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hannahlivre 's review for:
The Wonder
by Emma Donoghue
I LOVED this book. It took me awhile to get through...I rented the audiobook from the library, then the rental expired, and I had to wait to get it again, and during that time, I went through a litany of feelings about the characters and story.
But in the end, I think The Wonder, by Emma Donoghue, has the potential to be a classic. Towards the end of the novel, I had a moment where I realized..."this book is brilliant!" I can imagine students reading this in high school English class 20 years from now, and analyzing it as great literature.
So, with that preamble...here are a few more specifics about what I thought of The Wonder.
The setup for the story is that Lib, an English nurse, is hired to go spend two weeks in Ireland watching over a young girl who reportedly is able to exist without eating any food. Lib doesn't know anything about her position beforehand. She arrives in Ireland with all kinds of preconceptions about Ireland as a place of ignorance, poverty, sloth, and slovenliness. As an agnostic/atheist, she also finds Catholic religious beliefs and practices incomprehensible. So Lib, to say the least, does not have a high opinion of the family she is working for, or the girl who is, purportedly, "a wonder." However, as the story progresses, Lib's understanding of what is really happening around her will shift dramatically. The Wonder is spectacular in its subtlety. Without you as the reader realizing, it takes you into this deep examination of a whole lot of stuff...guilt, love, the long term impacts of suffering, the impacts of famine on a country, gender inequality. And, a whole lot more. The novel is this complex interweaving of a character study, as well as the study of a country, and a culture, and a historic time period.
There were times...perhaps half way through, in which I felt very frustrated and even depressed and disturbed. But I'm really glad I stuck with this. As the story progresses there is an increasing sense of urgency, and by the end, I was holding my breath. Ultimately, The Wonder left me very satisfied and with a lot to think about. It is definitely a story that is about so much more that any summary could contain. I'd highly recommend this and place it as one of my favorite books of the year.
But in the end, I think The Wonder, by Emma Donoghue, has the potential to be a classic. Towards the end of the novel, I had a moment where I realized..."this book is brilliant!" I can imagine students reading this in high school English class 20 years from now, and analyzing it as great literature.
So, with that preamble...here are a few more specifics about what I thought of The Wonder.
The setup for the story is that Lib, an English nurse, is hired to go spend two weeks in Ireland watching over a young girl who reportedly is able to exist without eating any food. Lib doesn't know anything about her position beforehand. She arrives in Ireland with all kinds of preconceptions about Ireland as a place of ignorance, poverty, sloth, and slovenliness. As an agnostic/atheist, she also finds Catholic religious beliefs and practices incomprehensible. So Lib, to say the least, does not have a high opinion of the family she is working for, or the girl who is, purportedly, "a wonder." However, as the story progresses, Lib's understanding of what is really happening around her will shift dramatically. The Wonder is spectacular in its subtlety. Without you as the reader realizing, it takes you into this deep examination of a whole lot of stuff...guilt, love, the long term impacts of suffering, the impacts of famine on a country, gender inequality. And, a whole lot more. The novel is this complex interweaving of a character study, as well as the study of a country, and a culture, and a historic time period.
There were times...perhaps half way through, in which I felt very frustrated and even depressed and disturbed. But I'm really glad I stuck with this. As the story progresses there is an increasing sense of urgency, and by the end, I was holding my breath. Ultimately, The Wonder left me very satisfied and with a lot to think about. It is definitely a story that is about so much more that any summary could contain. I'd highly recommend this and place it as one of my favorite books of the year.