Mumbai Bookworms discussion

This historical fiction Pulitzer Prize-winning novel has won the polls for next month. Please review the rules before you enter the discussions.

Blurb:

From the highly acclaimed, multiple award-winning Anthony Doerr, the beautiful, stunningly ambitious instant New York Times bestseller about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.

Marie-Laure lives with her father in Paris near the Museum of Natural History, where he works as the master of its thousands of locks. When she is six, Marie-Laure goes blind and her father builds a perfect miniature of their neighborhood so she can memorize it by touch and navigate her way home. When she is twelve, the Nazis occupy Paris and father and daughter flee to the walled citadel of Saint-Malo, where Marie-Laure’s reclusive great-uncle lives in a tall house by the sea. With them they carry what might be the museum’s most valuable and dangerous jewel.

In a mining town in Germany, the orphan Werner grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments, a talent that wins him a place at a brutal academy for Hitler Youth, then a special assignment to track the resistance. More and more aware of the human cost of his intelligence, Werner travels through the heart of the war and, finally, into Saint-Malo, where his story and Marie-Laure’s converge.

Doerr’s “stunning sense of physical detail and gorgeous metaphors” (San Francisco Chronicle) are dazzling. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, he illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another. Ten years in the writing, a National Book Award finalist, All the Light We Cannot See is a magnificent, deeply moving novel from a writer “whose sentences never fail to thrill” (Los Angeles Times).

Happy Reading!

Oh damn, I thought today would be the last day to vote.

S. wrote: "Oh damn, I thought today would be the last day to vote."

Did you want another nominee to win? ;-)

This is quite a good book to read too. Please do join us :)

Hah, I was torn between two of them.
Like you, I've already read this, sadly.

Has anybody started this? Any initial thoughts on the life of Marie-Laure and her father?

S. wrote: "Hah, I was torn between two of them.
Like you, I've already read this, sadly."

Oh, okay :) Did you like it?

Sharadha wrote: "Oh, okay :) Did you like it?"

Enough to give it 4/5 stars. :)

Well, I had reviewed it a while back, and had given it a 5 star. 😊. Yup, guilty of being a hopeless romantic.

My review ( no spoilers ) :

Maybe this is the only book, that I have rated five stars, in the last two years. And had Goodreads allowed, I would have added a sixth.

Ok, so maybe there is a bias here, since this one takes me to my absolute favourite time in history, and through the geek landscapes of science, literature, and music; all of which were googled and enjoyed in parallel. Equally, it is an utterly beautiful tale of love, loss, hope, and memories ( again, a favourite genre).

But what really took me, or rather dragged me in, were the words. Boy, can he write! Sentences sparkle, descriptions are vivid, inventive, sweeping, and the bite sized chapters move effortlessly, back and forth in time. The characters are so well etched, that you don't just see them as if on HD, but also feel for them, be repulsed by them, fear them, root for them. This is the book, every film wants to be.
If you have not read it yet, make it your next.

Ashish wrote: "My review ( no spoilers ) :

Maybe this is the only book, that I have rated five stars, in the last two years. And had Goodreads allowed, I would have added a sixth.

Ok, so maybe there is a bias..."

Nice. Is it holding up on your second read?

I am a one book at a time kind of reader. So will start right after my current read. Last few pages :)

Can someone recommend me a good book to read.

* Should not be a romantic novel.
*Great story
* Last read - Kite Runner, Current reading - Confess

Abhishek wrote: "Can someone recommend me a good book to read."

This here is a good book. If you're looking for something shorter, Of Mice and Men is my go-to rec.

Thanks So, will give that a try.

Thanks S, will give this a try

Nowadays you find many authors writing books in first person. I think that everybody must read 'Moby Dick' by Herman Melville, to know how and when to write a book with in the first person. It is probably one of the best books I have read in which 'I' is not the real protagonist.

Moby Dick is an absolute classic, of course. Equally there are quite a few first person narratives, that are right up there. Gulliver's travel, Heart of darkness, the great Gatsby, All quiet on the western front, To kill a mocking bird, A catcher in the rye, and closer home, Midnight's children, and so many more, we could fill up an entire page without dropping on merit 😊

Ashish wrote: "Moby Dick is an absolute classic, of course. Equally there are quite a few first person narratives, that are right up there. Gulliver's travel, Heart of darkness, the great Gatsby, All quiet on the..."

Writing in first person is apparently a mid-twentieth century style. Virtually all the classics before that are in third person. When I chose Moby Dick it is with a specific purpose. It begins with 'Call me Ishmael'. It ends with '...I alone lived to tell the tale'. True it is in first person, the last line explains why? But that is not the only reason why it is an absolute classic. Ishmael is part of every action in the book and yet he remains a narrator. There is not a single scene where he is the hero or the main protagonist. You see a similar character in Pierre in Leo Tolstoy's 'War and Peace' who is everywhere from the beginning to the end and we see the battle of Borodino, the occupation of Moscow practically through his eyes, not the least, his relationship with Natasha and Prince Andre'.

Am not sure, I get the nuance you point out, about first person narrative being a mid twentieth century style. This for instance is the opening para of Gulliver :

My father had a small estate in Nottinghamshire: I was the third of five sons. He sent me to Emanuel College in Cambridge at fourteen years old, where I resided three years, and applied myself close to my studies; but the charge of maintaining me, although I had a very scanty allowance, being too great for a narrow fortune, I was bound apprentice to Mr. James Bates, an eminent surgeon in London, with whom I continued four years. My father now and then sending me small sums of money, I laid them out in learning navigation, and other parts of the mathematics, useful to those who intend to travel, as I always believed it would be, some time or other, my fortune to do.

So far as I remember the novel, Gulliver remains the principal narrator, and hero ( or victim) throughout his travels.

Moby Dick, and also War and Peace, which you have quoted as another example of the first person technique, are not mid twentieth century works, so could you please elaborate a little more on the distinction that you draw, between pre twentieth century examples and the ones that came later. Thanks.

Oh ok, just reread your note. Do you mean, the narrator as an observer of events, and not the protagonist ? That kind of first person ?

Is anyone reading *this* book? Let me at least try to lead a discussion. Since three of us have already read it before and had generally positive reactions to it, it would be interesting to debate the negative reviews, of which I will share two here. Please chime in as to whether you think the criticisms that these reviewers make are justified, and how you would counter.
https://newrepublic.com/article/12076...
http://the-toast.net/2016/03/23/on-bl...

I'll start by saying that although I wrote favourably about the book, I did append these links to my review because...
→ the first makes a valid point about the commercialisation of the Holocaust. Q1. What are your thoughts on the same?
→ the second is by someone with lived experience of blindness who feels the book misrepresents her. Q2. Do you think Doerr exoticises disability?

Dominic Green's review in the Republic certainly lays out his distaste for the book, if not the genre, pretty much flat out. My issue with his criticism is that he has used primarily one interpretation of reading about the past, and from one book ( Hi Hitler), which deals with the normalisation of Nazi History in contemporary culture. Like all rear view interpretations, this one too is tight in its logic, or as they say, retrospectively self evident.

So yes, Doerr could on that account be held guilty of the two charges of relativising and aestheticising the holocaust, but then by that measure so would every literary or cinematic work, created after the war, or for that matter any historical period. The period serves as a plot device in any historical fiction, and the characters interaction with it creates interest/ conflict etc. It is what breathes life into a cold and distant historical detail. As a reader or viewer, the period is just the stage on which the human story plays out; my reason for sustained interest being the story itself. And if that in some way normalises the background period, so be it.

Further, Green pans the novel's choice of characters as sentimental. Well, can't argue with that. An albino boy and a blind girl, certainly are awww inspiring :). About the only thing I can say in defence is that it did not feel contrived, or convenient when I read it.

Green then then goes on to poke Doerr's writing style with multiple stabs, from too many adjectives ( really?), to using mixed metaphors. And that's when his intellectually taut argument fell apart for me. It felt less the voice of reason, and more the rant of someone Samuel Becket dismissively called, a crrrrrritic !

Ashish wrote: "Am not sure, I get the nuance you point out, about first person narrative being a mid twentieth century style. This for instance is the opening para of Gulliver :

My father had a small estate in ..."

Gulliver's travels in first person is quite different. Moby Dick was first published in 1851. Like in Moby Dick he is the only witness to tell the story. So it works. The same with books like the Time Machine. War and Peace is in third person but with one character across the full canvas of the book.

Ashish wrote: "Oh ok, just reread your note. Do you mean, the narrator as an observer of events, and not the protagonist ? That kind of first person ?"

Precisely. My second book is the only one in first person because it is based on true incidents, personal interactions and observations about similarities in children and dogs. Most of the action is a record of happenings within five hundred yards of my own home. Only a critical reader can tell me what he/she thinks about the book. However, my reason of raising this discussion is that I find more and more books by new authors in the first person. In the process, what I feel, they end up seeing too much of themselves in the totality of the story and fail to develop the other characters of the book. When you write something in the third person you have to take yourself away from the plot and look at the full canvas. Shrikant by Sharat Chandra is said to be his autobiography, yet he writes in third person. Godaan by Munshi Prem Chand is yet another great work that cuts across times. Literature in any language is what all masterpieces are all about.

Without sounding too nitpick-y, I think Shrikant is in first person. At least it starts out in first person. I hope I remember this right :) I read and reviewed it a few years ago.

Anyway, the subject of this thread is Anthony Doerr's All the light we cannot see. So any further takes on it ? The moderator sent out two articles that had a critical view of the book. Read and commented on one. I will see the other one too.

Ashish wrote: "Without sounding too nitpick-y, I think Shrikant is in first person. At least it starts out in first person. I hope I remember this right :) I read and reviewed it a few years ago.

Anyway, the su..."

You are right, it is in first person. This discussion came about in response to Abhishek asking for recommendation of a good book to read and therefore got sidetracked. I don't think I will have time to read All the Light we cannot see in the immediate future since I am reading a number of other books for another project. Since you mention it, how do you review books? It is so difficult to ask anybody to write anything about what they read and that too critically.

@Ashish: Thank you for your participation! :) I am not the moderator; I simply thought of keeping the discussion on-point, seeing as this book won over others. I appreciate your perspective, even if I can't always concur.

"but then by that measure so would every literary or cinematic work."
Indeed, but I fear I phrased my question in very generalised terms; every book written about the war can be charged with commercialising war, since there is a profit motive to writing a book. The question should have been "Does Doerr aestheticise it?" To which we both say aye, but disagree on how much it matters. There are almost no allusions in the book to the major event of the war i.e. the Holocaust, and the one representation I can think of is melodramatic and never hints at the horrors. Unlike you, I cannot say "so be it" to such normalisation. I believe art has a certain responsibility to uphold truth through fiction. Doerr's equating of Nazi motives with "technological determinism" is reductive. I forgave all of this mostly because I don't think he intended to write a book about the war, but to create a story with fairy-tale elements. He does not want to use his characters to relate history. In that sense, I disagree with your assertion that period works as plot device in historical fiction. In really great fiction, setting may put the pieces on a collision course, but it does not manipulate the characters; their actions are internally consistent with what the reader knows about them. As to relativising, to state that atrocities were committed on both sides is not as morally outrageous as Green makes it out to be. If anything, he sounds like a jingoist! So I'm with you there.

"Further, Green pans the novel's choice of characters as sentimental."
This is undeniable and further illustrates that the book appeals more to emotion than reason. It also relies too much on dichotomies, instead of realistically flawed characters—but falling short of feeling contrived, as you say. And this, too, goes to my point about "fairy-tale elements"...

Green then goes on to poke Doerr's writing style with multiple stabs, from too many adjectives ( really?), to using mixed metaphors. And that's when his intellectually taut argument fell apart for me.
Haha, it's that old writers' workshop advice: Your story should be just as complete if you were to cut out every adjective. (For a different view: http://www.themillions.com/2015/06/th...) But Green's not deriding the overuse of adjectives without cause. I'll agree that it's a matter of taste and efficacy, but his point was that, here, the artistic language further distances the reader from the realities of the war. For my part, I loved Doerr's writing, because it again came down to the goal that he set for himself: not to write authentically, but to paint with words.

x-x

I pilfered a bunch of Discussion Questions from another group. Feel free to answer the ones you like here or ponder them on your own time:

1. The book opens with two epigraphs. How do these quotes set the scene for the rest of the book? Discuss how the radio plays a major part in the story and the time period. How do you think the impact of the radio back then compares with the impact of the Internet on today’s society?

2. The narration moves back and forth both in time and between different characters. How did this affect your reading experience? How do you think the experience would have been different if the story had been told entirely in chronological order?

3. Whose story did you enjoy the most? Was there any character you wanted more insight into?

4. When Werner and Jutta first hear the Frenchman on the radio, he concludes his broadcast by saying “Open your eyes and see what you can with them before they close forever” (pages 48–49), and Werner recalls these words throughout the book (pages 86, 264, and 409). How do you think this phrase relates to the overall message of the story? How does it relate to Madame Manec’s question: “Don’t you want to be alive before you die?” (page 270)?

5. On page 160, Marie-Laure realizes “This . . . is the basis of his fear, all fear. That a light you are powerless to stop will turn on you and usher a bullet to its mark.” How does this image constitute the most general basis of all fear? Do you agree?

6. Reread Madame Manec’s boiling frog analogy on page 284. Etienne later asks Marie-Laure, “Who was supposed to be the frog? Her? Or the Germans?” (page 328) Who did you think Madame Manec meant? Could it have been someone other than herself or the Germans? What does it say about Etienne that he doesn’t consider himself to be the frog?

7. On page 368, Werner thinks, “That is how things are . . . with everybody in this unit, in this army, in this world, they do as they’re told, they get scared, they move about with only themselves in mind. Name me someone who does not.” But in fact many of the characters show great courage and selflessness throughout the story in some way, big or small. Talk about the different ways they put themselves at risk in order to do what they think is right. What do you think were some shining moments? Who did you admire most?

8. On page 390, the author writes, “To shut your eyes is to guess nothing of blindness.” What did you learn or realize about blindness through Marie-Laure’s perspective? Do you think her being blind gave her any advantages?

9. One of Werner’s bravest moments is when he confronts von Rumpel: “All your life you wait, and then it finally comes, and are you ready?” (page 465) Have you ever had a moment like that? Were you ready? What would you say that moment is for some of the other characters?

10. Why do you think Marie-Laure gave Werner the little iron key? Why might Werner have gone back for the wooden house but left the Sea of Flames?

11. Von Rumpel seemed to believe in the power of the Sea of Flames, but was it truly a supernatural object or was it merely a gemstone at the center of coincidence? Do you think it brought any protection to Marie-Laure and/or bad luck to those she loved?

12. When Werner and Marie-Laure discuss the unknown fate of Captain Nemo at the end of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Marie-Laure suggests the open-endedness is intentional and meant to make us wonder (page 472). Are there any unanswered questions from this story that you think are meant to make us wonder?

13. The 1970s image of Jutta is one of a woman deeply guilt-ridden and self-conscious about her identity as a German. Why do you think she feels so much guilt over the crimes of others? Can you relate to this? Do you think she should feel any shame about her identity?

14. What do you think of the author’s decision to flash forward at the end of the book? Did you like getting a peek into the future of some of these characters? Did anything surprise you?

15. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn once wrote that “the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.” All the Light We Cannot See is filled with examples of human nature at its best and worst. Discuss the themes of good versus evil throughout the story. How do they drive each other? What do you think are the ultimate lessons that these characters and the resolution of their stories teach us?