This week I finally finished "Plague Dogs" and I have to say, the last 50 pages made the book. There was a giant plot twist right at the end that completely changed how I read the book. It had really seemed that it was building up to a sad and brutal climax, and I was sure there was no chance of a happy ending, but let's just say I was shocked at what happened. I was disappointed at how long it took me to read this book, as I'm am usually a much more dedicated and speedy reader. I blame about 90% of it on Senioritis however. Anyways, overall I give "Plague Dogs" an 8.5/10. It was a compelling story with a deeper undertone that did not compromise the actual adventure, and the ending was satisfying and complete. The only lacking point of the book was the occasionally confusing dialogue, which sometimes made the reading hard to follow or slower. But that doesn't change the fact that this was an excellent book. Today I started my new book, "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy. "The Road" is a book set in a desolate post-apocalyptic world and follows the struggles of a travelling father and son. In terms of powerful books, I know this one will be a winner, and I'm only 25 pages in. I did see the movie adaptation of the book, which I also found incredibly powerful and shocking. I would recommend the movie and surely the book as well, but only to those who can handle brutality and some horror. Both the book and the movie deal with the violent side of humanity. One interesting thing I have already noticed is that McCarthy does not use quotations for speech and doesn't always start a new paragraph when a character says something. It seems to make the whole novel flow better, while decreasing the importance of the father and son's words. Also I noticed that in both the movie and the book, neither the boy nor the man had names, they are referred to as the father and the son. So far I think "The Road" is acting as a narrator's stream of thought while following the struggle of two lone, "good" souls in the end of the world. The narrator seems aloof and distant, unconcerned and with no tone, simply relaying all that happens. I'm very excited to continue into this book, and hopefully I'll zoom right through it.
I'm a slower reader myself. In fact, I'm not a reader at all, that's why I read so slowly, so I can sympathize with you.
ReplyDeleteI think a good ending is essential. I watched a recent movie recently, I won't say the name, and it's not The Grand Budapest Hotel, but this untitled picture had a extremely underwhelming ending. In fact, it didn't have an ending at all, it just stopped seconds after the climax. I enjoyed the film, but the ending alone took a lot of points off for me. A satisfying ending is essential.
I too have seen the film, I only watched the first hour, because I found it to be pretty distasteful, without a point. I suppose that is what the film/book is trying to say, that life is only as good as we make it, but yeah. It seems you're drawn to these very dark books, which is cool, what would you say your favorite genre is? Is your writing very dark as well?
Yeah I can see how the movie can be pretty distasteful. The first time I actually saw the movie was when I was like 10. My dad rented it and I wanted to watch with him. Needless to say I left the room about 30 minutes in. I guess the reason I watched the movie, and am now reading the book, is because I do find post-apocalyptic adventures to be my one of my favorite genres. The only other reading I really enjoy is fables or historical writings, such as history textbooks, which I know seems pretty weird. Anyways, I got really into to this genre thanks to Walking Dead on TV, which in turn led me to the comics (which are 100x better than the show), and in turn led my to a wide range of zombie and end of the world writings and movies. The struggle for survival just seems exciting to me. In terms of my writing, yeah, I guess it gets pretty dark. I was heavily influenced by all these apocalyptic works to actually start my own novel. I'm planning a slightly more uplifting ending than "The Road" for my book, but there are definitely some dark times. Honestly though the hardest part of making an end of the world book is keeping it original, so I had to spend a lot of time coming up with my own special apocalypse, which was actually pretty fun.
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