Book review: One Day by David Nicholls

A great book to read on vacation on a sunny beach (sipping away cocktails is optional ;-)

One Day by David Nicholls

Dexter and Emma spend the night together following their graduation in 1988. They talk about how they will be once they are 40. While they do not become romantically involved completely, this is the beginning of their friendship. The novel visits their lives and their relationship on July 15 in successive years in each chapter for 20 years. source: wikipedia

The format of this book makes it very interesting to read. You get older with them and it feels like you really, really know them. I've laughed out loud (which startled my sleeping husband), cried and got really angry at Dexter while I was reading this book.

It is funny, sad at times but above all it is a great must-read love story.

Fact:

• 435 pages 
• read in English
• One Day (the movie) was released in 2011. Starring Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess
• On Spotify you can find Emma Morley's Mix Tape. In the book she makes a mix tape cassette for Dexter in 1989 and 2000.

edit: I watched the movie, o my! You will need a lot of tissues

Tissue rating : Between 4 and 5 packs.

(tissue rating explanation)

Short post warning

No I am not reading 50 shades of Grey, I am just busy :-)

Almost done!!

Sorry no posts this week!

I'm finally finishing Easy Money (Snel Geld) by Jens Lapidus.
The 1st part of his Stockholm Trilogy

Dutch cover of the book

It took me a while to get used to the language used in the book, but now I love it and can't wait to get to the last page.

Book review: The solitude of Prime numbers - Paolo Giordana

After reading a bunch of detectives and thrillers I decided it was time for me to read an award winning novel again. Usually award winning is equal for well written literature.


I opted for The Solitude of Prime Numbers since it was standing patiently on my bookshelves and I heard great things about the book.


Before I start my review let me tell you what the story is about:


A prime number is inherently a solitary thing: it can only be divided by itself, or by one; it never truly fits with another. Alice and Mattia also move on their own axes, alone with their personal tragedies. As a child Alice's overbearing father drove her first to a terrible skiing accident, and then to anorexia. When she meets Mattia she recognises a kindred spirit, and Mattia reveals to Alice his terrible secret: that as a boy he abandoned his mentally-disabled twin sister in a park to go to a party, and when he returned, she was nowhere to be found.


At first I really enjoyed the book although it has quite a depressing tone. It reads easy and the chapters are not too long but tell everything you need to know. The description of Alice's and Mattia's high school years was very vivid and brings you back to your own high school memories (good or bad)


What first distracted me from reading the novel was the way the author uses the perspective of the main characters. He switched between them sometimes in the middle of a scene. I am not an acclaimed author by any means (sad but true ;-), but I do know that engaging your readers can be done by using the correct perspective in story-telling.
example


I would have loved it if the story of Michaela was explained a bit more. Now that story-line was unfinished and left me with a lot of unanswered questions.


I did like the flow of the book. The author chose to leave big time gaps in the story. One chapter is written in 1984 when Mattia and Alice are teenager, the next chapter is written in 1990 when they are young adults. This enabled the author to write about a 24 year time span, without having to write a novel more then  a 1000 pages.


As for the end of the book.. I didn't get it!! I just didn't. Never happened before.
So please enlighten me if you have a clear idea what the deeper meaning of the end was.


I guess I am going back to reading my less literature-like detectives and thrillers.


Facts:

• 318 pages
• read in Dutch (De eenzaamheid der priemgetallen)
• Won the Premio Strega literary award