The Incendiaries

This novel’s language turns me utterly present, each breath and the surface of my skin attuned to the words. It’s a rare piece of writing that gives me this feeling, but in Kwon’s hands, every sentence–down to the syllables and commas–is deliberate, artfully chosen.

The result–which took her ten years–is soaring, exhalant, and musical. One of her characters is a former virtuoso concert pianist, and I can’t help but think reading Kwon is like being overcome by a brilliant piece of music, not one note out of place.  

This novel is a masterclass in unreliable narration. It follows Will, a young man estranged from his family and religion, as he attends college and falls in love with Phoebe.

As Will takes over and narrates his recollections of their relationship, Phoebe’s friendship with a man named John Leal, and her inculcation into a religious cult, he becomes increasingly untrustworthy. Will rails against John Leal, his lies, and the damage he has done to Phoebe, revealing his complicity in toxic masculinity and his own harmful actions.

Kwon renders her characters as entirely believable, frightening people, in lyrical and considered prose.

Told with lyrical, freewheeling assurance, this campus novel-meets-love story-meets meditation on fanaticism is a short, sharp read that tells the story of Phoebe and Will, whose lives collide and then break apart when Phoebe joins a secretive cult bent on enacting faith-based violence. We spend most of the time in Will’s head, as he carefully recreates the tragic timeline to try to understand Phoebe’s heart and grapple with the long legacy of loss. 

This powerful novel involves a young man, Will, who falls in love with a woman named Phoebe in college in Upstate New York. Phoebe is indoctrinated into a religious cult that ends up bombing several buildings, killing five people. Phoebe then disappears, and Will becomes intent on finding her, wanting to figure out her involvement in the terrorist acts. The story’s propulsive and electric, diving into everything from first love to religion to politics. It’s also a personal story. R. O. Kwon herself was, as she phrases it, “a Jesus freak,” though she lost her faith in high school.

Grieving and guilt-ridden, a college student and her reluctant boyfriend are drawn into a secretive fundamentalist cult. For Phoebe Lin, the cult is a place of healing from all that she has lost in her life. When the group commits an act of violence in the name of faith, her boyfriend must grapple with the fanaticism that has claimed his girlfriend. Kwon’s writing is luminous, and the devils in this book are very real.