Read This Book: ‘A Partial History of Lost Causes’

I didn’t expect to enjoy A Partial History of Lost Causes. Another debut novel by another up-and-coming young author? Sure. Right. So Gary Shteyngart blurbed it? All right, whatever, I’ll take a reader home. It sat on my shelf a while. Then one morning it was almost Christmas, I was getting on a plane to New York and I needed a thick book to keep me company. The generosity of the season filling my heart, I thought, What the heck. I grabbed it and dragged it through airport security.

At some point after that I understand I boarded a plane, that that plane took off, and that at some point I landed at La Guardia. I also understand that a whole Christmas holiday ensued, with family and turkey and presents and the whole bit. There are pictures of these latter episodes, so they must be true. But my head was elsewhere. My head was in Russia during the Cold War, and in modern Cambridge, MA. It was tucked neatly and happily away in the world of A Partial History of Lost Causes.

Much of the joy of this book is in the discovery of the twisting, turning lives of its characters, so I’ll try to sum it up without divulging too much. We have two characters, Irina and Aleksandr. Irina is a thirty year old woman living in Cambridge, MA, who has been diagnosed with Huntington’s Disease, the same degenerative illness which her father suffered and to which he ultimately succumbed. duBois takes us through Irina’s experience watching her father lose his physical and mental faculties, and draws up Irina’s fears about her own oncoming loss. Her grief and fear put her on a path towards Russia, and Aleksandr.

Aleksandr’s story begins in Leningrad in 1979, where he dreams of becoming a chess champion. Irina initially knows of Aleksandr because her father, an avid chess player, was a fan. We’re with Aleksandr as he moves into the world of Cold War era chess matches, and beyond into underground politics and the dangerous world of Russian politics under the reign of Vladimir Putin.

While I enjoyed Irina (and her condition certainly resonated, as I imagined the terror of losing my mental faculties), Aleksandr’s chapters were by far my favorite, if for no other reason than I learned a LOT about modern Russian history. I knew Putin was not someone I’d ever want to run into a dark alley, but yikes! I’m almost a little nervous to be typing this right now…..

This novel reads like a classic. A long list of characters, many of whom we’re allowed to know over a long period of time (if not their entire lives), intrigue, mystery, high stakes, death and love and the threat of Siberia – who needs vampires or hungry games? duBois has an undeniable talent for storytelling, and not just moving from point A to B in a coherent line; she manages a character’s internal monologue like a swift moving river, guiding us through their psyches, psychoses, heartbreaks and hopes to put us on a journey with an inevitable destination. If there are a few eddies where the water seems to swirl a while around Irina’s fears, the current can be trusted to carry you forward soon enough.

At nearly 400 pages, this is a book for people who (like me) enjoy sinking into a story with a broad scope and story lines that swoop into one another. I’m glad I didn’t let this novel get away.