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4.07 AVERAGE
4.07 AVERAGE
This is one of the best books I've ever read. I'm seriously sitting here wondering how Ann-Marie MacDonald isn't one of the most famous authors of our time. I will definitely be reading Fall on Your Knees in the near future.
It's absolutely heart-wrenching, and you will need to put it down a few times to calm yourself, but it is brilliantly written. The characters are so well developed and the setting is so vivid. I loved every moment in these 810 pages.
It's absolutely heart-wrenching, and you will need to put it down a few times to calm yourself, but it is brilliantly written. The characters are so well developed and the setting is so vivid. I loved every moment in these 810 pages.
challenging
dark
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Set as a cold war story, this is mostly a tragic family saga where a once happy family struggles with little white lies and questions not asked. It was a very different time during the 50,s and 60,s and this depicts that very well. Meanwhile another tragidy happens when a local child dies, and how is the other story connected to that? This book is divided into 5 big parts, with their own chwpters, and while I didn't feel much for the 4th part, I do recommend this book. It was tragic but also intruiging to read!
The writing is beautiful, the characters are so perfectly developed... there are some incredible things about this book. BUT... the lead up to anything actually beginning is about HALF of this very long book (my edition also had TINY text, which didn't help matters!). It was difficult to keep on reading. Then it got GOOD. Couldn't put it down. Then it got predictable. Some books you think you're supposed to "get it" before the characters do, but I wasn't sure it was intentional here. With Fall on Your Knees it was an "Oh my god, NOOO!" moment. Not so with this one. And then that was it, done.
There is reallly a lot to like about this book, and I hate to give it a bad rating, but.... iit did take me TWO MONTHS to slog through, and I guess that about sums it up. I'm glad to see similar reviews here. I felt like maybe I missed something brilliant in there, but I guess I didn't.
There is reallly a lot to like about this book, and I hate to give it a bad rating, but.... iit did take me TWO MONTHS to slog through, and I guess that about sums it up. I'm glad to see similar reviews here. I felt like maybe I missed something brilliant in there, but I guess I didn't.
This was a hard book to read. The writing is beautiful, the subject matter however is quite disturbing. The book is somewhat based on the Stephen Truscott case which is notorious here in Canada. A young man was convicted of raping and killing a younger classmate. Anne-Marie Macdonald gives a different interpretation of the events here. Although the book is so well-written and enveloping, I found many of the events in the book so disturbing that it was hard to make it through.
It’s a slow start, but the story really finds its stride about 80-100 pages in. At over 800 pages, I never once felt like I was dragging myself through any of them. It’s about childhood and the space race and learning to love your parents despite their flaws. And it’s about the ugliness of childhood and the way we can only see the truth of things once we have lived through them. It’s ugly and beautiful and everyone is broken and no one is without flaws but I love it.
emotional
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
Slow, dragging, boring. I had friends who loved this book so I was really looking forward to reading it. I trudged through about a third of it and finally gave up. Life is too short to read boring books!