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3.62 AVERAGE
3.62 AVERAGE
The last 20% was terrible
Though the beginning of the book had a few instances of me thinking, "Huh - well that doesn't make much sense," the last part of the book seemed to have them in every paragraph. Unnecessarily so! Thus, the whole book was ruined for me. It was like her editor said "Let's wrap this up," and she just wrote whatever came to mind - or rather what might've come to a 14-year-old's mind. Skip this, there are so many other great books in the world to read.
Though the beginning of the book had a few instances of me thinking, "Huh - well that doesn't make much sense," the last part of the book seemed to have them in every paragraph. Unnecessarily so! Thus, the whole book was ruined for me. It was like her editor said "Let's wrap this up," and she just wrote whatever came to mind - or rather what might've come to a 14-year-old's mind. Skip this, there are so many other great books in the world to read.
3 1/2 stars
This was a bit of a baffling read for me – I was both thrilled and disappointed.
I loved Coralie and her side of the story, how she grew up in the Museum of Extraordinary Things, how her innocence got stolen from her and finally to see her become strong enough to break away (her parts deserve 4 stars)
But the flip side of this coin was disappointment at the other protagonist, Eddie. I just didn’t connect with him or his troubles. The sections dealing with Eddie’s story made me very fidgety putting down this book and reading TWO other novels before revisiting this story.
What I did enjoy was the section describing the infamous Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire as I also recently read another book that dealt with this piece of history.
Unfortunately the love story also felt a bit forced to fit into the direction the author wanted the story to go and the ending was just too nicely wrapped-up for my liking BUT all in all it was not a bad reading experience.
This was a bit of a baffling read for me – I was both thrilled and disappointed.
I loved Coralie and her side of the story, how she grew up in the Museum of Extraordinary Things, how her innocence got stolen from her and finally to see her become strong enough to break away (her parts deserve 4 stars)
But the flip side of this coin was disappointment at the other protagonist, Eddie. I just didn’t connect with him or his troubles. The sections dealing with Eddie’s story made me very fidgety putting down this book and reading TWO other novels before revisiting this story.
What I did enjoy was the section describing the infamous Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire as I also recently read another book that dealt with this piece of history.
Unfortunately the love story also felt a bit forced to fit into the direction the author wanted the story to go and the ending was just too nicely wrapped-up for my liking BUT all in all it was not a bad reading experience.
As a thought provoking, interesting historical novel, I'm giving this a four. If I were to rate it as an Alice Hoffman book, (one of my favorite authors), I'm afraid it would have to be a bit lower. Though it became obvious to me in reading Hoffman's previous book, (The Dovekeepers) that she was making a commitment to Jewish history, doing extensive research, and providing a female viewpoint, part of me hoped that she would continue to do magical realism novels as well. In The Museum of Extraordinary Things, there's a hint of the magic/mystic, but it doesn't seem quite the same.
Hoffman's love of New York, her respect for her Jewish heritage, and the need to tell the old stories about abuses, child labor, poverty, and the will to overcome are apparent and beautifully handled in this book. It's well written, in a fashion that almost amounts to four voices, though from primarily just two viewpoints. It was easy to keep track of where I was in the story, despite this unusual way of telling the tale. The details of labor abuses are well-presented; so much so, that I found myself repeatedly realizing that the events she outlines, as well as the prevalent working conditions of the day, took place just a hair over 100 years ago. That fact kept coming to the forefront of my mind - these atrocities happened well within my grandfather's lifetime; not so far removed at all.
Hoffman's love of New York, her respect for her Jewish heritage, and the need to tell the old stories about abuses, child labor, poverty, and the will to overcome are apparent and beautifully handled in this book. It's well written, in a fashion that almost amounts to four voices, though from primarily just two viewpoints. It was easy to keep track of where I was in the story, despite this unusual way of telling the tale. The details of labor abuses are well-presented; so much so, that I found myself repeatedly realizing that the events she outlines, as well as the prevalent working conditions of the day, took place just a hair over 100 years ago. That fact kept coming to the forefront of my mind - these atrocities happened well within my grandfather's lifetime; not so far removed at all.
" ... a man had many lives. Each day we chose the path we would take by our own actions."
"He wondered if every criminal saw himself as the hero of his own story, and if every thankless son was convinced he'd been mistreated by his father."
"The future was spun from moments such as this. If she backed away, it might all unravel."
"I have faith in your father because he's a good man, and like every good man, he, too, has failed."
"Nearly every aspect of our daily lives had been affected by people who never knew our names."
"He wondered if every criminal saw himself as the hero of his own story, and if every thankless son was convinced he'd been mistreated by his father."
"The future was spun from moments such as this. If she backed away, it might all unravel."
"I have faith in your father because he's a good man, and like every good man, he, too, has failed."
"Nearly every aspect of our daily lives had been affected by people who never knew our names."
I thought this book was enchanting and well written, but it didn't have the spark I look for in extraordinary novels. The plot captured my attention throughout the book, but I ended up losing interest in character development toward the end! Overall a nice, easy, fun but dark(ish) read.
The saying goes that there are only 7 stories in the world and people just write variations of those 7 stories. This might be a new one. I have never read anything like this.
Story is unbelievable. Writing is repetitive. Transitions were not smooth at all; the book felt way too forced. And I seriously hated reading such long passages in italics! It made my eyes hurt!
Enthralling throughout with wonderfully flawed, sympathetic characters. A little unfocused throughout, but still very good.
I really enjoyed stepping back into 1910/11 New York City.
It took me a while to get into this story - enough that I almost gave up twice. But I'm glad I kept with it. I'm rewriting parts of it in my mind, but all in all I really enjoyed reading it.