torn about Erika Swyler's Book of Speculation.  It hits a lot of the right notes for me: magical realism, circus, mermaids.  It has beautiful lush language.  But.... the dual stories were boring. And I didn't ultimately care.  And I could see the ending coming from 250 pages away.

Simon receives a book that chronicles some of his ancestor's life. He is convinced that the curse he discovers will put his younger sister, Enola, at risk.  He believes she may try to commit suicide within days if the familial cycle holds true.

But nope. I didn't care. I didn't care about Amos and Evangeline (but I did love their names).  I didn't care about Enola and Doyle. I just didn't care. I think there are some truly beautiful language and perhaps I need to celebrate that instead?

"There's a danger with books. Text often breeds a notion of infallibility. It's easy for someone like you or me to get lost in an object, to accept certain ideas as fact without proper exploration." (180)

"We carry our families like anchors, rooting us in storms, making sure we never rift from where and who we are. We carry our families within us the way we carry our breath underwater, keeping us afloat, keeping us alive." (330)  

"There are things you do for people you've known your whole life.  You let them save you, you put them in your books and you let each other begin again, clean." (339)