Bloodorange
I'm a GoodReads user testing new waters after the serious website changes. I mostly read fiction, usually Anglophone classics/ modern classics; I like nonfiction (mostly social and cultural history), good fantasy and graphic novels. For guilty pleasure, I read advice and how-to books.
I made at least two reading resolutions recently; 1. read less, live more; 2. read books which give me more pleasure. I have poor filters, and books I find stylistically pleasing tend to be depressing, so I need to do something about that; if you think you know a book that is very well written, but won't make me weep, please drop me a line.
Breakfast of Champions
Why, oh why, did I choose to read this particular book?I think I wouldn't have finished it if not for the fact I was reading it for a group challenge (immature, I know). Also, I knew there exists a film adaptation of this, so I hoped that something by way of a plot would appear. And it did, albeit debatably and almost too late.
This book is beyond irritating - I hate the way Vonnegut needs to explain the _literal_ plane of nearly every simile or metaphor he uses, inevitably following this with a line drawing. Example:
Sigh.(...)no cry from a whistle had got very far from Earth for this reason: sound could only travel in an atmosphere, and the atmosphere of Earth relative to the planet wasn’t even as thick as the skin of an apple. Beyond that lay an all but perfect vacuum.
An apple was a popular fruit which looked like this:
[insert line drawing of an apple]
The narrator states early in the book it is to be his present to himself on the occasion of his 50th birthday; take his words seriously. This is a book only an author could love. I can hardly explain the two-star rating I gave it.
