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endless30's review
4.0
interesting story framed in the aftermath of katrina discussing one man and the maddening government response.
kristinvdt's review
4.0
A scary (true!) story about the status of human rights in the midst of a disaster. A very good read, Eggers is a great storyteller.
ericfheiman's review
4.0
Can this be the same author of "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius"? I mean this as the kindest of compliments. "Zeitoun" is a stark piece of work, all nervous stylistic tics repressed to let this Kafkaesque true story tell itself. Eggers keeps the prose minimal—almost Raymond Carver-like—and it's a smart move. What makes this book required reading is that this retelling of a very personal Hurricane Katrina family experience is not just a perseverance of the human spirit thing, but a cautionary tale of how our government practiced racial profiling and oppressed the individual's rights in the name of safety and calm during this dark period of our country's recent history. I wish the book was longer and went even deeper. Looking forward to seeing Eggers and the Zeitoun family in person soon!
rita_araujo's review against another edition
4.0
Maratona Trimestral - janeiro/fevereiro/março 2017 - Baixar a pilha de livros que temos em casa:
2- Ler um livro que esteja na tua pilha há pelo menos 5 anos.
2- Ler um livro que esteja na tua pilha há pelo menos 5 anos.
linneacolleenann's review
4.0
Even though the story of Katrina is well-known, this book made the Zeitouns' experience compelling and showed angles of the story that I don't think were presented a lot on mainstream media. I wanted to learn a little about the hurricane, but this book was compelling all on its own and a really great story. Definitely recommend.
jacki_f's review
5.0
This amazing book is the true story of Abdulrahman Zeitoun, a successful Muslim building contractor living with his family in New Orleans when Cyclone Katrina hit. Zeitoun's wife Kathy left New Orleans with their children, but Zeitoun chose to stay behind and the book is about what happens to him in the weeks after Katrina strikes. The first half of the book is about the storm and his first week in the flooded city. Zeitoun paddles about in a canoe, helping others where he can. Then he disappears, and Eggers shifts to Kathy's point of view. From this point, the tension rapidly builds and the book becomes increasingly difficult to put down.
Post-Katrina, New Orleans was effectively a city under martial law, with the enforcers - many from outside the city - getting increasingly frenzied by media reports of looting, rape and murder. There's a quote at the start of the book that "to a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail" - to them, every person looked like a looter, even an elderly woman retrieving a packet of sausages from her own car. The system was so screwed that they prioritised building a temporary prison ahead of feeding their citizens and providing them with essential services.
It's a very simply written but immensely readable book. Eggers tells us what people were thinking and how they were feeling, but largely resists passing judgement on the situation, allowing the reader to draw their own conclusions. I tore through it, feeling increasingly angry and disbelieving at what Zeitoun was going through and how this could be happening in a major US city in 2005. While the book is about a specific situation, it also gets you thinking about how easily things can spin out of control and how easy it is to be the wrong person in the wrong place at the wrong time. This is an eye opening and important story, powerfully told.
Post-Katrina, New Orleans was effectively a city under martial law, with the enforcers - many from outside the city - getting increasingly frenzied by media reports of looting, rape and murder. There's a quote at the start of the book that "to a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail" - to them, every person looked like a looter, even an elderly woman retrieving a packet of sausages from her own car. The system was so screwed that they prioritised building a temporary prison ahead of feeding their citizens and providing them with essential services.
It's a very simply written but immensely readable book. Eggers tells us what people were thinking and how they were feeling, but largely resists passing judgement on the situation, allowing the reader to draw their own conclusions. I tore through it, feeling increasingly angry and disbelieving at what Zeitoun was going through and how this could be happening in a major US city in 2005. While the book is about a specific situation, it also gets you thinking about how easily things can spin out of control and how easy it is to be the wrong person in the wrong place at the wrong time. This is an eye opening and important story, powerfully told.
liketheday's review
4.0
It was fantastic to read this book with my book club, because I know next to nothing about Hurricane Katrina or Muslims or Middle-Eastern culture or having a family that makes you angry but there was someone in the group to explain everything to me! I still don’t really understand it, of course, but a lot of things made a lot more sense after talking it over. I highly recommend this course of action.
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