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3.75 AVERAGE
3.75 AVERAGE
I'm finally done reading this blasted book. It's not a bad book. It's more of a "Brussels sprouts" book. I felt like it was good for me, and I ought to read it, but I didn't particularly enjoy it. There were some clever plot lines, but some of it was a bit too absurd for my taste. My biggest issue was that I have never taken a philosophy class and felt the need to understand and remember all the philosophers and philosophies woven into the book. It seemed more like work than pleasure. And yet, there were several passages I underlined, a few I quoted on social media. There are parts of this book that will stick with me and affect how I think about the world. Isn't that the hallmark of a really good book?
adventurous
challenging
funny
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
challenging
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
N/A
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I registered a book at BookCrossing.com!
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/11231286
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/11231286
Wanted to read this book when I was around 18 years old but never came around to it. Read it now to see what I missed. I truly would have loved it at that age. Still a good read now. But more for the opportunity to think who would I have been if I read it then? Who am I really?
I think if I had discovered this book when I was twelve I would've devoured it voraciously, given it five stars, and carried it with me always like a personal paperback bible for awhile. It's a great gift for any young, inquisitive, precocious kid who loves to read and asks a lot of open-ended questions.
I stumbled across this book randomly at a used bookshop in Canyon Country (Santa Clarita, CA) on a roadtrip to Joshua Tree back in April. I picked this book up and down throughout the last four months and finally finished it late-July.
I wouldn't call it a page-turner. It's really two books in one. It's fictitious-fantasy (entertainment) and factual-history (education).
The beginning of the novel was heavily focused on history lessons of specific philosophers and time periods so at times the storyline fell flat and the influx of historical information: names, dates and ideologies one after the other felt dense for my brain-head (first half). Not much happens other than history lessons and the prose are not the main pinnacle or purpose of this book per se.
Towards the end it gets interesting plot wise with the characters and I found myself wishing there were more philosophical pages on absurdists for example. The ideologies of philosophers and schools of thought are purely introductory and give the reader a nice big picture, overview. The words aren't difficult to read, but I'd approach each chapter like a 7th grade history class...just take it in a chapter at a time, over many weeks and let the lessons marinate over the weekends.
Would I read this book again cover to cover? No. However, in the words of Maria Popova, "Literature is the original Internet – every footnote, every citation, every allusion is essentially a hyperlink to another text, to another mind."
Jostein Gaarder's book has gifted readers with plenty of fun cliffs to jump off and who knows where we will fly (or fall) off to next.
I stumbled across this book randomly at a used bookshop in Canyon Country (Santa Clarita, CA) on a roadtrip to Joshua Tree back in April. I picked this book up and down throughout the last four months and finally finished it late-July.
I wouldn't call it a page-turner. It's really two books in one. It's fictitious-fantasy (entertainment) and factual-history (education).
The beginning of the novel was heavily focused on history lessons of specific philosophers and time periods so at times the storyline fell flat and the influx of historical information: names, dates and ideologies one after the other felt dense for my brain-head (first half). Not much happens other than history lessons and the prose are not the main pinnacle or purpose of this book per se.
Towards the end it gets interesting plot wise with the characters and I found myself wishing there were more philosophical pages on absurdists for example. The ideologies of philosophers and schools of thought are purely introductory and give the reader a nice big picture, overview. The words aren't difficult to read, but I'd approach each chapter like a 7th grade history class...just take it in a chapter at a time, over many weeks and let the lessons marinate over the weekends.
Would I read this book again cover to cover? No. However, in the words of Maria Popova, "Literature is the original Internet – every footnote, every citation, every allusion is essentially a hyperlink to another text, to another mind."
Jostein Gaarder's book has gifted readers with plenty of fun cliffs to jump off and who knows where we will fly (or fall) off to next.
informative
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
I tried to read and actually listened to the abridged
informative
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
informative
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated