A Puzzle Game

A Review about the Novel ‘Snake’ by Dewi Anggraeni.

Reading Dewi Anggraeni’s Snake is like playing the jigsaw puzzle game without knowing how the puzzle would be when it has already performed in full form at the end of the game. The excitement you’d have at first, the curiosity that pump up in your mind, and the challenging sensation that tingling in your minds for finishing the game.

And yes, likewise any puzzle games that touch your curiosity, so does this novel successfully done in building the heat of the story, well at least at the first parts of the novel. Enriched with the unique cultural elements of the East, by dissolving the exoticness of the East such as superstitions, unique customs as well as the meeting of the East culture and West culture – Serena, the central character of this novel, is described as a mix-blooded of a Chinese-Sundanese mother and an Australian father – make this novel is appealing and elicits the readers’ curiosity.

So, as the first page of the story within this novel is opened, the game then starts to begin. Pieces by pieces of puzzle are thrown everywhere and it’s the readers’ duty to collect those pieces one by one in order to make them a complete form. At first, it’s a very exciting game. As soon as you find the first pieces, which introduce you to the journey, you’ll begin to enjoy it. There is the description about Serena, a brief explanation about her life, a little touch about her love life and quite appealing sensations about the East culture in the first piece of the puzzle you’ll find. And then, as you continue the game, the next piece you’ll find will give you a little clue about how finally the puzzle would be then. It’s about the Snake brooch that Serena got and the mystery that surrounds it which would really attach your curiosity. You’ll then feel the sense of mystery which most likely is the most visible factor for you to keep on playing and enjoying your puzzle game.

However, as the story flows, as a player of this game you have to keep on searching for every single pieces of puzzle which are scattered around in order to make it a one finished work. Unfortunately, Dewi had made too many puzzle pieces and she had scattered them too far that makes the readers rather confused to collect them all along and to arrange them correctly. For instance, the pieces she made about the family ties and the long-winded description about minor characters who rather irrelevant and unimportant to the main picture of the novel. It seems like she has made too many unnecessary pieces, describing about unimportant details and forget her duty to emphasis the most important picture she wants the readers to see within the puzzle game she made. As a result of this, the pulse and excitement as well as the curiosity the readers had already have at the beginning of the game will beginning to decrease as they are forced to collect every single pieces, some of them are really confusing, in order to finish the game.

This is quite risky, however, if Dewi had wanted to create a puzzle full of mysterious journey, she ought to make it more intense. Even if she decided to make a huge number of puzzle pieces, each piece should contribute to shocking, relevant and important details of the picture so the readers would keep on searching for other pieces because each piece will attach them deeper and deeper to the game and deepening the excitement. By creating too many unnecessary and monotone details, not only is Dewi retarding the process of finding the puzzle pieces, but also forcing the readers to develop an extra patient if they want to finish the puzzle game.

Nothings would be matter then if the players of the puzzle game, in this case, the readers, are patient and persevering enough to work on the puzzle until the last pieces and see how it looks like at last. The rewards would be a beautiful picture that might be seen as a unique picture of the melting point and the exoticness between the East and the West. But that would never be happened and the picture would never be seen if the readers get too bored and impatient with the game. Instead of enjoying the beautiful picture, they’ll leave the game immediately.