Scan barcode
jimbowen0306's review against another edition
3.0
I'm not going to lie, I can't see why people like this book.
Okay, so where to start? You know those "Alaskan Wilderness Men" reality-tv shows that are on at the moment? The ones where they have to survive in the wilderness, building tut, and catching animals? Well this book is like that, except it's set in what is now Eastern Nicaragua(ish). And the leader of the family (the father, Allie Fox) is an arrogant fool, and racist to boot.
Fox drags his family to The Mosquito Coast from Maine, because he's convinced that American society is on the verge of collapse, a race war, or nuclear war (so he's like one of those people too, all we needed was a purpose built air raid shelters in a basement, and the Mom being an extreme couponer to have the reality show trifecta). Once there he sets up an ice manufacturing enterprise (because, of course, that makes sense), with the idea that he'll work with the shiftless locals to get it set up (because he thinks, of course, that only the white man can get them organised). He starts with a bang, but as the book progresses, the wheels come off, as his communistic ideas, and racism, come face to face with reality.
Another thing that had me thinking was the similarity to Jonestown, and the People's Temple mass suicide/killing. In that, Jim Jones convinced 1000 people to go and live in Guyana for similar (if more religious) reasons. The big difference here is that I'm assuming Jim Jones had some charisma. Fox has as much charisma as a Wet Wednesday in Whitby. Oh, and his wife is about has no agency. Absolutely none. We don't even learn her name. Fox pontificates from on high, and his wife should know her place.
To make matters worse, I'm a townie. I can just about tell the difference between a sheep and a goat, and tend to view the countryside as the place you drive through to get somewhere. In short, I don't know much about rural ways of life. This said, I spent most of my time reading the book thinking "Why are you doing that there?", and "There's a reason the locals don't do that there." If an out and out townie can be picking holes in some of the Science Fox was using, most people are going to be thinking "You're a special sort of silly, aren't you?"
So all, not good.
p.s. I know those reality shows are staged, mostly.
Okay, so where to start? You know those "Alaskan Wilderness Men" reality-tv shows that are on at the moment? The ones where they have to survive in the wilderness, building tut, and catching animals? Well this book is like that, except it's set in what is now Eastern Nicaragua(ish). And the leader of the family (the father, Allie Fox) is an arrogant fool, and racist to boot.
Fox drags his family to The Mosquito Coast from Maine, because he's convinced that American society is on the verge of collapse, a race war, or nuclear war (so he's like one of those people too, all we needed was a purpose built air raid shelters in a basement, and the Mom being an extreme couponer to have the reality show trifecta). Once there he sets up an ice manufacturing enterprise (because, of course, that makes sense), with the idea that he'll work with the shiftless locals to get it set up (because he thinks, of course, that only the white man can get them organised). He starts with a bang, but as the book progresses, the wheels come off, as his communistic ideas, and racism, come face to face with reality.
Another thing that had me thinking was the similarity to Jonestown, and the People's Temple mass suicide/killing. In that, Jim Jones convinced 1000 people to go and live in Guyana for similar (if more religious) reasons. The big difference here is that I'm assuming Jim Jones had some charisma. Fox has as much charisma as a Wet Wednesday in Whitby. Oh, and his wife is about has no agency. Absolutely none. We don't even learn her name. Fox pontificates from on high, and his wife should know her place.
To make matters worse, I'm a townie. I can just about tell the difference between a sheep and a goat, and tend to view the countryside as the place you drive through to get somewhere. In short, I don't know much about rural ways of life. This said, I spent most of my time reading the book thinking "Why are you doing that there?", and "There's a reason the locals don't do that there." If an out and out townie can be picking holes in some of the Science Fox was using, most people are going to be thinking "You're a special sort of silly, aren't you?"
So all, not good.
p.s. I know those reality shows are staged, mostly.
karrama's review against another edition
3.0
Not a bad read, but not the best travel book I've read lately. I really like the story, but the telling makes it hard to read. There is a sarcasm to the writing that one must be in the mood to imagine your most snarky friend speaking the words while reading.
angus_mckeogh's review against another edition
4.0
Really engaging story about a survivalist father, who despises modern living, taking his family into the jungle to scrabble out an existence, before he ultimately loses the thread and his mind. Theroux’s fiction is frequently underrated and ignored.
novabird's review against another edition
4.0
The tone of, “The Mosquito Coast,” is one of captivating dread. The beauty and the horror co-mingle and infuse this novel with such a compulsion to not abandon ship, to not be disloyal to the leader/ father/, but to stick with it to its end, despite the long, long wait for the so-called hero to fall.
At first, the archetype of a ‘crazy American,’ is shown in Allie who is both a genius/neurotic and charismatic. As he continues to reinforce his anti-American, anti-capitalist ideals, he further goes up the river into the heart of his darkness, taking his family with him to the jungle of Honduras. Initially he is the portrait of an American dream colonizing the wilderness and is successful with his spirit of inventiveness and ‘hard work,’ ethic that forestalls the progression of his mental illness. When he begins to have illusions of grandeur, this is also the time in which his tenuous hold on reality starts to lose its grip. After his delusion is shattered Allie become increasingly irrational.
In the dedication of, “The Mosquito Coast,” Theroux acknowledges, Charlie Fox as the real talebearer and thanks him for the story. Not that Theroux needed any authentication to ground this offering, as it is based in realism with the depiction of the environment, the psychology of a borderline case of mental illness worsened by isolation and told through the clarion voice of Allie’s eldest son, Charlie Fox.
A genuinely good horror tale told as a fable that examines the question of what makes a ”comfortable good life.’
4.25 The arcing, slow and long build-up doesn't quite equally weight the balancing of the plot.
At first, the archetype of a ‘crazy American,’ is shown in Allie who is both a genius/neurotic and charismatic. As he continues to reinforce his anti-American, anti-capitalist ideals, he further goes up the river into the heart of his darkness, taking his family with him to the jungle of Honduras. Initially he is the portrait of an American dream colonizing the wilderness and is successful with his spirit of inventiveness and ‘hard work,’ ethic that forestalls the progression of his mental illness. When he begins to have illusions of grandeur, this is also the time in which his tenuous hold on reality starts to lose its grip. After his delusion is shattered Allie become increasingly irrational.
In the dedication of, “The Mosquito Coast,” Theroux acknowledges, Charlie Fox as the real talebearer and thanks him for the story. Not that Theroux needed any authentication to ground this offering, as it is based in realism with the depiction of the environment, the psychology of a borderline case of mental illness worsened by isolation and told through the clarion voice of Allie’s eldest son, Charlie Fox.
A genuinely good horror tale told as a fable that examines the question of what makes a ”comfortable good life.’
4.25 The arcing, slow and long build-up doesn't quite equally weight the balancing of the plot.
metricks's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
dobbydoo22's review against another edition
2.0
Not what I was expecting from Theroux; it read almost like a YA novel.
cozi82's review against another edition
adventurous
reflective
tense
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
4.0