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3.72 AVERAGE
3.72 AVERAGE
adventurous
challenging
emotional
hopeful
lighthearted
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
This book focuses heavily on the themes of death and seemed to jump around a bit. I didn’t love it and didn’t hate it… it was just okay.
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
mysterious
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
It’s rare that I find myself reading a novel and highlighting sections just because I love their lyricism. (Insights? Sure. Witticisms? Often.) This read like poetry and I loved its quirky, eerie, yet quietly hopeful arc.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Toxic relationship, Car accident
Moderate: Alcoholism, Death, Incest, Dementia, Abortion
4.5 Annie Proulx is so good! Endless fantastic imagery of sea life in Newfoundland and such a unique way of storytelling and character development that cultivates compassion and tenderness for humans. Sad it's over.
For if Jack Buggit could escape from the pickle jar, if a bird with a broken neck could fly away, what else might be possible? Water may be older than light, diamonds crack in hot goat’s blood, mountaintops give off cold fire, forests appear in mid-ocean, it may happen that a crab is caught with the shadow of a hand on its back, that the wind be imprisoned in a bit of knotted string. And it may be that love sometimes occurs without pain or misery.
I first read this book 30 years ago when it was new and I re-read it for an online book club I help run. All I remembered about it was that the main character had a big chin . . . and that I really loved it. While I'm not one to reread books often, I am so glad I did so with this book. The setting is described so wonderfully, I could feel the cold air and taste the fish. The characters are beautifully drawn, real and flawed and human and aching for connection. If you've never read it, I beg you to do so. And if you've read it before, I highly recommend reading it again.
I first read this book 30 years ago when it was new and I re-read it for an online book club I help run. All I remembered about it was that the main character had a big chin . . . and that I really loved it. While I'm not one to reread books often, I am so glad I did so with this book. The setting is described so wonderfully, I could feel the cold air and taste the fish. The characters are beautifully drawn, real and flawed and human and aching for connection. If you've never read it, I beg you to do so. And if you've read it before, I highly recommend reading it again.
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This was a real slow burn for me, the first 100~ pages were a real slog but after that it was just beautiful. Created a deep and sad world that I am sure I will be thinking about for a while. It is interesting that Proulx writes very male-centred stories without ever feeling oppressively masculine.
Liked the movie - Loved the book.
As the jacket cover states it is "darkly comic," exposing, at times, the darkest underside of human nature. The uplifting ending while not surprising is definitely not formulistic.
Proulx has interesting descriptive style that is both flowery and wordy but which never approaches cloying.
Here is a good example: "The North tilted to the sun. As the light unfolded, a milky patina of phytoplankton bloomed over the offshore banks along the collision line of the salt Gulf Stream and the brack Labrador current. The water crosshatched in complex layers of arctic and tropic, waves foamed with bacteria, yeast, daitoms, fungi, algae, bubbles and droplets, the stuff of life, urging growth, change, coupling.
To Roy
As the jacket cover states it is "darkly comic," exposing, at times, the darkest underside of human nature. The uplifting ending while not surprising is definitely not formulistic.
Proulx has interesting descriptive style that is both flowery and wordy but which never approaches cloying.
Here is a good example: "The North tilted to the sun. As the light unfolded, a milky patina of phytoplankton bloomed over the offshore banks along the collision line of the salt Gulf Stream and the brack Labrador current. The water crosshatched in complex layers of arctic and tropic, waves foamed with bacteria, yeast, daitoms, fungi, algae, bubbles and droplets, the stuff of life, urging growth, change, coupling.
To Roy
Lavmælt og fin, men med små glimt av galskap - som gjorde at jeg ble litt sidetracked og forventet meg magiske realisme, eller i det minste mer hodeløse kropper/kroppsløse hoder/mystiske sjøvesner, når alt egentlig handler om tilgivelse, trygghet og myk kjærlighet. Kanskje hadde jeg gitt fire stjerner hvis det ikke var for egen forvirring - og det faktum at jeg vet at Proulx kan ennå bedre.
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
2.5 stars, really. Too much detail about boats and weather. But, interesting characters and surprisingly funny tidbits mixed in. Enjoyed the writing for the most part.
Whoa. This book was cray-cray. Very much looking forward to seeing the movie now because there are scenes in the book that I am CERTAIN will not translate to film. Pretty darn good.