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9.01k reviews for:

Идиот

Elif Batuman

3.77 AVERAGE


like why does she know what happened to me….

Quotes:

I wasn’t particularly interested in high school math acquisition, but nobody ever said we were put on this earth for our own entertainment.

My love for you is the person writing your letters.

They try to hammer the atom back to Fruit Loops, life back to paradise, and love back to nonexistent simplicity…It isn’t possible, and they shouldn’t pretend.

Everything he said seemed to reach me directly…seemed to bear some bad omen.

How could he want to see somebody fall? Was that why he agreed to see me?

I registered that information with an inward sigh; so you weren’t supposed to carry around alcohol swabs.

It turned out Nora’s tendency to run to her grandparents house was well-known. It was because of the cake.

“Don’t worry, I wouldn’t eat you. You’re my favorite sheep.”

What had men ever done, to deserve so much beauty and grace?
funny reflective slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Loveable characters: Yes
emotional inspiring reflective slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
lighthearted reflective medium-paced
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
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: Yes

Selin is so random omg. 

The following lines had me chortling:

“‘He died by falling off a barstool’, I wrote, ‘it may have been suicide.’”
“The consumption of that baguette seemed to require ear muscles that I had lost during the two million year course of human evolution.”
“I saw Einstein. This reminded me to pack a brush.”
“Europe was so small. It seemed weird that people took it so seriously.”
“Of course he couldn’t love me. Not when I lived through so many layers, when I was spooked by Montmartre, and wore a seatbelt in order to steer a car out of a ditch.”
emotional sad slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

idk what I read..
adventurous challenging emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing sad slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

jenny_king's review against another edition

DID NOT FINISH

I really really wanted to like this, and I did persevere on because there were some bright sparks in it and the writing was excellent. But I’m one of the reviewers of the opinion that the the book is a bit pseudo-smart and pretentious, and some of the talk about linguistics and films etc was just going over my head a bit.