Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
2 journalers for this copy...
Journal Entry 1 by 
crimson-tide
from Balingup, Western Australia Australia on Wednesday, November 3, 2010
crimson-tide from Balingup, Western Australia Australia on Wednesday, November 3, 2010
From Publishers Weekly:
Oskar Schell, hero of this brilliant follow-up to Foer's bestselling 'Everything Is Illuminated', is a nine-year-old amateur inventor, jewelry designer, astrophysicist, tambourine player and pacifist. Like the second-language narrator of Illuminated, Oskar turns his naïvely precocious vocabulary to the understanding of historical tragedy, as he searches New York for the lock that matches a mysterious key left by his father when he was killed in the September 11 attacks, a quest that intertwines with the story of his grandparents, whose lives were blighted by the firebombing of Dresden. Foer embellishes the narrative with evocative graphics, including photographs, colored highlights and passages of illegibly overwritten text, and takes his unique flair for the poetry of miscommunication to occasionally gimmicky lengths, like a two-page soliloquy written entirely in numerical code. Although not quite the comic tour de force that Illuminated was, the novel is replete with hilarious and appalling passages, as when, during show-and-tell, Oskar plays a harrowing recording by a Hiroshima survivor and then launches into a Poindexterish disquisition on the bomb's "charring effect." It's more of a challenge to play in the same way with the very recent collapse of the towers, but Foer gambles on the power of his protagonist's voice to transform the cataclysm from raw current event to a tragedy at once visceral and mythical. Unafraid to show his traumatized characters' constant groping for emotional catharsis, Foer demonstrates once again that he is one of the few contemporary writers willing to risk sentimentalism in order to address great questions of truth, love and beauty.
Oskar Schell, hero of this brilliant follow-up to Foer's bestselling 'Everything Is Illuminated', is a nine-year-old amateur inventor, jewelry designer, astrophysicist, tambourine player and pacifist. Like the second-language narrator of Illuminated, Oskar turns his naïvely precocious vocabulary to the understanding of historical tragedy, as he searches New York for the lock that matches a mysterious key left by his father when he was killed in the September 11 attacks, a quest that intertwines with the story of his grandparents, whose lives were blighted by the firebombing of Dresden. Foer embellishes the narrative with evocative graphics, including photographs, colored highlights and passages of illegibly overwritten text, and takes his unique flair for the poetry of miscommunication to occasionally gimmicky lengths, like a two-page soliloquy written entirely in numerical code. Although not quite the comic tour de force that Illuminated was, the novel is replete with hilarious and appalling passages, as when, during show-and-tell, Oskar plays a harrowing recording by a Hiroshima survivor and then launches into a Poindexterish disquisition on the bomb's "charring effect." It's more of a challenge to play in the same way with the very recent collapse of the towers, but Foer gambles on the power of his protagonist's voice to transform the cataclysm from raw current event to a tragedy at once visceral and mythical. Unafraid to show his traumatized characters' constant groping for emotional catharsis, Foer demonstrates once again that he is one of the few contemporary writers willing to risk sentimentalism in order to address great questions of truth, love and beauty.
Journal Entry 2 by crimson-tide at Balingup, Western Australia Australia on Wednesday, November 3, 2010
crimson-tide at Balingup, Western Australia Australia on Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Deliciously original, and not at all what I was expecting. Oskar is definitely one of a kind, and his voice here is a good counter to those of his grandparents. The book is sad, funny, tragic, touching and thought-provoking. And also, as Oskar himself would no doubt say, "weird".
Overall a great read.
Overall a great read.
Journal Entry 3 by crimson-tide at Balingup, Western Australia Australia on Wednesday, November 3, 2010
crimson-tide at Balingup, Western Australia Australia on Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Released 13 yrs ago (11/3/2010 UTC) at Balingup, Western Australia Australia
CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:
Posted off today to leeny37, who is the November recipient in the Southern Cross Book Exchange.
I hope you enjoy it.
I hope you enjoy it.
Thanks for the wishlist book! :)
