Review: The Reader

Amazon.com Review. Oprah Book Club® Selection, February 1999: Originally published in Switzerland, and gracefully translated into English by Carol Brown Janeway, The Reader is a brief tale about sex, love, reading, and shame in postwar Germany. Michael Berg is 15 when he begins a long, obsessive affair with Hanna, an enigmatic older woman. He never learns very much about her, and when she disappears one day, he expects never to see her again. But, to his horror, he does. Hanna is a defendant in a trial related to Germany's Nazi past, and it soon becomes clear that she is guilty of an unspeakable crime. As Michael follows the trial, he struggles with an overwhelming question: What should his generation do with its knowledge of the Holocaust? "We should not believe we can comprehend the incomprehensible, we may not compare the incomparable.... Should we only fall silent in revulsion, shame, and guilt? To what purpose?"

In the mood for a book that I could, hopefully, finish more quickly than some I’ve read recently, I searched my TBR shelf. I was surprised to find a copy of The Reader, which I had borrowed from my dad at least six years ago. The fact that I had hung on to this book that has now regained popularity by becoming a movie gave me some sort of satisfaction along with the happy surprise of finding that I owned it. As if it somehow helped prove my case that books are never a bad investment…they don’t get moldy or slimy like the bulk container of baby carrots that made its way into my cart during the first trip to Costco.

Unlike the carrots, I finished this book in less than a week. Although it wasn’t light reading, it was engaging. Bernhard Schlink’s writing style was uncomplicated, yet rich. I had no trouble connecting with Michael and understanding his fascination, confusion, and self-doubt surrounding his interactions with Hanna. Their affair impacts him throughout life, leading up to the trial and long beyond it. The end took me by surprise, but seemed perfectly fitting.

The moral questions go far beyond those specific to the Holocaust. How do you reconcile your personal experience of an individual when it conflicts so drastically with his/her past actions? How do you balance your emotions with logic? How do you reconcile a past that still influences you with the present?

If you enjoy books that make you ponder life, I recommend this one.

Aromatherapy

Despite the recent book reviewing tendencies of this blog, I have not lost my interest in stitching. I continue to work on some gift stitching and cannot, therefore, post any of my updates.

I probably have at least 5 times more cross stitch patterns than I do books in my TBR shelf/night stand pile/box in the basement. Several of those patterns are in progress, but that never stops me from beginning another one...big surprise.

Earlier this week, my latest coveted stitching supply was announced to me in the email inbox...scented threads! It reminds me of the lickable wallpaper scene fromWilly Wonka's Chocolate Factory...stitch an orange, it smells like an orange; stitch a lemon, it smells like a lemon; stitch a snozzberry...well you get the idea.

Despite the cheesey, 80s reminiscent ad, I am eager to try these out. Stitching might just have reached a new level of relaxing!

Review: The Eyre Affair

From Publishers Weekly: Surreal and hilariously funny, this alternate history, the debut novel of British author Fforde, will appeal to lovers of zany genre work (think Douglas Adams) and lovers of classic literature alike. The scene: Great Britain circa 1985, but a Great Britain where literature has a prominent place in everyday life. For pennies, corner Will-Speak machines will quote Shakespeare; Richard III is performed with audience participation … a la Rocky Horror and children swap Henry Fielding bubble-gum cards. In this world where high lit matters, Special Operative Thursday Next (literary detective) seeks to retrieve the stolen manuscript of Dickens's Martin Chuzzlewit. The evil Acheron Hades has plans for it: after kidnapping Next's mad-scientist uncle, Mycroft, and commandeering Mycroft's invention, the Prose Portal, which enables people to cross into a literary text, he sends a minion into Chuzzlewit to seize and kill a minor character, thus forever changing the novel. Worse is to come. When the manuscript of Jane Eyre, Next's favorite novel, disappears, and Jane herself is spirited out of the book, Next must pursue Hades inside Charlotte Bronte's masterpiece.

Dare I admit I have yet to read Jane Eyre? (Does it count that I saw the play?) And, the only Dickens I know in depth is A Christmas Carole! Despite my classical reading deficits, I really enjoyed this book. I found it entertaining and so witty! (And I probably still missed a lot of the wit.) With characters named Victor Analogy and Braxton Hicks you can’t help but chuckle. Not to mention crazy inventor Uncle Mycroft and his bookworms that produce too many apostrophes and hyphens when they get overwhelmed. There’s time travel, travel into classic books, and elements of any good adventure book all mixed in with some romance and a little family drama. I know, it all sounds like too much, but Fforde has true talent and, in my opinion, it works. I envy his creativity. This is the perfect read when you simply want to have fun. This is just the first book in the Thursday Next series, and I look forward to reading more.

This book was also recently read by Trish.