Once upon a time author Joe Hill started the Big Read Along. We were going to read Cloud Atlas and discuss it via twitter and Joe's website. He spoke very highly of this book, and I was excited to read it. Well, that was back in September. Joe Hill's website was down for the count for about a month. Some people still read the book on time and posted to twitter (#BigReadAlong). Joe finished the book in a weekend (which seems odd for the person leading the book club...) and the Big Read Along was lost. Well, I started the book when the read along began, and I was adamant that I finish it.
I just finished it.
I can safely say, this book was really hard (for me) to read. I don't read like most people, and the reasons I found it difficult to read are not the reasons I think other people would find it difficult to read. I knew nothing about this book when I started reading it, and I'm fairly certain I still don't know anything about the book. I didn't even look at the table of contents, which looking back, might have helped.
I really want to research and find answers to my questions, but I decided I would write my review before I started reading other people's ideas on the book.
Normally, I would tell you the synopsis of the book, but this is difficult to do without giving a lot away. The book consists of 7 stories. There are 6 stories of individuals and then the entire book as a story. The reason I make this distinction is because at the end, you have to step back and look at the whole book as it is woven together.
There were many times when I exclaimed what a genius David Mitchell is (my husband can attest to these exclamations). He did things with this story that were brilliant and wonderful, but it was still a difficult story to read.
Each of the 6 stories revolves around one person:
1. Adam Ewing
2. Robert Frobisher
3. Luisa Rey
4. Timothy Cavendish
5. Sonmi 451
6. Meronym
Each of the stories is from a different time. Adam Ewing is the earliest and his story is a couple centuries earlier than our present. I'm going to write my review on the individual stories and then on the overall story.
1. Adam Ewing
This is a difficult place to start the story, not because of Ewing's story, but because the writing is not what one would expect to read. Instead of a lot of direction and dialogue in dialect, it is Ewing's journal entries so the entire thing is written in the speech of an educated man from San Francisco in the 1840's give or take. There is not a lot of unknown speech, but there is a lot of personal conviction. It's something that I love and hate about Ewing's story. I love how well Mitchell wrote this section. I love reading about it from Ewing's point of view. I love his language use. I think it was really well written, but it's dry. I finished this section (which ends midsentence) and thought, "Where is this story going?"
2. Robert Frobisher
I really disliked this portion of the story. I think this is mainly because music isn't my favorite thing to read about. I never liked Frobisher, but I don't know if you're supposed to. This section is written as letters from Robert Frobisher to Rufus Sixsmith. Again, you don't have the advantage of copping out on the speech because the whole thing is written from Frobisher's point of view. One thing I absolutely adored is how well Mitchell changed voices from Ewing to Frobisher. We're talking two completely different time periods (this being written from the 1930's) and he captured the speaking and writing style of both. Color me impressed! I still don't like Frobisher, but I can't deny the talent of Mitchell's writing.
3. Luisa Rey
Luisa's story was much easier to read. It resembled the murder novels we read today. Luisa is a reporter and she is trying to get to the truth. I didn't love this story. It was well written and clever. It helps you connect to other parts of the story. It is not overly memorable. It is written from the third person which was unexpected. I wasn't overly impressed with this portion of the story.
I need to take a brief moment and let you know that it took me two months to get to this point. I was determined to finish the book, but this point in the story is only about 30% into the book. If the storied continued like this, I wasn't going to finish it. Then Mitchell introduced...
4. Timothy Cavendish
The beginning of Cavendish's story is average. It's just a regular guy who works in publishing and is trying to make some money. Unfortunately, the money he tries to make "belongs" to some tough customers. Once Cavendish makes a daring escape, his story starts getting really interesting. This is where I got hooked. I loved his story, but it ended too soon. It was told as a recollection (first person past). Once again, Mitchell has had to change his writing language to match the time period (present).
5. Sonmi 451
This is told like an interview between an Archivist and a Fabricant (I guess we would see this as a sort of AI... but there is more to this story). The language used in this part of the story imagines a world that is a Corpocracy (ruled by the corporations). Mitchell's imagining of the language is nothing short of amazing. I fell in love with his ability to create and mimic dialect and speech over vast differences in time (this story takes place in 2144... I think). Instead of movies like we have today, they are called Disneys. Instead of coffee that we drink, it is all referred to as starbuck. In a world where the corporations have the control, I can totally imagine they would hold monopolies on words. Shoes are now called nikes. Cigarettes are now called marlboros. [brief aside: When I was growing up and my mom wanted me to grab a plastic bag, she would always call it a walmart bag. Being the smart alec that I was, I would return and tell her we were all out of walmart bags, would a kmart bag suffice?] Genius. It's one thing to come up with a future world in your head, but it's a totally different ballgame to come up with a language to match it. Kudos.
6. Meronym
Every other story in this book gets two chapters. This one only has the one. This was by far my favorite chapter. If there was a book written like this, I would gladly seek it out and read it. When I describe the dialect to people I ask them if they've seen Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome.
I just finished it.
I can safely say, this book was really hard (for me) to read. I don't read like most people, and the reasons I found it difficult to read are not the reasons I think other people would find it difficult to read. I knew nothing about this book when I started reading it, and I'm fairly certain I still don't know anything about the book. I didn't even look at the table of contents, which looking back, might have helped.
I really want to research and find answers to my questions, but I decided I would write my review before I started reading other people's ideas on the book.
Normally, I would tell you the synopsis of the book, but this is difficult to do without giving a lot away. The book consists of 7 stories. There are 6 stories of individuals and then the entire book as a story. The reason I make this distinction is because at the end, you have to step back and look at the whole book as it is woven together.
There were many times when I exclaimed what a genius David Mitchell is (my husband can attest to these exclamations). He did things with this story that were brilliant and wonderful, but it was still a difficult story to read.
Each of the 6 stories revolves around one person:
1. Adam Ewing
2. Robert Frobisher
3. Luisa Rey
4. Timothy Cavendish
5. Sonmi 451
6. Meronym
Each of the stories is from a different time. Adam Ewing is the earliest and his story is a couple centuries earlier than our present. I'm going to write my review on the individual stories and then on the overall story.
1. Adam Ewing
This is a difficult place to start the story, not because of Ewing's story, but because the writing is not what one would expect to read. Instead of a lot of direction and dialogue in dialect, it is Ewing's journal entries so the entire thing is written in the speech of an educated man from San Francisco in the 1840's give or take. There is not a lot of unknown speech, but there is a lot of personal conviction. It's something that I love and hate about Ewing's story. I love how well Mitchell wrote this section. I love reading about it from Ewing's point of view. I love his language use. I think it was really well written, but it's dry. I finished this section (which ends midsentence) and thought, "Where is this story going?"
2. Robert Frobisher
I really disliked this portion of the story. I think this is mainly because music isn't my favorite thing to read about. I never liked Frobisher, but I don't know if you're supposed to. This section is written as letters from Robert Frobisher to Rufus Sixsmith. Again, you don't have the advantage of copping out on the speech because the whole thing is written from Frobisher's point of view. One thing I absolutely adored is how well Mitchell changed voices from Ewing to Frobisher. We're talking two completely different time periods (this being written from the 1930's) and he captured the speaking and writing style of both. Color me impressed! I still don't like Frobisher, but I can't deny the talent of Mitchell's writing.
3. Luisa Rey
Luisa's story was much easier to read. It resembled the murder novels we read today. Luisa is a reporter and she is trying to get to the truth. I didn't love this story. It was well written and clever. It helps you connect to other parts of the story. It is not overly memorable. It is written from the third person which was unexpected. I wasn't overly impressed with this portion of the story.
I need to take a brief moment and let you know that it took me two months to get to this point. I was determined to finish the book, but this point in the story is only about 30% into the book. If the storied continued like this, I wasn't going to finish it. Then Mitchell introduced...
4. Timothy Cavendish
The beginning of Cavendish's story is average. It's just a regular guy who works in publishing and is trying to make some money. Unfortunately, the money he tries to make "belongs" to some tough customers. Once Cavendish makes a daring escape, his story starts getting really interesting. This is where I got hooked. I loved his story, but it ended too soon. It was told as a recollection (first person past). Once again, Mitchell has had to change his writing language to match the time period (present).
5. Sonmi 451
This is told like an interview between an Archivist and a Fabricant (I guess we would see this as a sort of AI... but there is more to this story). The language used in this part of the story imagines a world that is a Corpocracy (ruled by the corporations). Mitchell's imagining of the language is nothing short of amazing. I fell in love with his ability to create and mimic dialect and speech over vast differences in time (this story takes place in 2144... I think). Instead of movies like we have today, they are called Disneys. Instead of coffee that we drink, it is all referred to as starbuck. In a world where the corporations have the control, I can totally imagine they would hold monopolies on words. Shoes are now called nikes. Cigarettes are now called marlboros. [brief aside: When I was growing up and my mom wanted me to grab a plastic bag, she would always call it a walmart bag. Being the smart alec that I was, I would return and tell her we were all out of walmart bags, would a kmart bag suffice?] Genius. It's one thing to come up with a future world in your head, but it's a totally different ballgame to come up with a language to match it. Kudos.
6. Meronym
Every other story in this book gets two chapters. This one only has the one. This was by far my favorite chapter. If there was a book written like this, I would gladly seek it out and read it. When I describe the dialect to people I ask them if they've seen Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome.
I absolutely love it when people are clever enough to pull off speech like this. I am 100% amazed at Mitchell for not only having his characters speak like this, but he wrote it down. Seeing speech like this in text form is daunting. I find it's actually easier to read it out loud than it is to read it in your head... It's also more fun. The story he tells is one of superstition, action, danger, daring escapes, and hidden treasures. This is by far my favorite. I wish this story could have gone on for the whole book, but that would defeat the point of the book.
Overall:
I am so impressed with Mitchell's writing abilities that I want everyone to read this book and marvel with me. The problem with this is that not everyone has the same interest in language that I do. For someone who is more into music, they might like the nuances and humor of the Frobisher chapter more than I did. I will say this, once you finish it, the book makes more sense. It still doesn't make full sense, but it makes more sense. I look forward to doing more research on it and finding all the things I missed. I don't know if I could get myself to wade through the first third of the book to get to the good stuff again, but that is based on my interests. I can totally see other people loving the first few chapters and hating the middle ones. This is a book for everyone, but not all of the book is for everyone... just parts. It's worth a read, but I am not going to tell everyone they need to read it. I'd be interested to find out which parts interested the other readers out there. If you find this review and have read the book, please leave your thoughts in the comment section!
Overall:
I am so impressed with Mitchell's writing abilities that I want everyone to read this book and marvel with me. The problem with this is that not everyone has the same interest in language that I do. For someone who is more into music, they might like the nuances and humor of the Frobisher chapter more than I did. I will say this, once you finish it, the book makes more sense. It still doesn't make full sense, but it makes more sense. I look forward to doing more research on it and finding all the things I missed. I don't know if I could get myself to wade through the first third of the book to get to the good stuff again, but that is based on my interests. I can totally see other people loving the first few chapters and hating the middle ones. This is a book for everyone, but not all of the book is for everyone... just parts. It's worth a read, but I am not going to tell everyone they need to read it. I'd be interested to find out which parts interested the other readers out there. If you find this review and have read the book, please leave your thoughts in the comment section!
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