Fellow Gigglers, let me be clear: This is not a book review column. I’m not going to seek out the newest hardcovers and tell you whether or not to buy them. Partly because we have our own tastes, but mostly because I don’t read many books that are too new to be in paperback. I can support the industry without taking out a mortgage.
While not the Sunday Review, this Sunday blog will explore my brilliant and fascinating thoughts about books. Please use the comments section to share your own thoughts on this book, or whatever you’re reading.
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer made me cry on more than one occasion while commuting to work on the subway. Perhaps that’s not so shocking, given the book is about a young boy whose father died in 9/11. (This is not a spoiler—it’s the premise of the book!)
Don’t worry, the whole book isn’t sad, just moments. The protagonist, Oskar, a 9-year-old-going-on-40, is on a treasure hunt. He finds a key in an old vase that belonged to his father, and he traverses the city looking for someone who can tell him what it opens.
Oskar is one of those kids who are intelligent beyond their years, but he’s hopelessly immature with kids his own age. He writes letters to Stephen Hawking, befriends an aged man in his Manhattan apartment building and the person he’s closest to is his grandmother.
This might all feel contrived—because how do you write about an eccentric kid’s experience of 9/11 without it sounding forced?—but it doesn’t. Foer’s gift is in story-telling, and Oskar’s journey is contrasted with the story of his grandparents’ past from the time they met shortly before the World War II firebombing in Dresden, to their reunion in New York, to the present day.
What I enjoyed most was seeing the world through the eyes of a child who wears all white and carries a tambourine everywhere he goes. He also walkie-talkies from his bedroom with his grandmother across the street. When he’s upset or can’t sleep, he invents things in his mind. The idea of someday having a kid like Oskar, especially post-tragedy Oskar (who also gives himself “bruises”) is daunting. It’s hard to tell exactly how much his mother understands him sometimes, since we’re seeing his point of view, but she’s more in the know than Oskar realizes as most parents are.
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is now a movie, and I’ve heard good things. But one of the talents of the book for me was its visual nature. Not because of excessive description, but because the world Foer wrote is highlighted in the right spots to give me a vivid look at Oskar’s Manhattan. And I liked what I saw. So to see a different Oskar onscreen living in a different apartment would be sort of like coming home to someone else’s belongings. Did anyone have that experience, or was the movie what you imagined when reading the book? If you’ve already seen the movie, I would imagine reading the book will only improve the story. I’m not anti-movie, I’m just pro-book!
What did you think of the book? If you read Foer’s first book, Everything is Illuminated, which did you like better? They’re different in a lot of ways, so it’s tough to compare.
Image via DN.se. Featured image via Barnes & Noble.
I absolutely loved this book. I read it for the first time a couple of years ago–I actually read Everything Is Illuminated the same summer–and coincidentally just picked it up to read again. I am in love with this story. There is so much to it, that, unlike most books the second time around, it still feels so fresh as I’m reading it again. I read this book before I read Everything Is Illuminated, and I found them to be so different and so profoundly moving in their own ways. I, too, teared up multiple times on public transit! Foer truly has a gift for universality and painting the human condition without being overwhelmingly tragic or preachy-optimistic. His writing style is beautiful, and his gift for the specific voices and experimentation with grammar (this is mostly in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close) is really mind-opening to experience. I watched the second trailer they released (openly wept at the tragedy & incredible hope…and the U2 song used in that context didn’t help) and can’t wait to see the film. I’m certainly pro-book myself, and that’s because a book is rarely ever “ruined” for me once I watch the movie. What I experienced in my mind always prevails, even after getting absorbed in the film version. I feel I want to experience it because they did such a good job with Everything Is Illuminated. I know they left half the book out in that one, but I think it was a better choice rather than trying to squish what could be two separate films and a very complicated structure into one. I also always trust in Tom Hanks’ artistic choices! I can’t wait to see the movie, and I can’t wait to see what Jonathan Safran Foer writes next!
Foer is probably my favorite present day author. I first read Everything is Illuminated because I had seen parts of the movie, it quickly because my favorite book of all time. The movie is lovely, but I wish it had shown more of the contrasting story about the hero’s (Foer himself is the hero although the work is fictional) family past. I soon read Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close and instantly felt a connection with Oskar. I was closest to my Grandma as a child, but she was also my tragic loss instead of my father. I mostly felt connected to him because I was always an “oddball” child. I wanted to find the hidden meaning in everything and had to investigate everything. I had a tendency to carry certain items around for long periods of time and considered every act part of an adventure. I wanted deeper meaning, I wanted understanding, and I couldn’t communicate well with other kids my age. Another thing I loved was the nature of the dialogue, it really felt like that special nine year old boy was telling the story. I’ve not seen the movie, but I plan to asap.
I liked both books, but liked Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close a little more. Foer has a way of describing tragedies of human history. The Holocaust in Everything is Illuminated and 9/11 and Dresden in Extremely. Reading and getting personal with these characters makes the hurt strong when tragedy strikes. I liked how there is a little humor in each book to lighten the overall sadness of each book so you’re not totally depressed when you’re done reading (e.g. The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls…..waaaaah!).
I’ve read both books and seen the film version of Everything is Illuminated. That film was pretty decent, but it left out 2/3rd of the book, which I find rather sad. I personally preferred EII to EL&EC. EII seemed to have more fantasy and myth in it and Foer definitely played a lot with unreliable narration and many levels of narration. His wife, Nicole Krauss’ novel ‘The History Of Love’ is a better read still. She plays with words and sentences and there’s so much poetry-like language in her work it feels more than just a novel.
The movie is terrible compared to the book, they completely ruined it, just like they did when they made a movie of Everything is Illuminated. They left out like 50% of the book!
It’s hard to compare the two books though, Extremely Loud is much easier to read than Everything Is Illuminated. I’ve forced a lot of my friends to read Extremely Loud, and they’ve loved it as much as I did, but when I tried to get them to read Everything is Illuminated , they couldn’t get through it. It’s too bad, because it’s a beautiful book.
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You stopped me in my crtaks, captivated my soul and drew me towards you. I was just going to Art Fair on my lunch and there you were. You were awesome despite your sleep deprived state from your long drive. I can’t thank you enough for being here in Ann Arbor and enlightening us to your beautiful voice and music. Thank you so much for sharing.