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3.4 AVERAGE
3.4 AVERAGE
I would say more of a 3.5 I did find this book to be interesting but really have struggled to finish it due to it being such a slow paced story
Wow, that is not what I was expecting. I honestly did not know what to expect as I simply downloaded this audio book before going on vacation because it was available from the library and sounded like a book I might like. Well I did like it, but it was not what I was expecting. It starts off a bit slow but not boring. It creates a few questions and I really didn't like Krysta. I have never encountered a more spoiled, entitled, and bratty character in any other piece of literature. However, at the end of the book I saw her in a new way. I thought I had figured out how the two stories were connected, but boy was I ever wrong. When I finally discovered how they were connected, I admit I felt some intense emotions. It was really amazing to not see it coming, it is so rare to find a story that is unpredictable in that way.
This book is slow to start but intense at the end. Once you get half way through you won't be able to stop reading it until it is all finished. It will stay with you long after it is over.
This book is slow to start but intense at the end. Once you get half way through you won't be able to stop reading it until it is all finished. It will stay with you long after it is over.
Difficult to review, I found it intriguing but confusing, not enough to give up but keep reading and I am glad I did, the whole book was like a metaphor, dark, twisted, and horrible but told in such a compelling way without laying it all out there, this is a story of what the mind invents to survive the reality. I'm glad I read it till the end.
I had such high expectations, and none were met, at all. AT ALL.
challenging
dark
emotional
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Gretel and the Dark, Eliza Granville
This novel is seeped in fairy tales and their dark and scary atmospheric vision of the world. It also tells two stories that come together in a stunning and very surprising way at the end. Ultimately it is a book about friendship, love and survival.
Based on two sad periods in Austrian history where anti-Semitism ruled - the first the turn of the 20th century and the second WWII - there is no way to foresee how the two stories will come together and both captivate.
One story focuses on Dr. Josef Breuer, a renowned psychiatrist who finds and tries to help a mysterious young woman who's only desire seems to be to go to Linz to kill the young devil before he is allowed to grow up.
The second story focuses on Krysta, a young girl who ends up in a concentration camp after her father, one of the doctors doing experiments on inmates at the camp, dies and she is left with no one. Krysta is difficult and that is why she isn't adopted by someone else. Krysta turns to story telling to shield herself from the horrors she faces at the camp, while the mystery girl in the late 1990's seems to be living in a fairy tale - a very strange and frightening one. It is hard to describe the book because as you read you really can't figure out what the first story is really about, until you get to the end and its oddness is explained.
This novel is seeped in fairy tales and their dark and scary atmospheric vision of the world. It also tells two stories that come together in a stunning and very surprising way at the end. Ultimately it is a book about friendship, love and survival.
Based on two sad periods in Austrian history where anti-Semitism ruled - the first the turn of the 20th century and the second WWII - there is no way to foresee how the two stories will come together and both captivate.
One story focuses on Dr. Josef Breuer, a renowned psychiatrist who finds and tries to help a mysterious young woman who's only desire seems to be to go to Linz to kill the young devil before he is allowed to grow up.
The second story focuses on Krysta, a young girl who ends up in a concentration camp after her father, one of the doctors doing experiments on inmates at the camp, dies and she is left with no one. Krysta is difficult and that is why she isn't adopted by someone else. Krysta turns to story telling to shield herself from the horrors she faces at the camp, while the mystery girl in the late 1990's seems to be living in a fairy tale - a very strange and frightening one. It is hard to describe the book because as you read you really can't figure out what the first story is really about, until you get to the end and its oddness is explained.
I'm torn on this. The idea is original, the language is beautiful. The structure is interesting, and the ending is powerful, though not perhaps as shockingly twisty as it thinks it is.
Yet it's very much a book of two halves. "Gretel and the Dark" alternates chapters, telling two different stories that come to a connection in the end. The problem with this type of story-telling is that the author runs the very great risk of having their reader find one story that much more interesting than the other. Half the story is set around a young girl called Krysta, and this is beautiful and tragic and fascinating, extremely subtle work. Unfortunately it's constantly followed by disappointment, as I consistently finish Krysta's chapters and groan at the thought of more time spent with Josef.
Josef is, to be frank, a tiresome old lecher. Sadly, the writing - so luminous with Krysta - doesn't seem to have the same spark when it comes to her counterpart.
I'm sure there are people who have the opposite preference; people who prefer his chapters. Even people who like them both the same. Fair enough, tastes differ and all that. But for me, it made the book uneven. It actually took me several weeks to finish it, because every time I'd come to Josef I'd put the book down and walk away. I'd have to force myself to continue so that I'd eventually get back to Krysta.
In summary, I found this book an exercise in frustration, albeit one shot through with some startlingly lovely work.
Yet it's very much a book of two halves. "Gretel and the Dark" alternates chapters, telling two different stories that come to a connection in the end. The problem with this type of story-telling is that the author runs the very great risk of having their reader find one story that much more interesting than the other. Half the story is set around a young girl called Krysta, and this is beautiful and tragic and fascinating, extremely subtle work. Unfortunately it's constantly followed by disappointment, as I consistently finish Krysta's chapters and groan at the thought of more time spent with Josef.
Josef is, to be frank, a tiresome old lecher. Sadly, the writing - so luminous with Krysta - doesn't seem to have the same spark when it comes to her counterpart.
I'm sure there are people who have the opposite preference; people who prefer his chapters. Even people who like them both the same. Fair enough, tastes differ and all that. But for me, it made the book uneven. It actually took me several weeks to finish it, because every time I'd come to Josef I'd put the book down and walk away. I'd have to force myself to continue so that I'd eventually get back to Krysta.
In summary, I found this book an exercise in frustration, albeit one shot through with some startlingly lovely work.
I really didn't look into this book before I started reading it. I know it has the word "Dark" in the title, but somehow I didn't think it would be quite as dark as it was. I think I was expecting something a little more allegorical and not quite the historically grounded horror that I found. It was exceptionally well written, though. Aside from being an interesting choice, using Josef Breuer as a main character did a lot to ground it in reality and heavily colored the way that I interpreted the parts set in 1899 Vienna. I think that if he weren't a real, historical character then I might have guessed that it was a story being told by Krysta much earlier. The two stories worked so well in parallel and the way that they were brought together was very clever and the ending did a lot to soothe my nerves after unsettling events of the book.
Read my review on my blog:
http://www.50ayear.com/2014/02/15/6-gretel-dark-eliza-granville/
http://www.50ayear.com/2014/02/15/6-gretel-dark-eliza-granville/
This is a tough review. I was happy with the ending, and happy that the twist was what it was. I hated young Krysta, though, and I never really had a grasp on her age at various points in the story (although she mostly acted like a 4yr old). Early on, the story very closely resembled The Boy in the Striped Pajamas too, which I felt was unoriginal. I felt that the subject matter was intense enough, and Krysta's backstory and sexual abuse by her "uncle" was overload. Also, I felt that the story she created didn't quite fit with its narrator.
Other reviews go back and forth on the language, some describing it as beautiful, others tedious. I don't mind tedious language. I like long, complicated sentences that trail on and on and add descriptions of mundane things. I felt that sometimes the prose included descriptors for the sake of adding words, and often the writing lacked a cadence to make it flow for the reader. I had to force myself to keep reading at times.
Also... What's with her and setting fire to things?
The ending was very sweet-- sweet enough for me to bump the rating up. It was definitely different.
Other reviews go back and forth on the language, some describing it as beautiful, others tedious. I don't mind tedious language. I like long, complicated sentences that trail on and on and add descriptions of mundane things. I felt that sometimes the prose included descriptors for the sake of adding words, and often the writing lacked a cadence to make it flow for the reader. I had to force myself to keep reading at times.
Also... What's with her and setting fire to things?
The ending was very sweet-- sweet enough for me to bump the rating up. It was definitely different.