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3.71 AVERAGE
3.71 AVERAGE
Good story, good plot, good suspense, and excellently segmented to boot-- I certainly enjoyed "Freedom". However Freedom lacks a certain poetry I have grown to need in a book. There was a great deal about music, childhood, bird, and mountains-- but the author never gets lost in their beauty. A couple delicately placed reveries would have saved it-- but at the end it could be replaced by a good TV show.
I'd be lying if I didn't admit to eye-rolling my way through most of this book... I felt like Jeff Tweedy, NPR, and the White Stripes, just to name a few examples, had no business being there. The Joey parts were nauseating and tedious and in my opinion would have been much more satisfying if he'd been trampled to death by one of the horses in Argentina. But it was fine... entertaining overall, cinematic, blah blah. I don't get a lot of time to read these days but when I do, I have a certain appreciation for easy-breezy novels like this, with just enough drama and humor to hold my interest without making me feel like I have to stay up all night to keep reading. (Full disclosure: I'm up most of the night with a six-month-old baby anyway... who needs fiction to be intellectually challenging?! Not me.)
dark
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Huh-whut?! My god I’ve never been so bored and annoyed at the same time. I, don’t get it?
This was definitely hard to put down, which was fun... and I felt like I recognized a lot of the characters since a lot of it is set in Minnesota.
Overall I liked it but I can say with absolute certainty that it wasn't my cup of tea. Things that were good: characterization. It was, without a doubt, incredibly consistent with its characters. They felt very real and really awful. This is where it succeeds. I didn't really enjoy the story arc so much. I think it might have something to do with the fact that, halfway through, I stopped caring what was going to happen in the story. I stayed for the characters.
Such a challenging book to read and the time line could be difficult to follow. I really liked the evolution of all the characters. I found the ending surprising, but could believe it.
There is certainly redemption in a variety of forms in this book and quite a lot to think about as far as how we relate to one another but good lord I did not like these characters at all. I literally don't think I could pick a single character I liked. I know some people like the study on humanity that these kinds of books are but I read to learn or escape from reality so... This was not my thing. Leslie Knope led me astray!