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3.67 AVERAGE
3.67 AVERAGE
challenging
funny
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
inspiring
mysterious
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:
Complicated
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-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
Why is it that when I find a book worthy of five stars I'm at a loss for words, and can't write anything sensible about it? Well, let's just say that I fell head over heels with Capote after this one. One hundred percent more skill than his friend Harper Lee. The way Capote uses words is simple yet it creates a strong sense of place. The lack of plot doesn't really matter for me personally, because there's everything I could ever need from a Southern Gothic novel. Eccentric characters, ambiguous sexuality, abandoned houses, weird stories told by even weirder people, suffocating sense of alienation, dream-like sequences and overall cigarette and brandy fumed melancholia.
After putting this book off for more than a month so that it would fit within The Literary Others reading event and after it sat on my shelf since I purchased it from the 2011 Boston Book Festival I’ve finally gotten around to reading it. I’m not really sure if it was worth the build up to keep putting it off, but it was an interesting read. In addition to being a part of The Literary Others Event it also counts towards my Mount TBR Reading Challenge (23/25)!
This is only the second Capote work I’ve read and it was very different compared to In Cold Blood, which I read before I started this blog. Other Voices, Other Rooms is Capote’s first published novel and is semi-autobiographical. You can definitely see the personal influence from the effeminate young boy to the faded rich southern decadence you catch glimpses of throughout.
It did take a while to adapt to the writing style, but I did adapt to it. I thoroughly enjoyed the story even if there were parts that were unsettling. I mean someone gets shot, there’s a suicide (but a very odd one), what a midget woman who sexually molests young boys, there might be ghosts, there are definitely phantoms and southern decadence in decay is heavily prevalent. I’ve always been a fan of Southern Fiction and the older I get the more I find myself reading it.
Continue reading on my book blog at geoffwhaley.com.
This is only the second Capote work I’ve read and it was very different compared to In Cold Blood, which I read before I started this blog. Other Voices, Other Rooms is Capote’s first published novel and is semi-autobiographical. You can definitely see the personal influence from the effeminate young boy to the faded rich southern decadence you catch glimpses of throughout.
It did take a while to adapt to the writing style, but I did adapt to it. I thoroughly enjoyed the story even if there were parts that were unsettling. I mean someone gets shot, there’s a suicide (but a very odd one), what a midget woman who sexually molests young boys, there might be ghosts, there are definitely phantoms and southern decadence in decay is heavily prevalent. I’ve always been a fan of Southern Fiction and the older I get the more I find myself reading it.
Continue reading on my book blog at geoffwhaley.com.
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
A modern classic that doesn't really live up to it. Poetically written, but goes nowhere. Reminiscent of The Catcher in the Rye in its pacing and musings, but has a little more plot and more characters.
Capote was only 23-24 when he wrote it, and yet he exists in two of its autobiographical characters — Joel, the young teenager, and his uncle Randolph, the theatrical, narcissistic, unstable alcoholic that prefigures the role Capote would play in his own life. Or so it struck me.
Other Voices, Other Rooms is a coming-of-age novel but I felt there was no real plot or point; I struggled to understand what was happening for half the novel. I’d finally feel I got to grips with it and understood what was happening, only to turn the page and feel lost all over again. I feel like this novel was meant to be a profound piece of literature but it felt a bit like Capote tried too hard, tried to be too poetic and mysterious and totally lost me, as a reader, along the way.
Other Voices, Other Rooms is a coming-of-age novel but I felt there was no real plot or point; I struggled to understand what was happening for half the novel. I’d finally feel I got to grips with it and understood what was happening, only to turn the page and feel lost all over again. I feel like this novel was meant to be a profound piece of literature but it felt a bit like Capote tried too hard, tried to be too poetic and mysterious and totally lost me, as a reader, along the way.
I love Truman Capote. Love.
Quote-- "When twilight shadows the sky it is as if a soft bell were tolling dismissal, for a gloomy hush stills all, and the busy voices fall silent like birds at sunset."
Quote-- "When twilight shadows the sky it is as if a soft bell were tolling dismissal, for a gloomy hush stills all, and the busy voices fall silent like birds at sunset."
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Some of the writing was really beautiful, but Capote meanders around veiled themes, traumas, and metaphors a bit too much.