What, then, makes a great book? For me, a great book is one which draws me in to the story to such a degree that I start to feel an affinity with one or more of the characters, one which makes me lose all track of time. One where you find yourself deliberately reading more slowly as you become aware that you are approaching the end, because you don't want the story to be over. I'm reading a book at the moment which ticks all of those boxes. I read a lot, I'll get through 20-30 books a year. That may not seem like a lot to some, but I think it's a decent amount of reading, and I genuinely don't remember the last time I got drawn into a book the way I have with this one.
Part of what makes it such an engrossing book is the aforementioned affinity I have found with one of the characters. Despite this being a work of fiction, I have subconsciously found myself drawing parallels with my own life as the characters life is played out in front of me - the death of his father, estrangement from his brother, and of course, his unrequited love for another of the characters. I feel way too much of his pain on that last point, trust me, particularly as it was his own (in)action which caused him to lose the girl he loved. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt. Not the same t-shirt, but one from a related line certainly.
A great book to me, is one which makes you look at yourself and wonder how others see you. What do I mean by that, well, I'll try to explain, but I'm not very good at this sort of thing, but here goes:
When you start a book, you have no preconceptions about any of the characters - you haven't been introduced to them, you have no idea if they are heroic, villainous, cowardly, anything - all you get to know about the character is what you read as you go on. It's analogous to meeting someone for the first time and figuring out if you are going to like them. You also get to look at the characters through each other - you get to learn about their interactions, what they truly feel about each other, all of which combines to build up the pictures and abstracts in your head about the sociology of the cast of characters. When that is done well, so well in fact that you find yourself forming some sort of 'bond' (for the want of a better term) with one (or more) of the characters, it may make you wonder what those characters would think of you. Ok, maybe that's just me then, but it does give me pause to think 'I wonder how other people do actually see me...' Ironically, I'm not sure I would actually want to know the answer.
When I started writing this, I had an idea about getting some stuff off my chest, out of my head, I have one of those strange minds which seems to find it easier to let thoughts go when they are written down, I guess it's part of my strange connection to the written word. I am constantly fascinated by language and it's power. Sadly, despite this, and despite my reasonable vocabulary, my capacity for writing flowing and silken prose is somewhat restricted. It's why, no matter how much I would like to, I will never be an author. It manifests itself in other ways too. I find it very hard to talk about my feelings, to anyone. Every time I try, I wind up over thinking things, and then whatever I had in mind to say, comes out all garbled. By the time I've done that, and then reworded it in my head so it comes out closer to the way I originally intended, it's generally too late, I've made a bit of a mess of things. This is never truer than when a woman is involved, as I'm sure all my exes will attest, as will any unfortunate soul I have taken a noteworthy liking to and tried to woo. As an aside, no one uses 'woo' as a term for making attempts at exhibiting a courtly desire these days. Sorry, back on track...
So, you will be wondering, dear reader, what the heck I'm talking about. How did all this come together in my head, and where do books fit in... Well, the part of the book I'm currently completely enthralled with features the protagonist suffer a very very similar fate with his love interest. Obviously, that resonated with me, now more than ever. I will spare you the gory details, but there has been a specific reason for my malaise of a couple of weeks ago, and it was strange to see something which is so utterly personal to me, play out in front of me in the book, in a manner which so closely resembles my recent experiences. It doesn't take much to thrust me into the throes of introspection, but that certainly did it - seeing, in black and white, a literary depiction of one of my biggest failings, feeling a strange jarring in my mind as I found myself thinking "just say it, for **** sake, why are you skirting around it... Oh. Hold on... that seems eerily familiar!".
Before I got to that chapter, and those pages in that chapter, I was already of the opinion that the book was one of the best I'd read for a while. The more I read, the more inclined I am to say that it's one of the best books I've read ever, and over my life, I've read hundreds. A book which captures and holds your imagination, which makes you buy into the characters (which are so amazingly well developed), and makes you look at yourself? That's a very rare thing indeed.
So, my friends, I will leave you with my thought of the day - if you love someone, let them know. Don't skirt around it, don't dress it up in flowery language so that the meaning is diluted, or indeed, lost. In my rare moments of clarity it occurs to me that Occam's Razor doesn't only apply to physics, chemistry etc. It can just as easily apply to language - strip away the words which don't need to be there, which don't contribute to the sentiment you are trying to portray, and what you are left with is the truth. If only I was able to take my own advice, huh!
Oh, and if you are wondering why this issue is titled as it is, I really couldn't think of a suitable title, I happened to be listening to a song which has that line in it, it's a favourite song, so I thought what the hell.
Until next time folks. Take care.
No comments:
Post a Comment