Casual Vacancy

[dumbledore11214]

So I finally read the Other Book :-). Here is the review I left. Maybe those who read it may share thoughts?








I loved Harry Potter books, I really did, but the last thing I expected from this book is to be anything like Harry Potter. I expected the book for adults which has nothing to do with magic and everything to do with reality of our existance. I expected something along the line of Dikkens, along the line of my beloved Russian classics of 19 century. Based on the reviews I expected something maybe not as well written, but with similar subject matter like Dostoevsky.

I am writing all of this to stress that the reason I disliked this book so much has nothing to do with me expecting something fun, light and entertaining. I did not. I also want to stress that it is all me, it is not the book's fault.

Yes, the people in this book have to deal with terrible things. You name it it is there - abuse, poverty, drug use, more abuse, just plain out marriages that not working. It is all there, so in that sense it reminded me of Dostoevsky a little. Do you know what's different? I hated them all. It is so true that the person that had something worthy in him as a person leaves the book within first few pages.

I did not expect the perfect people in this book, heck I would have been fine with wrecks of human existance, grey, almost dark characters. But I did not feel that one of them has a spark, something redeemable in him? Gogol, Dickens, Dostoevsky wrote a lot about horrible, miserable people, but they managed to make me feel for their characters, made me pity them. Those humans? I would not mind if they all would drop dead now. I pretty much could not stand most of them.

For some reason when I read this book, I was also thinking of american TV show The Wire. Those who watched it may confirm that this show dealt with some of the darkest horrors of human nature and looked at those horrors very unflinchingly. But guess what? The worst criminal sometimes showed that they still had a little tiny something in them to remind us that they are humans. Not so much in this book as far as I am concerned.

I deeply respect that this is the book JKR wanted to write and I think for what she wanted to convey, she wrote it remarkably well (thus three stars and not one out of respect for writing), but boy I despised her subjects and if this is the story she would continue telling in her next books, I do not care to continue reading them.