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4.03 AVERAGE
4.03 AVERAGE
good, but i much prefer his absolutely true diary of part time indian. the illustrations and narrator's voice spoke to me more clearly.
If you're new to Alexie, this collection of short stories (that reads like a novel) is the place to start.
In 1998, I went to the movie theater and saw Smoke Signals, which had won the Audience Award at that year's Sundance Film Festival. I went with my good friend, who is Cherokee and Ojibwe. I laughed and she laughed and sometimes we laughed at the same things. That began my relationship with Sherman Alexie. Since then, I have been to 2 conferences where he was a key note speaker and felt the same connection. I read two of his other books (Reservation Blues and The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian) and loved the second one so much that I signed up to give away 25 copies for World Book Night that same year. He is, in my mind, as The New York Times said, "one of the major lyric voices of our times." It doesn't hurt my relationship with him that we both attended Gonzaga University at different points in time and both loved Dick's hamburgers, or that I have visited the Spokane reservation where he grew up, so that I feel bonded to the geography of his stories.
All that being said, this book, which contains the roots of what became the movie Smoke Signals (highly recommend) is not what the movie was based on. They contain some of the same characters and some of the stories, but not all of the things I loved in the movie are in the book. Both are glimpses into what being a Native American from the Spokane Tribe is like, both are funny and sad and infuriating and poignant. I don't know that I can pick a favorite of these stories or can explain the book beyond what I have already written. They are pieces of a patchwork quilt of life from this perspective and the book has been fit like a piece of an even larger quilt into my understanding of Alexie's world and the world of Native Americans and of America and of humanity. It is like one of those ever widening panoramic shots at the end of an epic movie. It is worth the time to view up close and will impact your relationship to the wide shot.
All that being said, this book, which contains the roots of what became the movie Smoke Signals (highly recommend) is not what the movie was based on. They contain some of the same characters and some of the stories, but not all of the things I loved in the movie are in the book. Both are glimpses into what being a Native American from the Spokane Tribe is like, both are funny and sad and infuriating and poignant. I don't know that I can pick a favorite of these stories or can explain the book beyond what I have already written. They are pieces of a patchwork quilt of life from this perspective and the book has been fit like a piece of an even larger quilt into my understanding of Alexie's world and the world of Native Americans and of America and of humanity. It is like one of those ever widening panoramic shots at the end of an epic movie. It is worth the time to view up close and will impact your relationship to the wide shot.
adventurous
funny
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:
Yes
This should be required residing for everyone ever.
I flew through this book and really enjoyed the stories about the reservation and the recurring characters.
As with any short story collection, I enjoyed some stories more than others, but with this one I generally enjoyed them all. Alexie's writing in this book was beautiful, one story even brought me to tears. The characters were vibrant, layered & real. Though there were so flaws, all the stories were fragmented, disjointed, and random. But I enjoyed the fact that in a way they were all connected, I enjoyed see characters In different stages of their life and how they've changed or stayed the same. Some stories focused on characters family and showed how they were the same.
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Anyhoo, I recommend this collection to everybody, one of the best books I've been forced to read for school.
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Anyhoo, I recommend this collection to everybody, one of the best books I've been forced to read for school.
Like with most short story collections there are some that I love and others I just manage to get through. What I liked least is there are times it was hard to figure out if the speaker was Victor or someone else. My favorite ones were also a bit sad like Victor going to retrive his father's ashes in Phoenix, Thomas Builds-the-Fire grandfather's story, and James Many Horses cancer story. I really didn't care for Family Portrait. I read this for a book club, but it is not something I would normally read. I'm not one that is fascinated with Native American culture, but I'm aware of it growing up around several tribes. Overall an enjoyable book. I'm curious about a few other books of Alexies.
"Because My Father Always Said He Was the Only Indian Who Saw Jimi Hendrix Play 'The Star-Spangled Banner' at Woodstock" remains one of my desert-island all time favorite short stories. However, a lot of these stories are repetitive and can get too emo. All the talk about tears can turn me off after a while. I am mesmerized by the way Alexie writes, but at times I need more variety.
Odd that descriptions of people and their way of life within my own country can feel so foreign. The feeling of belonging - or lack thereof - within the rest of this country was particularly poignant to me. I've met so many immigrants to the U.S. who feel like they belong within the society in this country more then the characters of this book.