Books: Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison

This was quite a story – full of dramatic episodes and a look into a culture that felt very foreign to me. Somehow the excellent story in this book seemed to be hard to coax out for me. Once read I enjoyed the book, but the author sure didn’t make it easy.

Just like in another book I read recently, the author seemed to enjoy building up to a big event and then fast forwarding and looking back at it afterwards. This always feels like a gimmick to me and doesn’t really feel like natural storytelling.

The book was divided into two main sections, the first half of which shows the main character as passively watching the world go by, and the second half has them taking a more active part. I enjoyed this second half much more – and wonder if the way this is set up is sort of a message in itself.

But the biggest challenge for me is reading about all these characters living in dysfunctional relationships and making bad decisions. Some are warranted, others less so, and anyway it reaches a point where it is very hard for me to identify with the motivations of these characters. This made the book hard to read.

But as I said, in the end it was a little easier to see what the idea was – maybe I just should have hard more confidence in the author when I started.

Next I am reading Little Bosses Everywhere by Bridget Read.


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