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I just read Cloud Atlas for the second time this year. I am now reading the same author's The Bone Clocks, so I'm just going to not read the post above this. In any case, I am someone that hates having a favorite anything--I feel life is too short to narrow down a favorite song, food, etc. Still, right now I would label Cloud Atlas as my favorite book. It has so much going for it. I love the themes that the book expresses: predation, social class, the birth lottery, rebellion, propaganda, human weakness. Furthermore, I love the harmony of the book; each of the six stories is like a different instrument playing the same song but in a different way. I greatly enjoyed the second reading. Since I knew how each story turned out, I could really focus on the details and the commonalities between each story. There were a ton of references to the other stories that I didn't catch, or couldn't catch, on the first run-through. I've got to confess, though, that I did skim a portion of the above post. Even though the novel has a definite gimmick, that of six stories of different genres in different time periods, the author uses the gimmick to tie together--rather than segment--each of the stories and highlights the common struggle of the human condition through many different situations. For me, the novel is great as it shows how values change between different cultures and modalities of political rule. I can't recommend the book highly enough.
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Sep 9, 2014 20:17
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Poutling posted:Would you say that The Bone Clocks would be more interesting to someone that isn't a fan of The Cloud Atlas? For what it's worth, my significant other tried to get into Cloud Atlas multiple times but it didn't interest her. However, she's tearing through The Bone Clocks in its first week.
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Sep 9, 2014 22:16
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computer parts posted:It only "destroyed" the novel if you're an incredible cynic. Yeah, I didn't enjoy the movie due to that format. Instead of nesting they aligned moments from each story; I felt this was forced and jarring.
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Mar 5, 2015 20:41
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I recently finished Number9Dream by David Mitchell; just before that I read Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami. I didn't make a plan of it, but I was delighted to read them back-to-back as Number9Dream heavily references Norwegian Wood. My significant other had asked me for years to read Murakami's NW and I just now read it to cleanse my palette from feverishly reading Mitchel novels. Not being a Beetles fan I also ran into the odd coincidence that both novels are titles of Beetles songs. Both books are about young men (~20 years old) coming of age in Tokyo and heavily focus on their growth in the realms of personal identity, romantic life, and existential aim. As for Murakami's Norwegian Wood I found the book to be enjoyable but fairly forgettable. The principal character, Toru Watanabe, writes a memoir of his experience as a young man early in his college career. He experiences the loss of a close friend, falls in love with another, and generally fumbles through many segments of early adulthood. For context, I read Murakami's Kafka on the Shore in my first year of college (some time ago) and absolutely loved it. The only other book I've read from him is 1Q84. My feelings for that book echo Norwegian Wood in that I felt like there was beauty there but the narrative falls short. I feel it was completely worth the read but I can't see myself re-reading it at any point. As for Number9Dream, I absolutely loved it. The narrator, Eiji, is from a small, backwoodsy island in Japan; he was born a bastard and his mother left he and his twin sister at an early age. Eiji decides to go to Tokyo to meet his father whom abandoned him and his sister before birth since he was a married Tokyo socialite at the time of conception. As with Norwegian Wood, the title of this book is lifted from a Beetles song title. It also affects the structure of the book: each of it's nine chapters includes a dream, daydream, journal, or story interspersed throughout the general narrative. The book was extremely exciting and provided a lot of existential reflection and beauty that I love to find in a novel. it was apparent from the first chapter that the book was, at least in part, a homage to Murakami. Several references to Murakami and Norwegian Wood are found throughout the book: 19/20 year old protagonist in Tokyo, starts off his journey as a virgin/near-virgin, each plays guitar, has a rich, womanizing friend that likes to double-date and swap partners, Beetles song title for each book, characters named/nearly named after NW characters (Watanabe, Nagasawa, Naoko/Naoki), themes of suicide, primary character in a mental rehab facility in the mountains)
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Aug 5, 2015 03:41
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I also recently finished Slade House. I am a very big fan of Mitchell's work and re-read some of his books every so often. I had pre-ordered the book a while back and forgot that it was coming out on 10/27. Very oddly enough, I happened to be reading through The Bone Clocks and finished it on 10/25. For even more  I started Slade House on 10/27 and finished it within five days--the time span that occurs in the book as well...Anyways, the book was very good. I think it stands on it's own but a reader would really benefit from reading The Bone Clocks (and, to a lesser extent, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet) prior to reading this book. The book was sufficiently creepy and I found each of the characters to be interesting; they definitely each had their own voice and gave their own perspective on Slade House. Likewise, Slade House reacted differently to each character... Does anybody have a link to a good fan resource for Mitchell's novels? I love how characters (or their ancestors/family) re-appear in different books and I'm also interested in how the timeline of each of his books looks as a whole considering that many story segments occur at the same or nearly-same time.
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Nov 5, 2015 16:48
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VelociBacon posted:Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace. I don't really know how to describe it and if you're in this subforum you probably already know about it. I'll just say that it's worthwhile to push through it if you're not hooked by the opening few chapters. I could not get hooked on this book so I'll try to power through it again.
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Dec 15, 2016 19:44
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Utopia Avenue by David Mitchell Just finished this recently. I am not into band/music piopic stuff, which this basically is, but this had enough soul and good prose for me to enjoy it. Is there a David Mitchell thread around or do I need to make one?
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Aug 12, 2020 06:46
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Sinatrapod posted:The time when you were cool? 😎 I also encourage you to finish it. Imo it is extremely good. Also read Mitchell's other novels if you haven't. (Have you?)
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Apr 1, 2021 19:59
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