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3.58 AVERAGE
3.58 AVERAGE
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
It's difficult to articulate what makes this a great book, which of course is exactly what makes a book great. I've read this a few times before, and I still don't think I'm fully ready to perceive it. It's the kind of book that unfolds in layers, and you have to understand one layer before you can even recognize that another one is there to begin trying to understand. Yes, this is a book about teenage angst. Yes, it's about an unlikeable character you're challenged to sympathize with. Yes, it's about the trauma of loss. And so the layers go, and keep going. The last time I read this book, I had it tagged as "made me cry" because, like many others, I was intensely moved by the title passage (on page 173 in my edition). It's without a doubt the crux of the book, but it's impossible to fully absorb without reading the entire book, and it's a keyhole through which many different interpretations of the book can be seen.
The last time I read it, I cried because it reminded me of someone close to me, who's always struggled to "make it" in the real world, the adult world, but has the biggest heart you can imagine. And I thought that maybe that's all this person really wanted to be, deep down, a catcher in the rye. A helper, a guardian, who watched everybody else go through life, succeeding in their own baffling, mysterious way, seeking an alien kind of happiness through alien means, and just observing, standing at the edge and catching people, lest their haphazard comings and goings bring them too close to the precipice they couldn't see.
This time when I read it, intentionally expecting and suppressing the intense dislike and disapproval I knew I'd have for Holden, I walked away with a different interpretation. That the trauma of the loss of his little brother so permeated and stunted his life that he could never move beyond that moment. That all he could imagine himself ever doing was reliving a moment in which he could have prevented such loss, that maybe he could wrap his arms around the whole world and prevent anybody else from experiencing that same loss.
I'm sure the next time I read it, I'll explore a new layer, and walk away with a new interpretation. Maybe one day I'll be the parent of an angsty teenager, instead of the angsty teenager I once was when I first read this book. My, what a different reading experience it'll be then!
That's what makes a great book great. Not necessarily "strong story" or "strong plot" or "strong characters", but a labyrinth of stories all encoded into the same shared set of words, to be read differently by different people all at different stages in life.
The last time I read it, I cried because it reminded me of someone close to me, who's always struggled to "make it" in the real world, the adult world, but has the biggest heart you can imagine. And I thought that maybe that's all this person really wanted to be, deep down, a catcher in the rye. A helper, a guardian, who watched everybody else go through life, succeeding in their own baffling, mysterious way, seeking an alien kind of happiness through alien means, and just observing, standing at the edge and catching people, lest their haphazard comings and goings bring them too close to the precipice they couldn't see.
This time when I read it, intentionally expecting and suppressing the intense dislike and disapproval I knew I'd have for Holden, I walked away with a different interpretation. That the trauma of the loss of his little brother so permeated and stunted his life that he could never move beyond that moment. That all he could imagine himself ever doing was reliving a moment in which he could have prevented such loss, that maybe he could wrap his arms around the whole world and prevent anybody else from experiencing that same loss.
I'm sure the next time I read it, I'll explore a new layer, and walk away with a new interpretation. Maybe one day I'll be the parent of an angsty teenager, instead of the angsty teenager I once was when I first read this book. My, what a different reading experience it'll be then!
That's what makes a great book great. Not necessarily "strong story" or "strong plot" or "strong characters", but a labyrinth of stories all encoded into the same shared set of words, to be read differently by different people all at different stages in life.
funny
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
mysterious
tense
fast-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
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
funny
lighthearted
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
When you are passed your teenage years, you seek other plots than one in this story. However it's nice to see the world from rebellious teenage perspective, described with all-over-the-place language
medium-paced
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
love the writing. good classic to start with if you’re looking to get into classics.
** 3.5 rounded down**
Not much to say it was enjoyable. Holden got some work to do tho
Not much to say it was enjoyable. Holden got some work to do tho
Chiquito pero con big emotions. Pienso que me hubiera gustado otro final, una revelación de por qué es de la manera que es, por qué no quiere volver a casa con sus papás, etc. pero también entiendo que es solo un adolescente y eso lo explica todo. Igual me quedo levemente insatisfecha.