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A review by jimmylorunning
A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes
5.0
This is one of the best books I have ever fucking read. Don't even read this review... Just go read the book already! Then you can come back and read the rest of this review.
First of all the subject matter cannot be better: pirates, kids, pigs, monkeys, goats, earthquakes, hurricanes, clue-less adults.
Secondly, it's the language, stupid! The language is so fucking great. Hughes sometimes forms the most un-intelligeable sentences with the weirdest fucking words, but string them up in a way that gets across something you wouldn't get with a sensible one.
Next, the narrator: he is so funny. He's always coming in at odd times to tell us his opinion, but rarely outright. He's subtle about it.
Also, the book is full of surprises. Every other chapter presents a weird twist. But it's not a plot-heavy book, by that I mean it doesn't rely on the plot or the twists to make it good. Considering the 500-pages worth of shit that happens in this 200-page book, it is surprisingly leisurely and pleasantly aimless in its plot, until closer to the end.
This book is brilliantly crafted to lull you into one state while shocking you constantly out of it.
This book resists to the very end in giving you the sentimentalism you want, in giving in to your pre-conceived ideas of how things should be. And for that it is pure genius.
This book is entertaining in that page-turning way, to the highest degree.
This book is often laugh out loud funny.
This book does not moralize. It is light reading, but also very heavy if you want to read into it. But most of all, it is light.
There is no lull in this book. It goes straight through.
First of all the subject matter cannot be better: pirates, kids, pigs, monkeys, goats, earthquakes, hurricanes, clue-less adults.
Secondly, it's the language, stupid! The language is so fucking great. Hughes sometimes forms the most un-intelligeable sentences with the weirdest fucking words, but string them up in a way that gets across something you wouldn't get with a sensible one.
Next, the narrator: he is so funny. He's always coming in at odd times to tell us his opinion, but rarely outright. He's subtle about it.
Also, the book is full of surprises. Every other chapter presents a weird twist. But it's not a plot-heavy book, by that I mean it doesn't rely on the plot or the twists to make it good. Considering the 500-pages worth of shit that happens in this 200-page book, it is surprisingly leisurely and pleasantly aimless in its plot, until closer to the end.
This book is brilliantly crafted to lull you into one state while shocking you constantly out of it.
This book resists to the very end in giving you the sentimentalism you want, in giving in to your pre-conceived ideas of how things should be. And for that it is pure genius.
This book is entertaining in that page-turning way, to the highest degree.
This book is often laugh out loud funny.
This book does not moralize. It is light reading, but also very heavy if you want to read into it. But most of all, it is light.
There is no lull in this book. It goes straight through.