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3.99 AVERAGE
3.99 AVERAGE
Arggggg I dont have anything nice to say im sorry Mr Mitchell your afterword was so nice and very well explained you seem very thoughtful.
If you have ever stood somewhere and thought about all the people in the past who have lived and walked where you stand and felt empathy for them and curiosity about their lives this will not impress you very much at all. I feel like I understand the message of the prevailing optimism of human nature as well as the thread of constant change in our societies, and that was nice to have tied together at the end but I have just literally thought about that before.
There were some very poetic and beautifully written one-off lines buried in here; "the evening was lemon-blue" was my favorite, but largly I felt like I had to drag myself through the pages and I had to fight some long blinks.
I think would have liked this much more as 6 short stories in full moving forwards or backwards in time, rather than the split, because I largely forgot what was going on by the time I made it back to the second half. Made it very hard to give an f about any of the characters or their relationships to the people in their stories.
Feeling very let down but lots of people seem to say the reread is worth it so perhaps I shelve this for a decade and see how I feel next time. Sorry Dave.
If you have ever stood somewhere and thought about all the people in the past who have lived and walked where you stand and felt empathy for them and curiosity about their lives this will not impress you very much at all. I feel like I understand the message of the prevailing optimism of human nature as well as the thread of constant change in our societies, and that was nice to have tied together at the end but I have just literally thought about that before.
There were some very poetic and beautifully written one-off lines buried in here; "the evening was lemon-blue" was my favorite, but largly I felt like I had to drag myself through the pages and I had to fight some long blinks.
I think would have liked this much more as 6 short stories in full moving forwards or backwards in time, rather than the split, because I largely forgot what was going on by the time I made it back to the second half. Made it very hard to give an f about any of the characters or their relationships to the people in their stories.
Feeling very let down but lots of people seem to say the reread is worth it so perhaps I shelve this for a decade and see how I feel next time. Sorry Dave.
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Oof.
At the end of the audiobook, Mitchell explained what he was attempting with ‘Cloud Atlas’ - to write a novel in a format that had never been done before. Unfortunately, some ideas should stay just ideas; this completely missed the mark.
The story lines were bizarre and disconnected. They were overly complicated and hard to follow. The writing was way, way too flowery. ‘Cloud Atlas’ read like someone had one glass of wine too many and discovered a thesaurus.
Do not recommend.
At the end of the audiobook, Mitchell explained what he was attempting with ‘Cloud Atlas’ - to write a novel in a format that had never been done before. Unfortunately, some ideas should stay just ideas; this completely missed the mark.
The story lines were bizarre and disconnected. They were overly complicated and hard to follow. The writing was way, way too flowery. ‘Cloud Atlas’ read like someone had one glass of wine too many and discovered a thesaurus.
Do not recommend.
http://gece1.blogspot.com/2013/03/cloud-atlas-david-mitchell.html
adventurous
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Everyone and their mom says this is an absolutely fantastic novel that you’ll love. So I was a bit disappointed when I found it widely varying in quality. The books starts off with arguably its weakest story - The Pacific Journal of Adam Ewing. Boring and bland are the nicest words I got for it. Then it is followed up by an absolute BANGER - Letters from Zedelghem. An unhinged bisexual British composer flees from disgrace in England to the Netherlands. He seeks work with Vyvyan Ayrs, a famous composer who hasn’t able to produce any more works due to his age and disability. Frobisher (the narrator) is so full of himself yet his circumstances make the reader emphasize with him even though he is a little spoiled brat. Half Lives: The First Luisa Rey mystery is heavily inspired by crime/mystery pulp novels. However, it really wasn’t for me. I could see how someone might like it. The Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish’s titular protagonist, like Frobisher, is full of himself. However, he is definitely not as entertaining to read about. He just comes off as a grumpy old man, and I wasn’t a fan of the nursing home element. The Orison of Sonmi-451 happily takes second-place in my rankings. In a futurist Capitalist hellscape in Korea where the Nea So Copros, clones are created with no other purpose than to serve as manual labor for the “purebreds”. The Q&A format was done really well and added a lot to the story. Lastly, Sloosha’s Crossin' an' Ev'rythin' After is about…uh, what is it about? I was not a fan of the writing style in this one. At all. It felt weird and gimmicky and I had no clue what the characters are saying. If you wanted characters to speak in a dialect, despite my numerous other qualms with it, Young Mungo does this quite well. The characters speak in Glaswegian but everything is narrated in Standard English. The average reader can understand what is going on while also taking note of the setting, which plays an important role.
I could only really recommend select stories from this book. Again, anthological collections like these are really all-over the place. You get bangers and you get duds.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Racial slurs, Racism, Slavery, Suicide, Murder
Moderate: Infidelity, Rape
Wish the stories were just a tiny bit more relevant to each other instead of being glorified MCU style cameos. the only stories that really connected in a satisfying way were the dystopia and the elderly home.
each story was a delight to read though
each story was a delight to read though
adventurous
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
LOVED this book. Mitchell does an incredible job of telling an interesting story from multiple points of view, each of which has a very strong and distinct voice. This book was very different. If you don't love the story, you'll love the writing. If you don't love the writing, you'll love the story.
I do not know how David Mitchell pulled that off! Varied timelines, genres and languages all in one novel, addressing the same themes of humanity and power; and it worked. While it did take me a bit to get the gist of what was going on, once I did, it left you marveling at what talented writers can do. Cloud Atlas is a unique reading experience, and one that will be with me for sometime to come.
I had a hard time getting into this book -- there were a few false starts that never made it more than 5 pages in. I finally had the time to get interested on the plane to Hawaii, and I read most of it while were on vacation.
The book is made up of 6 nested stories in different time periods. All the stories are connected to each other, in both subtle and obvious ways. The dystopian future segment reminded me of Margaret Atwood's Oryx & Crake and its sequel -- genetic engineering, cloning, rampant consumer consumption. One of the themes that connects each story to the others is how consistently human beings prey on those who are weaker than they are, not matter how "civilized" the world has become. So, not exactly a hopeful story about the world's future, but fascinating.
One passage that grabbed me was this one; it simultaneously describes the way the stories of the book are nested together:
"* Exposition: the workings of the actual past + the virtual past may be illustrated by an event known to collective history, such as the sinking of the Titanic. The disaster as it actually occurred descends into obscurity as its eyewitnesses die off, documents perish + the wreck of the ship dissolves in its Atlantic grave. Yet a virtual sinking of the Titanic, created from reworked memories, papers, hearsay, fiction -- in short, belief -- grows ever "truer." The actual past is brittle, ever-dimming + ever more problematic to access + reconstruct; in contract, the virtual past is malleable, ever-brightening + ever more difficult to circumvent/expose as fraudulent.
* The present presses the virtual past into its own service, to lend credence to its mythologies + legitimacy to the imposition of will. Power seeks + is the right to landscape the virtual past (he who pays the historian calls the tune).
* Symmetry demands an actual + virtual future, too. We imagine how next week, next year, or 2225 will shape up - a virtual future, constructed by wishes, prophecies + daydreams. This virtual future, constructed by wishes, prophecies + daydreams. This virtual future may influence the actual future, as in a self-fulfilling prophecy, but the actual future will eclipse our virutal oneas surely as tomorrow eclipses today. Like Utopia, the actual future + the actual past exist only int he hazy distance, where they are no good to anyone.
* Q: Is there a meaningful distinction between one simulacrum of smoke, mirrors + shadows - the actual past - from another such simulacrum - the actual future?
* One model of time: an infinite matryoshka doll of painted moments, each "shell" (the present) encased inside a nest of "shells" (previous presents) I call the actual past but which we perceive as the virtual past. The doll of "now" likewise encases a nest of presents yet to be, which I call the actual future but which we perceive as the virtual future."
The book is made up of 6 nested stories in different time periods. All the stories are connected to each other, in both subtle and obvious ways. The dystopian future segment reminded me of Margaret Atwood's Oryx & Crake and its sequel -- genetic engineering, cloning, rampant consumer consumption. One of the themes that connects each story to the others is how consistently human beings prey on those who are weaker than they are, not matter how "civilized" the world has become. So, not exactly a hopeful story about the world's future, but fascinating.
One passage that grabbed me was this one; it simultaneously describes the way the stories of the book are nested together:
"* Exposition: the workings of the actual past + the virtual past may be illustrated by an event known to collective history, such as the sinking of the Titanic. The disaster as it actually occurred descends into obscurity as its eyewitnesses die off, documents perish + the wreck of the ship dissolves in its Atlantic grave. Yet a virtual sinking of the Titanic, created from reworked memories, papers, hearsay, fiction -- in short, belief -- grows ever "truer." The actual past is brittle, ever-dimming + ever more problematic to access + reconstruct; in contract, the virtual past is malleable, ever-brightening + ever more difficult to circumvent/expose as fraudulent.
* The present presses the virtual past into its own service, to lend credence to its mythologies + legitimacy to the imposition of will. Power seeks + is the right to landscape the virtual past (he who pays the historian calls the tune).
* Symmetry demands an actual + virtual future, too. We imagine how next week, next year, or 2225 will shape up - a virtual future, constructed by wishes, prophecies + daydreams. This virtual future, constructed by wishes, prophecies + daydreams. This virtual future may influence the actual future, as in a self-fulfilling prophecy, but the actual future will eclipse our virutal oneas surely as tomorrow eclipses today. Like Utopia, the actual future + the actual past exist only int he hazy distance, where they are no good to anyone.
* Q: Is there a meaningful distinction between one simulacrum of smoke, mirrors + shadows - the actual past - from another such simulacrum - the actual future?
* One model of time: an infinite matryoshka doll of painted moments, each "shell" (the present) encased inside a nest of "shells" (previous presents) I call the actual past but which we perceive as the virtual past. The doll of "now" likewise encases a nest of presents yet to be, which I call the actual future but which we perceive as the virtual future."