The Infinite Noise was pretty much what I expected, as a fan of the podcast. I loved the look into Caleb and Adam’s respective relationships with their families; you got the sense that they had nice families from the podcast but you actually get to see them interact and their moms in particular were lovely. Also, getting to see the development of their relationship purely from their perspectives was great.
My only criticism is that The Infinite Noise is more of a companion to the podcast than a standalone novel/adaptation--there are parts that overlap with scenes from the podcast (whenever Caleb is with Dr. Bright following their first session) that assume you’ve already listened to the conversation that took place and so skips over it with lines like “I explain what happened.” On the one hand, it’s fine, because it means I’m not reading the exact same material over again, but on the other someone reading the book without any prior knowledge of The Bright Sessions might feel like it’s lazy writing.
Perfectly okay that it’s a companion piece, but it’s undoubtedly going to draw in new people who’ve never heard of The Bright Sessions and I feel like they might be let down.
My only criticism is that The Infinite Noise is more of a companion to the podcast than a standalone novel/adaptation--there are parts that overlap with scenes from the podcast (whenever Caleb is with Dr. Bright following their first session) that assume you’ve already listened to the conversation that took place and so skips over it with lines like “I explain what happened.” On the one hand, it’s fine, because it means I’m not reading the exact same material over again, but on the other someone reading the book without any prior knowledge of The Bright Sessions might feel like it’s lazy writing.
Perfectly okay that it’s a companion piece, but it’s undoubtedly going to draw in new people who’ve never heard of The Bright Sessions and I feel like they might be let down.