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Marylegs (44 KP) rated Life of Pi in Books

Aug 14, 2019  
Life of Pi
Life of Pi
Yann Martel | 2001 | Fiction & Poetry
8
7.2 (21 Ratings)
Book Rating
So Life of Pi, a story of Indian boy castaway in a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger for 277 days. This is a story of human endurance and spiritual belief. The story is beautifully written and being a non-religious person I enjoyed that fact that this young boy embraces all religions he comes across and values them all equally and sees the best in each. I was slightly worried the religious aspects would be off putting for me but I believe they added depth and beauty to this story.

Unfortunately I came to read this book after having seen the film so I found it hard not to picture what I had already seen. Also, it meant I already knew how the story ended. I wish I had read the book before seeing the film as I think the story would have been better leaving the ending unknown. It was hard to get caught up with the revelations when they are revealed before you begin. I kept applying what I knew of the story’s ending to the book as I read.

I enjoyed that the story was written as if Pi himself were telling it to me, other than a couple of brief chapters were the journalist is making observations about Pi and his home. It isn’t hard to feel for Pi and knowing he survives to tell his story allows you to fully immerse in his pain and suffering. I would recommend this book, if you haven’t seen the film yet please read the book first so as not to ruin the story and how it unfolds.
  
Conversations With Friends
Conversations With Friends
Sally Rooney | 2017 | Fiction & Poetry
8
6.3 (4 Ratings)
Book Rating
Frances is a student in Dublin who performs her poetry with her ex-girlfriend Bobbi. They meet Melissa, a journalist and photographer, at one of their shows and she befriends them. When they go back to her house they meet her husband, Nick, and Frances goes on to start an affair with him.

Frances seems to be a very unapproachable person. She doesn’t give OF herself, but expects everyone to respond towards her with love. Which must be hard work. Her youth really comes across when she talks about never wanting to work and not wanting or needing money - and then later her father stops paying her allowance. She realises then just what having no money is really like. There are other hints at her mental state. She talks about self-harming, and she seems reluctant to talk to either Bobbi or Nick about her feelings for them (my theory is that her parents separation is responsible for this). She’s not a particularly likeable character, and writing this has made me realise that I actually seem to like books where the main characters just aren’t particularly nice. Perhaps I just want to see why people are like this?

Anyway, I listened to this on Audible as I read along (when I could), and I really liked the narrator, Aoife McMahon. She’s engaging, has a really nice voice and there was never any doubt in my mind that she was a good choice. She really made this book for me.

I can see why there was such a buzz around this book when it first came out, because I enjoyed it too!
  
Coming Up For Air
Coming Up For Air
Sarah Leipciger | 2020 | Contemporary, Fiction & Poetry
10
10.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Coming Up For Air is a really interesting book, in that it gives a life to the face of the resuscitation dummy, Resusci Anne. The original mask was the death mask of a suicide victim in Paris in 1899, and Leipciger tells the background story of a girl who decides to take her own life when her life becomes unbearable.

We also meet the Norwegian toy maker who designs Resusci Anne, and the things that happened in his life that brought him to that point. His is an equally sad story, and although he has been fictionalised, he has been based om the real man who made the doll.

The third story is that of a Canadian girl with cystic fibrosis, and her journey from childhood up until she becomes a journalist as an adult.

This is a book about transformations: the French maid is transformed in to a mask that will be recognised around the world over a hundred years after her death; a toy maker is transformed after the death of his beloved son, into someone who tries to ensure that everyone has the ability for such things not to happen again; and a woman with cystic fibrosis has a literal transformation with the promise of renewed, transplanted lungs.

This novel sucked me in to all three lives and times. Both the French girls and the child’s death devastated me, and the Canadian woman’s story was one of hope (although I was pretty much dreading the idea that something bad would happen to her).

I loved this book, and I feel lucky to have read it. I would most definitely recommend it.