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have_you_read_this's review against another edition
5.0
"The story centres around two old people from North London. Both have 90 years of (mis)adventure, guilt and shame behind them, and yet in the frailty of their remaining years they are able to find something that resembles love." - Full review on Have You Read This
thunderhead's review against another edition
3.0
I really enjoyed the character development in this one but ultimately found the overall story a bit patchy and disjointed leaving me with more questions than answers at the end.
homicidal_potato's review
2.0
Might have been better to read this one as physical book as the narration of the audiobook made it hard to tell the characters apart.
kenzieleckie_'s review
Couldn’t get into this book. Too many POVs to keep track of and just felt lost. May return to it in the future but as of now I didn’t find it interesting.
annarella's review
2.0
I DNFed it at 30%. It's either confusing or really complex and I wasn't able to grab the meaning and connect to the characters.
At the end of the day I think it's a matter of taste and expectations, mine were something witty and this book seemed deadly serious to me, and this wasn't my cup of tea.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine
At the end of the day I think it's a matter of taste and expectations, mine were something witty and this book seemed deadly serious to me, and this wasn't my cup of tea.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine
sumitbhagat's review against another edition
3.0
Every year when I travel all the way to Jaipur for the Literature Festival, I travel with no expectations but one - to discover a new author by some stroke of perchance or serendipity. And if my past experience were to bear any witness, in the process of that discovery, you not only come back with a new name, you also inherit a new person, a new idea, a new way of looking at the world. I can't thank the festival enough for introducing me to Jhumpa Lahiri, Andre Aciman, and now, Howard Jacobsen.
Howard Jacobsen took my fancy when he was a part of a larger panel on fiction (as told by my friends) and later on travel (which I personally bore witness to). Every time the mic was handed over to him, he was either very funny or very deep. More often than not, he was both. I was instantly a fan. Off I rushed to the book stall and to my dismay ended up finding neither his Booker prize winning work 'The Finkler Question' nor the 2014 shortlist 'J' there. Apparently, everything had been sold out the previous day. As a drifted across the book stall, heartbroken, I chanced upon a slightly torn copy of his latest book - 'Live a Little' on a random aisle. With a cover like that and the lovely premise, my joy knew no bounds.
Live a Little is a story of two individuals falling in love at the absolute twilight of their lives. Beryl Dusinberry is 99, Shimi Carmelli is 91. And yet, here they are on Finchley Road, falling in love, slowly, but surely. To be honest, I didn't enjoy the book so much when I started with it. Jacobsen's language initially reminded me of Joseph Conrad in its complexity and vocabulary, in that I had to look at the thesaurus often which broke my chain of thought. But once you are drawn into the story, it makes for a wonderful reading.
I found Shimi's character much more layered and interesting, and Jacobsen's writing does carry that wit, if only in a darkly comic way. Sometimes you would chuckle to yourself, and often you would be moved. I can't quite say I could feel for Shimi or Beryl, or completely connect to them, but the way Jacobsen builds his characters, there was definitely this neutral space in which I felt I knew them closely.
My only grouse with the story is that it builds up slowly and then moves too fast. I just couldn't help but compare it to 'A Man Called Ove' (due to the similarity of premise), and anything, when compared to A Man Called Ove is bound to end up falling short of your expectations at some level of the other.
To be fair, Howard Jacobsen as an author grows on you. I wasn't quite sure of him when I started, but by the time I finished this book, I fell in love with his writing. I think Live a Little shows the promise of his writing that may have once blossomed in A Finkler Question or J. That being said Live a Little shines in its own light in reminding us that love finds a way if we are open enough to embrace it, irrespective who or where we are.
Howard Jacobsen took my fancy when he was a part of a larger panel on fiction (as told by my friends) and later on travel (which I personally bore witness to). Every time the mic was handed over to him, he was either very funny or very deep. More often than not, he was both. I was instantly a fan. Off I rushed to the book stall and to my dismay ended up finding neither his Booker prize winning work 'The Finkler Question' nor the 2014 shortlist 'J' there. Apparently, everything had been sold out the previous day. As a drifted across the book stall, heartbroken, I chanced upon a slightly torn copy of his latest book - 'Live a Little' on a random aisle. With a cover like that and the lovely premise, my joy knew no bounds.
Live a Little is a story of two individuals falling in love at the absolute twilight of their lives. Beryl Dusinberry is 99, Shimi Carmelli is 91. And yet, here they are on Finchley Road, falling in love, slowly, but surely. To be honest, I didn't enjoy the book so much when I started with it. Jacobsen's language initially reminded me of Joseph Conrad in its complexity and vocabulary, in that I had to look at the thesaurus often which broke my chain of thought. But once you are drawn into the story, it makes for a wonderful reading.
I found Shimi's character much more layered and interesting, and Jacobsen's writing does carry that wit, if only in a darkly comic way. Sometimes you would chuckle to yourself, and often you would be moved. I can't quite say I could feel for Shimi or Beryl, or completely connect to them, but the way Jacobsen builds his characters, there was definitely this neutral space in which I felt I knew them closely.
My only grouse with the story is that it builds up slowly and then moves too fast. I just couldn't help but compare it to 'A Man Called Ove' (due to the similarity of premise), and anything, when compared to A Man Called Ove is bound to end up falling short of your expectations at some level of the other.
To be fair, Howard Jacobsen as an author grows on you. I wasn't quite sure of him when I started, but by the time I finished this book, I fell in love with his writing. I think Live a Little shows the promise of his writing that may have once blossomed in A Finkler Question or J. That being said Live a Little shines in its own light in reminding us that love finds a way if we are open enough to embrace it, irrespective who or where we are.
katherinenzr's review
4.0
LIVE A LITTLE is the story of two nonagenarians looking back on their lives, and realizing that despite their age they still have a lot of life left. The narrative is somewhat disjointed, as one character struggles to remember her past in the order it happened. The storytelling is delicious, and I couldn't put it down. A definite must read for the fall!
blvrns's review
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0