Since the last time I posted, I have left London (sadness!) and moved up to my apartment at Central. I don’t know if I’m quite ready for another school year to begin, but it will begin all the same. However, I have finished quite a few books since I last posted about books on here. I read Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer, Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman, and The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood. Since I’ve been back in the US, I’ve also read The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kinsolver and The Bourne Supremacy by Robert Ludlum. I don’t think I’ll have time to review all these books to quite the extent that I usually do, but I will give a brief overview on what I thought of each one.
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close was an interesting read. It’s about a boy named Oskar who is left fatherless after September 11th, and all he has left of his father are a few voice mail messages and a key. So he sets out to find out what the key unlocks. Oksar’s whole journey is actually quite an interesting one, and the way it’s told is different than what I’ve seen before. Foer reveals information in an interesting way, and after looking back on it, I think I rather enjoyed it. I think it would definitely be worth reading again, because I’m sure that there were things that I missed.
Neverwhere was an interesting book as well. It’s about a man named Richard Mayhew who accidentally gets thrown into the strange world of London Below all because of a good deed he performed. Now he has to figure out how to get back. I think what I loved most about reading this book was the fact that I was reading in London, so when Gaiman would mention places in London, I would know what he was talking about. I loved it! The story was pretty good as well, even if it was a little predictable at the end. I still thought it was a pretty good book.
The Handmaid’s Tale is a dystopian novel about a future where we’ve reverted back to life without technology. Offred is a handmaid that prays that she become pregnant, because if she doesn’t, the punishment could be severe. Throughout the novel, Offred learns what the world has really become, and she wants desperately to try and get out. It’s kind of a scary read because this is something that could happen in our future, which is something that is chilling about all dystopian novels. The fact that they could actually happen in our lifetime.
The Poisonwood Bible is about a family that goes to Africa on mission work. It’s a family of a father, mother, and their four daughters, with a controlling, almost emotionally abusive father. The book chronicles what happens to them in their time in Africa, and what happens to them while they grow up and how going to Africa changed their lives. I enjoyed it because it was an interesting look at what happens both in missionary life and after, and how it alters the lives of the children who are taken along with their parents. It raises a lot of good points, and would be a great book for discussion in a book club or something.
The Bourne Supremacy was way different than the movie. Not only does Bourne know different information than he does in the movie, the whole novel takes place in Asia rather than in Europe. It’s crazy how different the two are, actually. There aren’t many similarities between the two besides the characters that are in both of them. I can’t even really say which of the two I liked better because they are so different. I will just have to enjoy them separately, I guess.
Well, there were go! I’m now all caught up on my reading over the summer. 🙂 Now that school’s starting, I probably won’t have all that much free time for reading, but I will definitely try to squeeze it in when I can. Until next time, happy reading! 🙂