Book Addiction

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

Quick summary -

As children Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy were students at Hailsham, an exclusive boarding school secluded in the English countryside. It was a place of mercurial cliques and mysterious rules where teachers were constantly reminding their charges of how special they were.  Now, years later, Kathy is a young woman. Ruth and Tommy have reentered her life. And for the first time she is beginning to look back at their shared past and understand just what it is that makes them special–and how that gift will shape the rest of their time together.

My thoughts -

It is difficult to talk too much about this story without giving anything away.  The reader finds out pretty early on in the story what makes these children so “special” but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t still plenty of questions left unanswered at that point.  Slowly, things begin to make sense through the narration and easy storytelling of Ishiguro, but the more things make sense, the more questions I seemed to have.  This book is a very powerful story; although it is science fiction it reads like a well-written, easy to read novel, and I couldn’t tear myself away for very long.  The story raises some powerful ethical/moral questions regarding advances in science, our part in all of that, and basic human rights.  I HIGHLY recommend this book, I truly loved it.  Has anyone read any other of Ishiguro’s work, and if so, what did you think?  I am interested in exploring more of what he’s written.

Rating - 10! (out of 10)

Read Eva’s review here.

Picture Perfect by Jodi Picoult

From the back cover:

To the outside world, they seemed to have it all.  Cassie Barrett, a renowned anthropologist, and Alex Rivers, one of Hollywood’s hottest actors, met on the set of a motion picture in Africa.  They shared childhood tales, toasted the future, and declared their love in a fairy-tale wedding.  But when they returned to California, something altered the picture of their perfect marriage.  A frightening pattern took shape - a cycle of hurt, denial, and promises, thinly veiled by glamour.  Torn between fear and something that resembled love, Cassie wrestled with questions she never dreamed she would face:  How could she leave?  Then again, how could she stay?

My thoughts:

This book was pretty ok.  I enjoyed the way Picoult started the novel; Cassie had amnesia for the first 100 pages from some sort of accident or event that we did not know anything about (and neither did she).  And slowly, as Cassie begins to remember the event that caused her to forget her entire past, she starts to remember.  And in the remembering, she tells us her story.  Picoult’s masterful story telling is at it again in this book; I really think she is an excellent weaver of stories and really illustrates her characters’ personalities so well that you understand them and sometimes even like the most flawed of characters.  But although I enjoyed the book and got through it very quickly, it wasn’t as good as some of her others.  There was not nearly as much suspense, not too many unanswered questions throughout, and it was definitely missing a twist, especially since I’m so used to major twists in Picoult’s books.  If you are a fan of hers, though, I would still recommend reading this one.

Rating:  85 out of 100.

Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes

From amazon.com:

With more than five million copies sold, Flowers for Algernon is the beloved, classic story of a mentally disabled man whose experimental quest for intelligence mirrors that of Algernon, an extraordinary lab mouse. In poignant diary entries, Charlie tells how a brain operation increases his IQ and changes his life. As the experimental procedure takes effect, Charlie’s intelligence expands until it surpasses that of the doctors who engineered his metamorphosis. The experiment seems to be a scientific breakthrough of paramount importance–until Algernon begins his sudden, unexpected deterioration. Will the same happen to Charlie?

My thoughts:

Wow did I love this book.  Seriously, I had been wanting to read it for so long, but kept putting it off because for some strange reason, I assumed I wouldn’t like it.  But really, it is such an excellent story and I LOVED the character of Charlie.  None of the other characters were really fleshed out, but Charlie (obviously he was the narrator) was so wonderful to read.  This book was incredibly sad for me too, I found myself feeling very depressed about midway through the book and continuing throughout.  But still it is such an excellent story and I will be recommending this to everyone I know.

Rating: 95 out of 100.

And Flowers for Algernon is book 2 for my TBR challenge and book 1 for the What’s In a Name challenge.

Read Alessandra’s review here.

Children of God by Mary Doria Russell

Summary:  Children of God is the sequel to Mary Doria Russell’s 1996 The Sparrow, which saw a Jesuit mission to the planet Rakhat end in disaster. The sole survivor of that mission, a priest named Emilio Sandoz, returned a beaten and broken man, having suffered rape and mutilation at the hands of enigmatic aliens. Now the Jesuits want to go back to Rakhat, and they want Sandoz aboard the new mission. But Sandoz has renounced his priesthood and even found a measure of happiness with his new wife and stepdaughter. Meanwhile, on Rakhat, contact with the humans has thrown the local culture into turmoil, precipitating a war between Rakhat’s two sentient races. As forces conspire to send Emilio back to Rakhat–and toward a possible reconciliation with God–the planet verges on genocidal destruction. Children of God is a more polished novel than The Sparrow, and the story is equally compelling.

My thoughts-

Well contrary to what the amazon.com review above says, I did not find this to be a more polished novel than her first, The Sparrow.  That book was absolutely amazing, one of my favorite books of all time.  Children of God was a pretty decent sequel, as sequels go, but I also did not find the story nearly as compelling as her first.  The secondary characters were not as well developed, either, in my opinion, and there were far too many sad things that occured.  I also was expecting a very climactic ending but was disappointed in that as well.  It sounds like I hated the book, when I really did enjoy it, but it’s hard for me to compare it to The Sparrow because that book was honestly so damn good.  It would have been nearly impossible for Russell to top that first one… so my criticisms are definitely harsh with that in mind.  I am still very glad I read it, as it did tie up some loose ends and also introduce some stellar characters.  Definitely a good book, just not excellent.