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3.5 AVERAGE
3.5 AVERAGE
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
medium-paced
adventurous
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs, Racism
adventurous
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn starts by reminding the reader of events that happened in the novel that came before, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Both novels are set in the town of St. Petersburg, Missouri, which lies on the banks of the Mississippi River. Tom Sawyer ends with the two boys finding the robbers’ stashed gold. As a result of their adventures, they become rich and the bank held Huck’s money for him in a trust. He was adopted by the Widow Douglas, which Huck found to be stifling because he was used to doing whatever he wanted whenever he wanted. When Huckleberry’s drunken father comes back to town and learns about the boy’s wealth, he wants to get the money for himself. For several months he harasses Huck and deals with lawyers until eventually he kidnaps Huck from the widow and hides him away in a cabin across the river. Huckleberry comes up with a plan to escape by faking and staging his own death and hiding out on Jackson’s island, where he eventually runs into Jim, one of the widow’s sister, Miss Watson’s, slaves. Jim ran away after he overheard Miss Watson talk about selling him to a plantation down the river, where he would be separated from his wife and children. The two of them team up and head downriver on a raft they found, planning on getting aboard a steamboat eventually to head to the free states. During their travels they come across some other people and they take on new personas every time to try to avoid any problems. At one point they come across two con-artists who claim they are a displaced duke and the long-lost heir to the French throne, and they are powerless to tell them to leave, so they end up tagging along with their cons until the conmen sell Jim to a local farmer, claiming he was a runaway slave. Huck decides to try to save Jim, and the family who are holding him mistake Huck for Tom Sawyer, who was their nephew they had been waiting for. Huck goes along with it and when Tom arrives, he plays along by saying he was Sid. The two of them come up with an elaborate plan to rescue Jim once again and are almost successful when Tom gets a bullet in his leg that ends up bringing everybody back to the house. Tom’s Aunt Sally comes by to clear up the confusion, which clearly unearths all of the boys’ lies, but also proves what Tom finally said was true; Miss Watson had died two months earlier but had clarified in her will that Jim was to be a free man. Jim told Huck, who was worrying about his father reappearing, that the dead man they came across at the beginning of their travels had in fact been his father so there was no need to worry, and Aunt Sally offers to adopt Huckleberry, but he decides that he want to continue his adventures and head out for the West, stating that he’s had enough of being civilized.
This book needs a trigger warning or something for the amount of times it uses the “n” word. Six times alone on just page five! I was so shocked and kind of actually uncomfortable with how often and easily the word was written throughout the book. Not to mention the other offensive terms used for other characters we come across.
I’m so tired of Tom Sawyer and his thoughts. Needing everything to be “proper” in order to get Jim out of his hold. Acting like prisoners instead of just doing things the easy way. Instead, he’s practically bullying Aunt Sally and Uncle Silas, making them think they’re going crazy. Stealing their spoons and candles and sheets and everything. And using the uncle’s “noble brass warming-pan which he thought considerable of, because it belonged to one of his ancestors…” These are the nicest people and Tom is making Huck do these horrible acts for no reason! And they’re old enough to not be acting like this. They’re not five-year-olds, they’re thirteen or fourteen.
The plot twist of Jim being a free man already, I did not see that coming. I do wonder what happened to him and his wife and children after all of this, though. Were they reunited? Where did they go?
I do not plan on reading any more books from this collection, though, because as I stated before, I was so uncomfortable with the racism and offensive comments. I struggled to finish this book, so much so that I wasn’t paying as much attention towards the end as I usually do through my reading process.
This book needs a trigger warning or something for the amount of times it uses the “n” word. Six times alone on just page five! I was so shocked and kind of actually uncomfortable with how often and easily the word was written throughout the book. Not to mention the other offensive terms used for other characters we come across.
I’m so tired of Tom Sawyer and his thoughts. Needing everything to be “proper” in order to get Jim out of his hold. Acting like prisoners instead of just doing things the easy way. Instead, he’s practically bullying Aunt Sally and Uncle Silas, making them think they’re going crazy. Stealing their spoons and candles and sheets and everything. And using the uncle’s “noble brass warming-pan which he thought considerable of, because it belonged to one of his ancestors…” These are the nicest people and Tom is making Huck do these horrible acts for no reason! And they’re old enough to not be acting like this. They’re not five-year-olds, they’re thirteen or fourteen.
The plot twist of Jim being a free man already, I did not see that coming. I do wonder what happened to him and his wife and children after all of this, though. Were they reunited? Where did they go?
I do not plan on reading any more books from this collection, though, because as I stated before, I was so uncomfortable with the racism and offensive comments. I struggled to finish this book, so much so that I wasn’t paying as much attention towards the end as I usually do through my reading process.
adventurous
funny
informative
lighthearted
relaxing
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Set in the pre-Civil War American South, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn follows young Huck Finn as he escapes his abusive father and journeys down the Mississippi River with Jim, an enslaved man seeking freedom. Along the way, they encounter a range of characters and moral dilemmas. Through Huck’s evolving conscience and critique of societal norms, the novel explores themes of race, freedom, and the conflict between individual morality and societal expectations.
adventurous
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs, Racism
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
fast-paced
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
adventurous
challenging
emotional
lighthearted
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
N/A
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I just can’t. I chose to read this ahead of JAMES so I had the context, even though I’m told JAMES stands on its own. But it was a struggle. I KNOW it was written in a very different time, but I struggled with all of it. The language, the dialect, the wildly excessive use of the n-word (extra jarring via audiobook). I couldn’t get into the story. I couldn’t focus. I only finished it out of stubbornness. I know it’s a classic. But… maybe classics aren’t for me. Maybe it’s time classics become outdated and we determine new classics here in the year of our lord twenty-twenty-five. Sorry, Mark Twain.
adventurous
medium-paced