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3.74 AVERAGE
3.74 AVERAGE
While I was reading this, I was having flashbacks to Gilead by Marilynne Robinson. Not that it is very similar in style or subject, but that it was a very well reviewed book that won some prestigious literary prizes and that I just didn't get. Really. Didn't. Get. And I wanted to like it, I really did.
Parts of this book were beautifully written and the characters interesting, and the setting (a big part of the story) was well done. At the heart is a story of a complicated relationship between a boy and his father in rural Norway after World War II. There is promise there, but it just never came together for me in an even partially fulfilling way.
Parts of this book were beautifully written and the characters interesting, and the setting (a big part of the story) was well done. At the heart is a story of a complicated relationship between a boy and his father in rural Norway after World War II. There is promise there, but it just never came together for me in an even partially fulfilling way.
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Some great passages:
P. 67
...and if this had been something in a novel it would have just been iritating. I hacein fact done a lot of reading particularly during the last few years, but earlIer too, by all means, and I have thought about what I've read, and that kind of coincidence seems far-fetched in fiction, in modern novels anyway, and I find it hard to accept. It may be all very well in Dickens, but when you read Dickens you're reading a long ballad from a vanished world, where everything has to come toget er in the end like an equation, where the balance of what was once disturbed must be restored so that the gods can smile again. A consolation, maybe, or a protest against a world gone off the rails, but it is nit like that anymore, my world is not like that, and I have never gone along with those who believe our lives are governed by fate. They whine, they wash their hands and crave pity. I believe we shape our lives ourselves, at any rate I have shaped mine, for what it's worth, and I take responsibility.
P. 73
People like it when you tell them things, in su table portions, in a modest, intimate tone, and they think they know you, but they do not, they know about you, for what they are let in on are the facts, not feelIngs, not what your ipinion is about anything at all, not how what ha happened to you and how all the decisions you have made have turned you into they are. What they do is they fill in with their own feelings and opinions and assumptions, and they compose a new life which ha precious little to do wit yours, and that let's you off the hook. No-one can touch you unless you yourself want them to. You inly have to be polite and smile and keep paranoid thoughts at bay, because they will talk about you no matter how much you squirm, it is inevitable, and you would do the same thing yourself.
P.212
"'Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.'"
She smiles again and says: 'I always thought those opening lInes were a bit scary because they indicated we would not necessarily be the leading characters of our own lives. I couldn't imagine how that could come about, something so awful; a sort of ghost-life where I could do nothing but watch that person who had taken my place and maybe hate her deeply and envy he everything, but not Be able to do anything about it because at some point in time I had fallen out of my life as if from an aeroplane, I pictured it, and out into empty space, and there I drifted about and could not get back, and someone elsE was sitting fastened into my seat, although that place was mine, and I had the ticket in my hand."
P. 67
...and if this had been something in a novel it would have just been iritating. I hacein fact done a lot of reading particularly during the last few years, but earlIer too, by all means, and I have thought about what I've read, and that kind of coincidence seems far-fetched in fiction, in modern novels anyway, and I find it hard to accept. It may be all very well in Dickens, but when you read Dickens you're reading a long ballad from a vanished world, where everything has to come toget er in the end like an equation, where the balance of what was once disturbed must be restored so that the gods can smile again. A consolation, maybe, or a protest against a world gone off the rails, but it is nit like that anymore, my world is not like that, and I have never gone along with those who believe our lives are governed by fate. They whine, they wash their hands and crave pity. I believe we shape our lives ourselves, at any rate I have shaped mine, for what it's worth, and I take responsibility.
P. 73
People like it when you tell them things, in su table portions, in a modest, intimate tone, and they think they know you, but they do not, they know about you, for what they are let in on are the facts, not feelIngs, not what your ipinion is about anything at all, not how what ha happened to you and how all the decisions you have made have turned you into they are. What they do is they fill in with their own feelings and opinions and assumptions, and they compose a new life which ha precious little to do wit yours, and that let's you off the hook. No-one can touch you unless you yourself want them to. You inly have to be polite and smile and keep paranoid thoughts at bay, because they will talk about you no matter how much you squirm, it is inevitable, and you would do the same thing yourself.
P.212
"'Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.'"
She smiles again and says: 'I always thought those opening lInes were a bit scary because they indicated we would not necessarily be the leading characters of our own lives. I couldn't imagine how that could come about, something so awful; a sort of ghost-life where I could do nothing but watch that person who had taken my place and maybe hate her deeply and envy he everything, but not Be able to do anything about it because at some point in time I had fallen out of my life as if from an aeroplane, I pictured it, and out into empty space, and there I drifted about and could not get back, and someone elsE was sitting fastened into my seat, although that place was mine, and I had the ticket in my hand."
A small group, all female, with one new person. And everyone loved it. For the lyricism of the language (that survived translation intact) and the gradual unfolding of the interleaving stories, as Trond, retired to the hinterlands of Norway, reflects on his life, and especially on the summer a half-century before that defined the man he became.
What a remarkable find this book was! I think I picked it up because the campus bookstore had a special display of "foreign authors" (think how broad that category is!)
I've made it a goal recently to read books by Nobel prize winners. I've read quite a few, I enjoy them, and I think I've come to understand their common themes and qualities. Out Stealing Horses fits in with the Nobel collection.
Much of the book is spent establishing and fleshing out a setting-- Petterson seems to come from the school that believes that the place does as much to explain the individuals who live there as do descriptions of their actions, and in this case, I think he thoroughly succeeds, if only because his characters are men from Oslo, i.e.e cityfolk, who choose to live in the remote corner of Norway bordering on Sweden. The book spins back and forth in time, between our main character now, as a 60+ year old man, who has moved to live by himself in a rustic cabin a few years after the death of his wife; and this same main character's childhood, visiting his father who has established his own solitary residence-- although ostensibly for different reasons. While the book is primarily a study of relationships, it is set against the backdrop of World War II, and the father, we learn, is part of an underground resistance movement.
The characters, though taciturn, are richly described; the setting rises up around you as you read. As in the books of Nobel winners, the personal dramas mirror political struggles. Although this is decidedly a slow and quiet book, I strongly recommend it, and I intend to keep my eye on this author.
I've made it a goal recently to read books by Nobel prize winners. I've read quite a few, I enjoy them, and I think I've come to understand their common themes and qualities. Out Stealing Horses fits in with the Nobel collection.
Much of the book is spent establishing and fleshing out a setting-- Petterson seems to come from the school that believes that the place does as much to explain the individuals who live there as do descriptions of their actions, and in this case, I think he thoroughly succeeds, if only because his characters are men from Oslo, i.e.e cityfolk, who choose to live in the remote corner of Norway bordering on Sweden. The book spins back and forth in time, between our main character now, as a 60+ year old man, who has moved to live by himself in a rustic cabin a few years after the death of his wife; and this same main character's childhood, visiting his father who has established his own solitary residence-- although ostensibly for different reasons. While the book is primarily a study of relationships, it is set against the backdrop of World War II, and the father, we learn, is part of an underground resistance movement.
The characters, though taciturn, are richly described; the setting rises up around you as you read. As in the books of Nobel winners, the personal dramas mirror political struggles. Although this is decidedly a slow and quiet book, I strongly recommend it, and I intend to keep my eye on this author.
there's so much going on in this book i don't know where to begin. just read it. it is wonderful!