Atonement

The Book in 1 Sentence

A book written with no completion other than being a work of "literary brilliance" that you'd be forced to read in high school.

Brief Review

This book is written much like Lord of the Flies, the Great Gatsby, and To Kill a Mockingbird, without the finality of story that you get from those books. There is a ton that is supported and lifted, but there is no finality that makes this worthwhile to read a second time.

Why I Read this book

One of my new co-workers said this was their favorite book.

In-Depth Review

I am really impressed with the way this books takes the idea of a young person learning adult things after observation. If we all thought back to the first time we heard curse words from somewhere other than movies, or saw someone making out, or some other tawdry thing, we would all remember not understanding and attempting to use what little we knew to describe it. This idea is taken to another level with someone is attacked, and you are still thinking about seeing the thing from before. I am being ungodly vague to help divert from describing the story beats too much. I apologize. The first part of the book is very well written from that point of view.

The characters are very well written. Personally, "Part II" is my favorite as the descriptions of violence, smell, the mob, and what I could only imagine the retreat to Dunkirk would have been like felt real. I very much felt like I was there and could picture the events taking place. I think that there was so much said, in so few words that those without the experience of combat would miss. There are a lot of unspoken things and things that we know now happen more often than we would expect.

Part III and the epilogue are so lackluster. Very well written and expressive, but being about no finality or care. I just wanted more after the setup in "Part III" that when it wasn't even touched on, it made me feel like reading the book wasn't worth it as far as the story goes. Made it felt like it was written to the Pulitzer Prize and nothing else.

Rating

This book is expertly written as far as content and structure of the words, but not in the story. It feels and is written like 3 separate books that are tangentially tied together without any finality. If the final chapter had completed the first with the same authority the girl had sending someone to jail, then it would have been outstanding. However, it doesn't and that makes this a 7.

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