This book is the story of a name, or several options for a name, really. A family needs to register the birth of a baby boy in 1980s England, and so they have to pick a name. What to choose? The options are: Gordon, a family name passed down through generations and preferred by the boy’s father; Julian, a perfectly nice name that nevertheless breaks with tradition, as preferred by his mother; Bear, a cute but decidedly quirky name selected by his sister. The book proceeds in three parallel time lines, with the life of the family dramatically altered by this seemingly harmless decision. In other words, this is the story of nominative determinism brought to life.

I find the concept of nominative determinism utterly fascinating. There’s even some empirical evidence to suggest it’s a real world phenomenon: people named Dennis are disproportionately represented in the ranks of dentists, for example, and the Commonwealth of Virginia has more residents named Virginia than random chance would expect, and so forth.

In broad strokes there are two ways to think about this phenomenon. One is somewhat mystical, and suggests that there is something essential about the meaning of the name that imbues itself in the personality of its owner. This logic shows up over and over in the Torah, though usually in reverse: Jacob struggles with an angel, therefore he gains a new name which means “struggles with G-d”, and so on.

The other approach to nominative determinism is more logical, and suggests that names produce social reactions, and the owner’s life is in turn impacted by the environment those reactions produce. For example, people named Virginia are more likely to hear nice things about the southern commonwealth, therefore they are more likely to move there. It’s pretty easy to spin all sorts of stories like that.

I find the mystical paradigm a lot more interesting and inherently mysterious. Alas, this book is decidedly in the logical camp.

The boy’s father (Gordon Sr.) has dramatically different reactions to each name across the various storyline. Those reactions in turn produce sharply different outcomes for the family, decades into the future, which is really the point of the whole book. In order to logically justify such widely varying reactions, the author has to make Gordon Sr. into a monstrously controlling, abusive villain. It’s something of a boring choice, because it’s so easy to root for the other characters and to hate the father. That choice extends to the other characters, who are largely unproblematic, minimally-flawed people.

With all that said, I enjoyed the story and wanted to see it unfold, even though it was pretty clear early on: the Bear story is the happy one; the Julian story is the troubled, meditative one; and the Gordon story is the grim and depressing one. There is a missed opportunity to explore the glorious mystery of naming in all its complexity, but it’s still a pretty decent read.