Superb, absorbing book
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I picked this up because it was recommended reading on one of my Open University courses.
It's the story of a young man who falls for an older woman. I had seen a comment that it was a holocaust book, and was a bit baffled after reading the first part (the book is in 3 parts). However, this build up works extremely well, as it gives a good feel for an "ordinary" person getting caught up in the perpetration of the holocaust.
I thoroughly enjoyed the writing style, which is very descriptive, and the story had me hooked. There are several moments that surprise, and I think it's a while since I read a book which evoked such a variety of strong emotions.
In summary - a fantastic, gripping read, which you will be struggling to put down.
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One of the best books I have read recently
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This book is about the legacy of the Third Reich and concentration camps but deals with much more than that. It is about one's relationship with other people and one's own past. It explores the power of social mores and self-image. The writing style is matter of fact and very enjoyable, easy to read yet deep in meaning. It made me want to read more by Schlink, and in the original language!
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One of the best books ever
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A beautiful book. Quietly, unassumingly, it nudges and insinuates itself into your heart. Explores the grey areas of morality and the spectra of human psyches with incredible sophistication. Is a rare example of a novel that feels whole, and doesn't sag towards the end.
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Maybe something got lost in translation
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When Michael was fifteen, he began an affair with a middle-aged woman named Hanna. They shared little beyond the physical relationship; she was not a talker or a thinker as he was, but she did seem to enjoy it when he read to her. One day she disappeared without a word, only to surface years later when she was on trial for crimes against humanity.
The writing style of this book is similar to Albert Camus' "The Stranger," where the main character narrates the events of his life without passion or sympathy, in a dulled, distant, vacant voice. The first half of the book is fairly interesting with his steamy but unemotional affair with this mysterious and strangely callous woman. I had to force myself to finish the second half, though, which explains her disappearance, trial, and the next eighteen years, because the monotone narration got really old and boring.
It felt like the author was trying to be shocking and profound with his detached storytelling, but I was not impressed. This would have made a very interesting short story, but I found it a tedious book.
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The Reader
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The Reader is a subtle, thought-provoking work that continues - but does not quite belong to - a tradition of Holocaust literature. The novel very cleverly raises questions about the nature of complicity and the boundaries of responsibility. It also examines the idea of collective 'amnesia' and its consquential twin, collective guilt. It achieves this through a deceptively simple narrative that enables a degree of analysis and discourse without the author having to overtly theorise. The narrative carries both a metaphorical and emotional weight that is quietly devestating without having to depict the horrors of the concentration camps in explicit detail.
The writing, economic and sometimes a little stark, can be read as a little cold, dispassionate. But more often it is devestatingly precise. However, there are moments when the language gets a little glitchy, and you suspect something has been lost in the translation. Overall though, the novel is both intensely sad and mentally stimulating, sustenance for the heart and the head. A modern classic.
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