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A review by amber_lea84
The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster
3.0
So about 14 years ago a friend told me this was one of the best books he ever read and I immediately ran out and bought a copy.
This is my thing. When I like someone, I ask them their favorite books and then I immediately buy those books and squirrel them away. My room is full of everyone's favorite books, and I've only read about 1/3 of them. It's a problem?
Anyway, I finally read this one, and it's about a kid who's depressed, and then he comes home from school to find a box with a tollbooth inside and some instructions on how to use it. He goes on a ridiculous journey to an imaginary place where barely anything makes sense and in the end (spoiler alert?) he learns to find joy in the little things and life doesn't seem quite so dull.
Honestly, it's a little too whimsical and silly for me, and I felt like it could have been even more clever (I wanted the jokes to be more like, "haha, we're making fun of real things people do that don't make sense" and less "haha, we're taking things very literally and stretching our imaginations to the limit"), but it's still a unique book with funny jokes and a good message so I don't want to be too hard on it.
Also, I always appreciate a good jump to conclusions joke.
This is my thing. When I like someone, I ask them their favorite books and then I immediately buy those books and squirrel them away. My room is full of everyone's favorite books, and I've only read about 1/3 of them. It's a problem?
Anyway, I finally read this one, and it's about a kid who's depressed, and then he comes home from school to find a box with a tollbooth inside and some instructions on how to use it. He goes on a ridiculous journey to an imaginary place where barely anything makes sense and in the end (spoiler alert?) he learns to find joy in the little things and life doesn't seem quite so dull.
Honestly, it's a little too whimsical and silly for me, and I felt like it could have been even more clever (I wanted the jokes to be more like, "haha, we're making fun of real things people do that don't make sense" and less "haha, we're taking things very literally and stretching our imaginations to the limit"), but it's still a unique book with funny jokes and a good message so I don't want to be too hard on it.
Also, I always appreciate a good jump to conclusions joke.