Let me start by saying that I loved this book.
When I read, I dog-ear the bottom corner of each page that I enjoy so I can return to them while writing my blog entries. For this book I started dog-ear-ring on page 45 and gave up on page 71 since it was nearly every page. I think I noticed this book on Slate.com's booklist, although once I started reading it, I realized I had also read excerpts from it in the New York Times Magazine a few months back.
The book interweaves two stories. One is of the aggressively rising salaries of the left tackle in football, tracing the history back to Lawrence Taylor's dominance as a defensive lineman. Now, if you are reading that sentence and don't know what a left tackle or defensive lineman is, don't despair. One of Lewis' gifts is his ability to explain what is going on in the strategy of a football play without dumbing it down. I started the book knowing just how the scoring works in football, but little else. By the end of the book, I had learned a significant amount about football, prompting me to wake up my ever-agreeable fiancee Webster one night and have him draw out all the players and their positions. Did you know that unlike baseball, the offensive and defensive players are different guys??
The second story Lewis tells is of the high school career of a black child named Michael growing up in inner city Memphis. "Big Mike" is discovered as a football prospect, and then adopted by an affluent white family and placed in a suburban Christian high school.
It's Mike's size that first attracts attention (although his agility and his memorization skills follow shortly after), "Hugh's next thought was that he misjudged the boy's mass. No human being who moved that quickly could possibly weigh as much as 300 pounds. 'That's when I had them weigh him,' said Hugh. 'One of the coaches took him into the gym and put him on the scale, but he overloaded the scale.' The team doctor drove him away and put him on what the Briarcrest coaches were later informed was a cattle scale: 344 pounds, it read. On the light side, for a cow, delightfully beefy for a hgih school sophomore football player. Especially one who could run."
Many issues around affirmative action, privilege, and education are themes throughout the book. Unlike other books I've read that cover the same subject matter, Lewis describes the situations incredibly clearly, and the ethical concerns are laid out for the reader with no prejudice in any particular direction. One way he does this is through his descriptions of the other people in the story, "Leigh Anne Tuohy [his adoptive mother] was trying to do for one boy what economists had been trying to do, with little success, for less developed countries for the last fifty years. Kick him out of one growth path and onto another."
In another passage, Lewis writes, "Sean [his adoptive father] was interested in poor jocks in the same way that a former diva might be interestd in opera singers, or a Jesuit scholar in debators. What he liked about them was that he knew how to help them. 'What I learned playing basketball at Ole Miss,' he said, 'was what not to do: beat up a kid. It's easy to beat up a kid. The hard thing to do is to build him up.'"
I am still unsure of Lewis' opinion on the issues surrounding Michael's getting into college and subsequent college career, which is fine with me. As a mark of a good book, I am unsure of my own opinion on some of these issues as well. But I have not stopped thinking about him. I have nothing but praise for this book, and can't wait to read his baseball book, Moneyball. My only regret is that football season isn't for another several months, so I won't be able to apply what I learned in this book.
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See
This book was also on the New York Times list for 2006 (or was it Slate.com?). I really enjoyed the story and the cultural background that See so skillfully painted. It could have been just another "Ya-Ya sisterhood," or just a depiction of 19th century Hunan province, or just a coming-of-age story, but it was all of those things and more.
This story follows two "Old Sames" -- girls matched at a young age as soul mates based on the characters in their names and on the dates of their birth. As the narrator (Lily) says early on in the book, "How could we conceive of deep love, friendship, and everlasting commitment when we were only seven? We had not even met, and even if we had, we didn't understand those feelings one bit. They were just words I wrote, hoping that one day they would come true."
Old Sames are just one of the structured women's friendships mentioned in the book. Other characters are part of "sworn sisterhoods" after marriage as an alternative. A women's writing style called Nu Shu also played a central role in the story. Women wrote to each other in this poetic language. Lily and her Old Same pass a fan back and forth on which they correspond in Nu Shu.
The story begins when the girls are seven and follows them through their senior years, which in the 1800s in rural China is actually about 50. During their lifetimes, the girls have parallel experiences with footbinding, marriage, sexuality, the pressure to have sons, and the changing political (and thus economic) climate. See plays with fate and destiny through the book, leaving Lily to comment at one point, "But this is the nature of fate. You make choices that are good and sound, but the gods have other plans for you."
The scenes that describe the girls' footbinding are especially memorable. I had read about footbinding in the past, but the mechanics were explained in complete and grotesque detail. Also memorable were the relationships between the girls and their mothers-in-law...what they described as fair treatment sounded downright abusive to me. Later in the book, the women make a treacherous trek through the mountains during the Taiping Rebellion which has some unforgettable scenes.
My only negative criticism of the book is the occasional modern idiom that Lily used. Her voice sounded otherwise authentic, but I think the editing missed a few phrases. This surprised me, since the book was obviously well-researched and carefully thought out.
I would definitely recommend this book. Bring your passport -- you will be transported to 19th century China.
This story follows two "Old Sames" -- girls matched at a young age as soul mates based on the characters in their names and on the dates of their birth. As the narrator (Lily) says early on in the book, "How could we conceive of deep love, friendship, and everlasting commitment when we were only seven? We had not even met, and even if we had, we didn't understand those feelings one bit. They were just words I wrote, hoping that one day they would come true."
Old Sames are just one of the structured women's friendships mentioned in the book. Other characters are part of "sworn sisterhoods" after marriage as an alternative. A women's writing style called Nu Shu also played a central role in the story. Women wrote to each other in this poetic language. Lily and her Old Same pass a fan back and forth on which they correspond in Nu Shu.
The story begins when the girls are seven and follows them through their senior years, which in the 1800s in rural China is actually about 50. During their lifetimes, the girls have parallel experiences with footbinding, marriage, sexuality, the pressure to have sons, and the changing political (and thus economic) climate. See plays with fate and destiny through the book, leaving Lily to comment at one point, "But this is the nature of fate. You make choices that are good and sound, but the gods have other plans for you."
The scenes that describe the girls' footbinding are especially memorable. I had read about footbinding in the past, but the mechanics were explained in complete and grotesque detail. Also memorable were the relationships between the girls and their mothers-in-law...what they described as fair treatment sounded downright abusive to me. Later in the book, the women make a treacherous trek through the mountains during the Taiping Rebellion which has some unforgettable scenes.
My only negative criticism of the book is the occasional modern idiom that Lily used. Her voice sounded otherwise authentic, but I think the editing missed a few phrases. This surprised me, since the book was obviously well-researched and carefully thought out.
I would definitely recommend this book. Bring your passport -- you will be transported to 19th century China.
Sunday, February 11, 2007
My Name Is Bill by Susan Cheever
I heard about this book on NPR, when Susan Cheever was being interviewed about a more recently published book. Having read several books about about addiction and recovery, I decided to learn a little more about the life of Bill Wilson, the co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous.
The first half of this book was about Bill's early life, and there were many characteristics of his upbringing that probably reinforced his alcoholic tendencies. He was a guy who strove for perfection, never felt comfortable in his own skin, and who had low self esteem and a mother with high expectations. Bill seemed to develop an alcoholism that was in part a product of the puritanical New England world he grew up in.
The later part of the book covered both Bill's evolution as an alcoholic (and ultimately recovering alcoholic) as well as the evolution of the organization that became Alcoholics Anonymous. There was a lot of administrative conflict within the organization which was discussed. As a business person I found the sections around how AA was conceived and the arguments around the mission of AA very interesting.
While the story was inspiring, I was not a fan of Cheever's writing style. She was too poetic at times, and sometimes it seemed like she was working too hard to tell a specific story. Early in the book, she told several anecdotes out of chronological order, which I did not like. These factors made me feel like I should have considered one of the other biographies about Bill that had been written. (I would definitely like to read Bill's wife's biography -- she was the founder of Al-anon.)
As someone whose main exposure to AA was through NYPD Blue episodes, I enjoyed learning about the spirit of the group and some of the thought behind it. I was interested to learn that Bill insisted on anonymity not just to protect the members, but also to protect the organization. There are strong connections between alcoholics and grandiosity, so anonymity removes the potential for fame. Bill himself even turned down an honorary degree from Yale to ensure the validity of AA.
I also enjoyed thinking about what makes meetings effective. Webster suggested it was knowing that you were not alone, and that you were answering to a room of people depending on you. In the book there was also a lot of discussion of the importance in AA of recovering alcoholics helping other people to get sober. There were several years while Bill was starting AA before it was successful when all it was doing was keeping him sober.
This book sparked my curiosity not only about Al-anon, but also to read about how the philosophy of AA translated to Narcotics Anonymous, Overeaters Anonymous, and the other similar organizations. I was also interested to investigate Cheevers's dismissive treatment of whether AA works for non-religious people. I remember hearing about an organization that was atheistic rather than deistic (like AA) and wonder what percentage of alcoholics recover through the 12-step methods from AA specifically.
The first half of this book was about Bill's early life, and there were many characteristics of his upbringing that probably reinforced his alcoholic tendencies. He was a guy who strove for perfection, never felt comfortable in his own skin, and who had low self esteem and a mother with high expectations. Bill seemed to develop an alcoholism that was in part a product of the puritanical New England world he grew up in.
The later part of the book covered both Bill's evolution as an alcoholic (and ultimately recovering alcoholic) as well as the evolution of the organization that became Alcoholics Anonymous. There was a lot of administrative conflict within the organization which was discussed. As a business person I found the sections around how AA was conceived and the arguments around the mission of AA very interesting.
While the story was inspiring, I was not a fan of Cheever's writing style. She was too poetic at times, and sometimes it seemed like she was working too hard to tell a specific story. Early in the book, she told several anecdotes out of chronological order, which I did not like. These factors made me feel like I should have considered one of the other biographies about Bill that had been written. (I would definitely like to read Bill's wife's biography -- she was the founder of Al-anon.)
As someone whose main exposure to AA was through NYPD Blue episodes, I enjoyed learning about the spirit of the group and some of the thought behind it. I was interested to learn that Bill insisted on anonymity not just to protect the members, but also to protect the organization. There are strong connections between alcoholics and grandiosity, so anonymity removes the potential for fame. Bill himself even turned down an honorary degree from Yale to ensure the validity of AA.
I also enjoyed thinking about what makes meetings effective. Webster suggested it was knowing that you were not alone, and that you were answering to a room of people depending on you. In the book there was also a lot of discussion of the importance in AA of recovering alcoholics helping other people to get sober. There were several years while Bill was starting AA before it was successful when all it was doing was keeping him sober.
This book sparked my curiosity not only about Al-anon, but also to read about how the philosophy of AA translated to Narcotics Anonymous, Overeaters Anonymous, and the other similar organizations. I was also interested to investigate Cheevers's dismissive treatment of whether AA works for non-religious people. I remember hearing about an organization that was atheistic rather than deistic (like AA) and wonder what percentage of alcoholics recover through the 12-step methods from AA specifically.
Friday, February 09, 2007
The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards
Finally, a book I liked reading. This one made it on to my booklist from the New York Times’ 2006 best-books list, I think.
Memory Keeper’s Daughter told the story of a couple who have twins, and the husband discovers that the daughter has Downs Syndrome. He decides to tell his wife that she died at birth and gives her away, ostensibly to live in an institution. However, the nurse charged with bringing her to the institution decides to keep her instead. So far we are on page 20, so I’m not ruining anything for you.
This book had a significant number of well-written characters, at least seven. Following their lives over thirty years is no small feat, but Edwards does a great job of it. And the book ends up being only marginally about Downs Syndrome, although it is worth mentioning that the attitudes towards D.S. in the 1960s and ‘70s portrayed in the book are disturbing. This book is about what all great books are about: love, betrayal, siblings, marriages, regret, and so on.
There were some great contrasts in this book, between the mothers of the babies (Caroline and Norah), the fathers of each of the children, the birth mother and her sister, and of course the children themselves as they grow up. I’ve been thinking a lot about how siblings can often reveal an alternate version of one’s self, a more extreme or less extreme picture of one’s fears and desires. This book takes that concept and applies it to all the parallel characters masterfully.
Caroline, the mother of the child with Downs, was probably my favorite character, and I think she is supposed to be. One of the things about her I loved is that she sees her struggles as a mother as specific to her child’s disability. It is clear to the reader (partially through the contrasts to Norah, the other mother) that these concerns are specific to mothering, not to mothering a child with Downs. As she learns this through the story, one cannot help but think about one’s own pains and examine whether they are unique to us or more universal.
There was also just some plain great writing in the book. At one point, a character's sister asks her, “Do you and David talk about big things or small things.” At another point, one of the characters "nodded, unable to speak above the sound of the river, the smell of its dark banks, the starts roaring everywhere, swirling, alive." Though this is not a short book, at times Edwards says a lot with a few carefully chosen words.
Towards the end of the book, Norah finds boxes of photographs that her husband had kept. "Norah glanced at the boxes of photographs, wanting to take that young woman she had been by the arm and shake her gently. Keep going, she wanted to tell her. Don't give up. Your life will be fine in the end."
And for many of the characters, it is.
Memory Keeper’s Daughter told the story of a couple who have twins, and the husband discovers that the daughter has Downs Syndrome. He decides to tell his wife that she died at birth and gives her away, ostensibly to live in an institution. However, the nurse charged with bringing her to the institution decides to keep her instead. So far we are on page 20, so I’m not ruining anything for you.
This book had a significant number of well-written characters, at least seven. Following their lives over thirty years is no small feat, but Edwards does a great job of it. And the book ends up being only marginally about Downs Syndrome, although it is worth mentioning that the attitudes towards D.S. in the 1960s and ‘70s portrayed in the book are disturbing. This book is about what all great books are about: love, betrayal, siblings, marriages, regret, and so on.
There were some great contrasts in this book, between the mothers of the babies (Caroline and Norah), the fathers of each of the children, the birth mother and her sister, and of course the children themselves as they grow up. I’ve been thinking a lot about how siblings can often reveal an alternate version of one’s self, a more extreme or less extreme picture of one’s fears and desires. This book takes that concept and applies it to all the parallel characters masterfully.
Caroline, the mother of the child with Downs, was probably my favorite character, and I think she is supposed to be. One of the things about her I loved is that she sees her struggles as a mother as specific to her child’s disability. It is clear to the reader (partially through the contrasts to Norah, the other mother) that these concerns are specific to mothering, not to mothering a child with Downs. As she learns this through the story, one cannot help but think about one’s own pains and examine whether they are unique to us or more universal.
There was also just some plain great writing in the book. At one point, a character's sister asks her, “Do you and David talk about big things or small things.” At another point, one of the characters "nodded, unable to speak above the sound of the river, the smell of its dark banks, the starts roaring everywhere, swirling, alive." Though this is not a short book, at times Edwards says a lot with a few carefully chosen words.
Towards the end of the book, Norah finds boxes of photographs that her husband had kept. "Norah glanced at the boxes of photographs, wanting to take that young woman she had been by the arm and shake her gently. Keep going, she wanted to tell her. Don't give up. Your life will be fine in the end."
And for many of the characters, it is.
Sunday, February 04, 2007
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
This book first came to my attention as an Amazon recommendation. I recognized it from the Barnes and Noble table that has the Oprah-esque trade paperbacks I usually enjoy. The Haftorah for my bat mitvah was about the city of Gilead, so I thought I might also have a connection to the book that way. Unfortunately, it’s probably my least favorite book in a long time.
Gilead is a novel written as a series of letters (or maybe one long letter) from a minister to his son, when the father finds out that he is dying. It is set in Iowa in the 1950's. The letter format is a device the author uses to enable the narrator to tell his life story; unfortunately for the book it is not believable that this man’s secrets and concerns would go into a letter to his son.
The first third of the book goes through the minister's life story slowly, weaving his family's stories with mundane events taking place in the present. I enjoyed this part of the book, expecting that it was properly preparing the reader for what he’d face later in life. Many of the stories were charming and some of them captured charaters with incredible detail.
"Once we baptized a litter of cats. They were dusty little barn cats just steady on their legs, the kind of waifish creatures that live their anonymouse lives keeping the mice down and have no interest in humans at all, except to avoid them. But the animals all seem to start out sociable, so we were always pleased to find new kittens prowling out of whatever cranny their mother had tried to hide them in, as ready to play we we were. It occurred to one of the girls to swaddle them up in a doll's dress--there was only one dress, which was just as well since the cats could hardly tolerate a moment in it and would have to have been unswaddled as soon as they were christened in any case. I myself moistened their brow, repeating the full Trinitarian formula."
However, at about the third-mark, the narrator begins to hint at bad feelings he has towards his best friend’s grown son, Jack. The focus of the plot in the remainder of the book is foreshadowing the events Jack is involved in and finally telling his son (and the reader) what they are. While the actual story about Jack was compelling and surprising and everything you’d want it to be, its placement in a letter someone else was writing was not well done. And the supposed suspense around what it was, the supposed hesitancy the narrator had about telling his son the story, did not achieve anything.
This is the second book in a row that I’ve commented had the reader wondering about some future bad thing that was going to happen through most of the book. In both cases, the focus the author put on this anticipation and buildup was not enjoyable to read. It’s not a fundamentally flawed style, for example, God of Small Things does this quite effectively. But particularly in Gilead it had me impatient, not engaged.
One thing I did like about the book was the actual narrator. He comes across as a humble, pleasant, kind man. Though fictional, he restored a little faith in me that in fact there is a way for religion to be a completely positive force in the world. He reminds me of a minister I once met on a plane to Kansas. That said, the book was hardly worth the read just for the narrator.
Gilead is a novel written as a series of letters (or maybe one long letter) from a minister to his son, when the father finds out that he is dying. It is set in Iowa in the 1950's. The letter format is a device the author uses to enable the narrator to tell his life story; unfortunately for the book it is not believable that this man’s secrets and concerns would go into a letter to his son.
The first third of the book goes through the minister's life story slowly, weaving his family's stories with mundane events taking place in the present. I enjoyed this part of the book, expecting that it was properly preparing the reader for what he’d face later in life. Many of the stories were charming and some of them captured charaters with incredible detail.
"Once we baptized a litter of cats. They were dusty little barn cats just steady on their legs, the kind of waifish creatures that live their anonymouse lives keeping the mice down and have no interest in humans at all, except to avoid them. But the animals all seem to start out sociable, so we were always pleased to find new kittens prowling out of whatever cranny their mother had tried to hide them in, as ready to play we we were. It occurred to one of the girls to swaddle them up in a doll's dress--there was only one dress, which was just as well since the cats could hardly tolerate a moment in it and would have to have been unswaddled as soon as they were christened in any case. I myself moistened their brow, repeating the full Trinitarian formula."
However, at about the third-mark, the narrator begins to hint at bad feelings he has towards his best friend’s grown son, Jack. The focus of the plot in the remainder of the book is foreshadowing the events Jack is involved in and finally telling his son (and the reader) what they are. While the actual story about Jack was compelling and surprising and everything you’d want it to be, its placement in a letter someone else was writing was not well done. And the supposed suspense around what it was, the supposed hesitancy the narrator had about telling his son the story, did not achieve anything.
This is the second book in a row that I’ve commented had the reader wondering about some future bad thing that was going to happen through most of the book. In both cases, the focus the author put on this anticipation and buildup was not enjoyable to read. It’s not a fundamentally flawed style, for example, God of Small Things does this quite effectively. But particularly in Gilead it had me impatient, not engaged.
One thing I did like about the book was the actual narrator. He comes across as a humble, pleasant, kind man. Though fictional, he restored a little faith in me that in fact there is a way for religion to be a completely positive force in the world. He reminds me of a minister I once met on a plane to Kansas. That said, the book was hardly worth the read just for the narrator.
Thursday, February 01, 2007
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
This was an unusual book, which reminded me almost immediately of Atwood’s The Handmaiden’s Tale. Lisa Olin and Sara Coe each recommended this one to me, so it quickly rose the top of the to-be-read list. I had never read Remains of the Day by Ishiguro but I ignored my standard guilt at skipping a classic by the same author and plucked NLMG off the shelf at the library.
As Lisa said when she recommended it, the book is good but is not about what’s on the book jacket. I’m going to try to write about the book without giving away the major pieces of the plot. It’s ironic, or coincidental, or something, because in the book, the characters are referred to as having been “told but not told” about the unusual circumstances under which they live.
I would categorize this book as “mainstream science fiction,” in that it is science fiction incidentally not primarily. (I’d also categorize The Time Travelers Wife and a childhood favorite Girl with the Silver Eyes similarly. Even Passages, which probably falls more squarely in the fantasy realm could be described this way too.) There are elements of the book that are not possible with today’s science and medicine but these aspects of the story are juxtaposed with people who live in a society that is otherwise recognizable as ours. Certainly, social commentary emerges. One of the things Ishiguro does quite well is to effortlessly teach the reader his specialized vocabulary for this alternate world. Only in Handmaiden and perhaps Everything is Illuminated have I seen language used this way this well.
The book follows three main characters, Kath (the narrator), Tommy, and Ruth, starting when they are all students at Hailsham, ostensibly an idyllic boarding school. There are clear, well-written moments of adolescent angst; the manipulation and volatility of some of the characters also felt extremely accurate. I also related to the following passage, highlighting the importance of certain possessions:
"I don't know if you had collections where you were. When you came across old students from Hailsham, you always find them, sooner or later, getting nostalgic about their collections...You each had a wooden chest with your name on it, which you kept under your bed and filled with your possessions--the stuff you acquired from the Sales or the Exchanges. I can remember one or two students not bothering much with their collections, but most of us took enormous care, bringing things out to display, putting other things away carefully."
At first it is easy to read those personality characteristics as standard pre-teen behavior but as the book progresses, additional underlying forces emerge that explain the behavior more fully. As the narrator comments, the students are "...waiting for the moment when you realise you really are different to them; that there are people out there, like Madame, who don't hate you or wish you any harm, but who nevertheless shudder at the very thought of you--of how you were brought into this world and why--and who dread the idea of your hand brushing against theirs." Waiting and anticipation was a strong theme in this book. At a later point in the story, the narrator comments, "it was like she'd been waiting and waiting for me to do something to her and she thought the time had come now."
The characters know, having been "told but not told," that something ominous is coming. In one passage, Tommy is describing a new type of animal he had begun to draw, unconsciously describing society's responsibility to him:
"If you make them tiny, and you have to because the pages are only about this big, then everything changes. It's like they come to life by themselves. Then you have to draw in all these different details for them. You have to think about how they'd protect themselves, how they'd reach things."
There were some choices Ishiguro made around Kath's voice that I question. Given his (the author’s) recognition for excellent writing, I can only presume that the tone of her voice is intentional. However, the lack of emotional connection that Kath has in telling the story is surprising and not entirely justified from within the story. She also has a habit that I can only describe as annoying where she ends each chapter with a “teaser” such as, "We started to walk back toward the main house then and I waited for her to explain what she meant, but she didn't. I found out though over the next several days." In some ways, this mirrors the imperfect information that the characters have about their own lives, but it didn’t draw me in to her story as I think it was supposed to.
I hesitate to even comment on the climax because I don't want to give it away. I'll limit my comments to the following: the climactic moments are wonderful and horrible, and a scary commentary on the myths we create for ourselves.
I struggled while I was reading this book because of my problems with the narrator. However, having written about it here I appreciate the story and the themes more. As I felt after seeing The Sixth Sense , I want to go back and read it again knowing the ending. That's probably the best recommendation I can give a book.
As Lisa said when she recommended it, the book is good but is not about what’s on the book jacket. I’m going to try to write about the book without giving away the major pieces of the plot. It’s ironic, or coincidental, or something, because in the book, the characters are referred to as having been “told but not told” about the unusual circumstances under which they live.
I would categorize this book as “mainstream science fiction,” in that it is science fiction incidentally not primarily. (I’d also categorize The Time Travelers Wife and a childhood favorite Girl with the Silver Eyes similarly. Even Passages, which probably falls more squarely in the fantasy realm could be described this way too.) There are elements of the book that are not possible with today’s science and medicine but these aspects of the story are juxtaposed with people who live in a society that is otherwise recognizable as ours. Certainly, social commentary emerges. One of the things Ishiguro does quite well is to effortlessly teach the reader his specialized vocabulary for this alternate world. Only in Handmaiden and perhaps Everything is Illuminated have I seen language used this way this well.
The book follows three main characters, Kath (the narrator), Tommy, and Ruth, starting when they are all students at Hailsham, ostensibly an idyllic boarding school. There are clear, well-written moments of adolescent angst; the manipulation and volatility of some of the characters also felt extremely accurate. I also related to the following passage, highlighting the importance of certain possessions:
"I don't know if you had collections where you were. When you came across old students from Hailsham, you always find them, sooner or later, getting nostalgic about their collections...You each had a wooden chest with your name on it, which you kept under your bed and filled with your possessions--the stuff you acquired from the Sales or the Exchanges. I can remember one or two students not bothering much with their collections, but most of us took enormous care, bringing things out to display, putting other things away carefully."
At first it is easy to read those personality characteristics as standard pre-teen behavior but as the book progresses, additional underlying forces emerge that explain the behavior more fully. As the narrator comments, the students are "...waiting for the moment when you realise you really are different to them; that there are people out there, like Madame, who don't hate you or wish you any harm, but who nevertheless shudder at the very thought of you--of how you were brought into this world and why--and who dread the idea of your hand brushing against theirs." Waiting and anticipation was a strong theme in this book. At a later point in the story, the narrator comments, "it was like she'd been waiting and waiting for me to do something to her and she thought the time had come now."
The characters know, having been "told but not told," that something ominous is coming. In one passage, Tommy is describing a new type of animal he had begun to draw, unconsciously describing society's responsibility to him:
"If you make them tiny, and you have to because the pages are only about this big, then everything changes. It's like they come to life by themselves. Then you have to draw in all these different details for them. You have to think about how they'd protect themselves, how they'd reach things."
There were some choices Ishiguro made around Kath's voice that I question. Given his (the author’s) recognition for excellent writing, I can only presume that the tone of her voice is intentional. However, the lack of emotional connection that Kath has in telling the story is surprising and not entirely justified from within the story. She also has a habit that I can only describe as annoying where she ends each chapter with a “teaser” such as, "We started to walk back toward the main house then and I waited for her to explain what she meant, but she didn't. I found out though over the next several days." In some ways, this mirrors the imperfect information that the characters have about their own lives, but it didn’t draw me in to her story as I think it was supposed to.
I hesitate to even comment on the climax because I don't want to give it away. I'll limit my comments to the following: the climactic moments are wonderful and horrible, and a scary commentary on the myths we create for ourselves.
I struggled while I was reading this book because of my problems with the narrator. However, having written about it here I appreciate the story and the themes more. As I felt after seeing The Sixth Sense , I want to go back and read it again knowing the ending. That's probably the best recommendation I can give a book.
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