Atonement
I finally finished my second summer reading book and I finally have something new to add on to my favorite book list! YESSSSss!
I'm going to do a quick recap so I remember this book in the future, so here goes. It's a really really descriptive, admittedly overly descriptive in the middle, narrative from several perspectives. Briony is sort of the person in control of the story, but you don't realize it until the end. Each chapter is a different person's perspective and the story doesn't progress (uh, I can't think of the word so I'm going to use the one that comes to mind) smoothly.. or progressively in time, I guess, is better. You have to put the story together and keep in mind how each person's perspective fits into the overall storyline. It was confusing and a bitch to read at first, but now that I finished the book, I really admire the writing.
So storyline & total spoiler: Briony as a child witnesses her sister Cecelia and the cleaninglady's son Robbie having sex. Because she's only 13 and still incredibly naive, she misinterprets couple in the throes as Robbie attacking her sister. In the same night, her cousin gets raped, and she automatically assumes that the figure she saw in the starlight was Robbie because Robbie seemed like a maniac. The police are called up, Robbie gets arrested, no one except for Cecelia believes he's innocent. The story jumps to a long segment where a third person omnicient narrates about Robbie's accounts in France during World War II. That part was boring and pointlessly descriptive because it didn't help the last bit of the story. The story then goes back to Briony when she's 18 and serving as a nurse. She eventually finds her sister Cecelia, who moved away after Robbie was arrested and shunned the rest of her family, and talks about how she wants to clear Robbie's name. At that time, Robbie was already back from France, and Briony apologizes and all that crap. Robbie and Cecelia devised a plan for Briony to follow in an attempt to clear Robbie's name. Then the book jumps to 1999 when Briony is really old and having her 77th birthday party at her old house which was turned into a hotel. It's then that it is revealed that Robbie and her sister died soon after that one last encounter.
The cool thing about the book was that the book I was reading was the book that she spent 60+ years writing about the day she falsely incriminated Robbie. The author doesn't say it, but it's implied, and really subtly, too.
Atonement was really well written, in my opinion. A lot of writers these days have such a casual tone in their books. Everything is always about the story line and the voice of the novel never seems as important as the surprise in the storyline at the end of the book. This book, however, was well written AND an has an incredible storyline. The only negative thing I have to say about this book is that it's a bit too descriptive at some parts, making it hard to read and remember what else is going on in the storyline. Sometimes, in the most annoying parts, there are pages of stream-of-conciousness thoughts full of description. Because I like the book so much, I can overlook that aspect and simply think of it as a lot of exaggerated attention to detail.
If I get the chance, I think it would be worthwhile to reread this book and actually picture all the vivid imagery described. Because I wanted to finish the book before I went to bed, I had to read those long descriptive passages in my perusing reading speed.
Somehow, I feel insanely invigorated after reading that book. And now, I realize that Dan Brown's writing isn't that great and I no longer want to imitate his voice in writing. Ian McEwan is my new, dare I say, literary hero! Okay, that was an exaggeration.
It's the first summer I didn't buy my summer reading books, so I'm kind of sad that I won't keep this great book.
I'm going to do a quick recap so I remember this book in the future, so here goes. It's a really really descriptive, admittedly overly descriptive in the middle, narrative from several perspectives. Briony is sort of the person in control of the story, but you don't realize it until the end. Each chapter is a different person's perspective and the story doesn't progress (uh, I can't think of the word so I'm going to use the one that comes to mind) smoothly.. or progressively in time, I guess, is better. You have to put the story together and keep in mind how each person's perspective fits into the overall storyline. It was confusing and a bitch to read at first, but now that I finished the book, I really admire the writing.
So storyline & total spoiler: Briony as a child witnesses her sister Cecelia and the cleaninglady's son Robbie having sex. Because she's only 13 and still incredibly naive, she misinterprets couple in the throes as Robbie attacking her sister. In the same night, her cousin gets raped, and she automatically assumes that the figure she saw in the starlight was Robbie because Robbie seemed like a maniac. The police are called up, Robbie gets arrested, no one except for Cecelia believes he's innocent. The story jumps to a long segment where a third person omnicient narrates about Robbie's accounts in France during World War II. That part was boring and pointlessly descriptive because it didn't help the last bit of the story. The story then goes back to Briony when she's 18 and serving as a nurse. She eventually finds her sister Cecelia, who moved away after Robbie was arrested and shunned the rest of her family, and talks about how she wants to clear Robbie's name. At that time, Robbie was already back from France, and Briony apologizes and all that crap. Robbie and Cecelia devised a plan for Briony to follow in an attempt to clear Robbie's name. Then the book jumps to 1999 when Briony is really old and having her 77th birthday party at her old house which was turned into a hotel. It's then that it is revealed that Robbie and her sister died soon after that one last encounter.
The cool thing about the book was that the book I was reading was the book that she spent 60+ years writing about the day she falsely incriminated Robbie. The author doesn't say it, but it's implied, and really subtly, too.
Atonement was really well written, in my opinion. A lot of writers these days have such a casual tone in their books. Everything is always about the story line and the voice of the novel never seems as important as the surprise in the storyline at the end of the book. This book, however, was well written AND an has an incredible storyline. The only negative thing I have to say about this book is that it's a bit too descriptive at some parts, making it hard to read and remember what else is going on in the storyline. Sometimes, in the most annoying parts, there are pages of stream-of-conciousness thoughts full of description. Because I like the book so much, I can overlook that aspect and simply think of it as a lot of exaggerated attention to detail.
If I get the chance, I think it would be worthwhile to reread this book and actually picture all the vivid imagery described. Because I wanted to finish the book before I went to bed, I had to read those long descriptive passages in my perusing reading speed.
Somehow, I feel insanely invigorated after reading that book. And now, I realize that Dan Brown's writing isn't that great and I no longer want to imitate his voice in writing. Ian McEwan is my new, dare I say, literary hero! Okay, that was an exaggeration.
It's the first summer I didn't buy my summer reading books, so I'm kind of sad that I won't keep this great book.
1 Comments:
progress progressively in time? and thanks for spoiling it for me. now i'm never going to read it.
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