Paul Pen

I really don't know how I feel about this book. I found the writing superb, the story is intriguing and totally pulls you in, but the characters are completely horrible people (with two exceptions).

This novel is not for the faint of heart. There's abuse (mental, physical, sexual) throughout. The message at the end seems to be that family is family and should be forgiven no matter what, and um, sorry(not sorry), but no. These adults are terribly abusive to their children and should never be show more forgiven.

I can't recommend this to anyone, but I did find it completely immersive, though disturbing. I feel like a good sum up is that it's a good book, but please don't read it. show less

Lectura con el grupo 221 b Baker street

"Me sentí perdido en esa oscuridad que siempre había sido mi mundo. Ajeno a ella. Extraño en el sótano."

Una historia que es principalmente triste, llena de mentiras y fantasías, sueños de ser y de vivir pero limitado al mundo que te han creado, a espacios pequeños y situaciones repetitivas pero con la enorme ventaja de tener un narrador que, gracias a su fragilidad e inocencia, hace dinámicos los sucesos narrados y te mantiene a la expectativa show more de saber que va a pasar.

Algo a considerar es que hacen uso de un recurso que ya he visto varias veces en las historias que buscan sentirse claustrofóbicas: la falta de nombres, al tener tan pocos personajes, y estar todos relacionados entre sí, se les llama por el parentesco que tienen con el narrador, con ello el autor lo deja claro: aunque haya algo más, estas incapacitado para conocerlo.

Este es uno de los libros que el final lo condena, sin importar lo mucho que me gusto la primera mitad, que las revelaciones del porque llegaron al sótano se me hicieran muy interesantes (y detestables) y que en general la lectura fuera muy amena, el final me desencanto mucho: las razones son odiosas, egoístas , enfermizas y crueles, especialmente en lo referente a uno de los personajes es decir, la hermana, quien hizo que la compadeciera a pesar de ser manipuladora y mentirosa (aunque creo que en su situación yo habría hecho lo mismo) pero no por ello le quito el mérito de que el autor logro transmitir la idea de que tan lejos estas dispuesto a llegar por proteger a tus seres queridos.

La historia se une a la lista de personajes jodidos, todos aquí están en mayor o menor medida locos, presas de sus propias decisiones e incapaces de rectificar el camino, y creo que ese es el punto que hace que me desagraden: el no tomar responsabilidad por sus propios errores sino que buscan culpar y castigar a otros, que prefieren doblar las cosas a su conveniencia para vivir con lo que han hecho, que construyen un mundo falso e idílico en vez de enfrentar la realidad y que torturan a los demás sobre aceptar su propia culpa. No digo que no haya amor en esa familia, sólo que es un amor tan perturbado que es difícil justificar sus acciones o decir que, en tus cinco sentidos, también habrías actuado así, hay un momento en que la abuela dice, y con toda razón, que esto es resultado de una serie de malas decisiones y esa frase resume perfectamente el libro de principio a fin.

"No existe criatura más fascinante que aquella que es capaz de crear luz por sí misma"

P.D.El asunto de que el pollo y las luciérnagas fueran sólo producto de la imaginación del niño fue triste para mí, porque su deseo de ser libre pero no abandonar a su familia fue simplemente desgarrador y muy realista

"La luz pertenecerá siempre a los que son como él. Y en la oscuridad quedarán relegados quienes no estén preparados para saber qué hay más allá de su pequeño mundo" show less

3 stars.

The narrator was born underground and his lived his whole life there with his family, never seeing anything other than the basement in which they live. His family was burned in an accident, and his sister wears a mask so that no one can see her face. Everything starts to change when his sister gives birth. The narrator starts to find fireflies, and his father and mother and grandmother seem more odd than usual.

Honestly, I don't know what to think about this. I think that the writing show more was good? It was engrossing at least, and even if I didn't know what was going on or particularly like the characters, I thought that it still led me on to find out what happened. The first part of the story in the present, our guide is the boy. (I don't think any of them were given a name. Not that I can recall, anyway.) The boy's world is very limited, because he's never lived anywhere except for the basement. Everyone else lived in the real world at some point and then chose to move down to the basement and never go up again. The implication is that something bad happened to the world outside, so it's safer down in the basement. But when food is delivered, and toothpaste, and other necessities, as a reader we start to see cracks in the story. (Not to mention the sister's pregnancy. I kept going "the options are limited, and neither of them are good." Which, it's not.)
There are some other indications that the boy isn't reliable, especially when it comes to the fireflies. He sees them, but it doesn't really seem as though the others do. Then other things start happening. His sister is being weird, his dad might be a villain, his grandmother is more sad than usual, his mother seems to waiver between wanting to keep him close and wanting him to explore their cage a little. The only one who mostly acts the way he usually does is his brother. Even his small baby nephew has something going on with him.
Once I was done reading this, I actually had arguments with myself about it. I made some good points and just had to process everything. An argument could be made that the family made their bed, that they caused everything that eventually happened to them. I mean, they didn't treat the sister well after her actions caused the change in her brother, constantly blaming her and definitely showing preference for the damaged brother. However, I never saw or felt that the sister had any remorse or took accountability for her actions and the results of what she selfishly did. And you could say that she was a teenager, and all teenagers are selfish and self-involved. But usually, when they are involved in something that catastrophic, it's like oh, hey, I shouldn't have done that. And maybe she did, but we were never shown that.
Now, the family that chose to put the damaged son in front of everything else, up to the boy saying, when he is an adult something to the effect of "I look at my son and I understand and would maybe have done the same". I have issues with this. This might have something to do with how I was raised, where my mother told us all when we were just into teenager-hood: if you do something illegal and I find out about it, I will call the police on you myself. So we absolutely had to take accountability for our actions, and we knew that there would be no excuses made for us by our loving parents. (Yes, our parents did love us, and would have done anything for us, except, you know, shelter us from the consequences of our actions, especially if it caused harm to someone else.)
Now, an argument could be made that, because of his brain damage, the brother didn't know what he was doing or right from wrong. Except. Except. There are small clues that he actually does. He might not be able to understand the whole of it, but he does understand a lot of concepts. For example, he always got angry with the sister for not being a mother to her son. So he knew that mothers should care for their children, and he knew that she was the baby's mother. And if he really had no realization of what was going on or right or wrong, and his sexual urges got so strong, he wouldn't have differentiated between his mother and grandmother and sister. But he only raped his sister, so he knew what was right and wrong. Did he do it because he knew his sister was a pariah and that his family would do everything to protect him? Did he do it because the last time he did something like that there weren't consequences? Probably both were true. And I absolutely did not agree with their actions of protecting him. He had legitimate reasons why he couldn't comprehend the full consequences of his original actions, and I think that that would have been taken into account. I mean, it wasn't like he caused the girl to get hurt; he didn't get her the help that might have saved her life. And raped her, which I am not negating or making excuses for or explaining away. Again, it seemed to me like he knew that what he was doing was wrong, because otherwise he would have told people about her before she died.
As for the sister, was she sort of that way already, or was she made that way by her family? Probably a bit of both. There were other actions she could have taken, and when she started involving the boy and manipulating him, it definitely showed the scope of her personality as it was in the present. I do understand what and why she did what she did with the baby, but her other actions do not speak well of her. It was like she was stuck being that teenage girl who allowed her brother to get hurt forever, and she only ever acted like someone who was grievously wronged. I'm not saying that she wasn't, not by a long shot, but I also believe that she brought at least a small part of it on herself by her actions and reactions. And even though she was trying to do the right thing when they went to the basement, she absolutely was not doing it for the right reasons. It was vengeful and petty. It would actually be interesting to know if her brother was favoured even before he was hurt, or if that was something completely new after the accident. With how easily the family shut her out, I almost think that he was favoured before.
So, yes, I would LOVE to talk to someone about this book, but I would not recommend it to anyone. I have such issues with the morality of everyone's actions and the emphasis of protecting family above everything else. And if people really relate to this, I think it's no wonder the world is heading in the direction it seems to be. show less

An incredibly well written and engrossing read with very difficult subject matter and any number of unpleasant characters making terrible decisions means this is likely to split readers. I’m glad I read it but felt like I needed a bath afterwards. Given the subject matter comparisons with Room are inevitable but not helpful – this is a very different novel.

A door loses its meaning if you don’t ever go through it. It becomes a wall

Plot in a Nutshell
Our narrator is a young boy who show more has lived his entire life underground in a basement with his (significantly) older siblings, his gran and his parents most of whom were badly injured in a fire prior to his birth. The plot pivots on the birth of his sister’s new baby which drives the boy to question their way of life. A second part shifts to third person and describes the events that led to the family taking to their underground bunker.

Thoughts
My first thoughts on this one is that it is an exceptionally good translation. The writing is strong and the language really pulled me into the story especially in the first part where there was a dreamy, magical quality to some of the writing that reflected the initial innocence of the narrator really well. His characterisation is good and whilst it is made clear to us that he does not fully understand all of his observations of daily life in the basement and the interactions between the other inhabitants they are helpful in building up a sense of who they are – unreliability and all.

As for the rest of the characters I really enjoyed seeing the boys perspective on each develop as the story progressed. However even before knowing the full details of the flashback it was difficult to find any of them relatable or pleasant so I found myself only ever really rooting for the boy. I also did not appreciate the decision to not give any of the characters names. This can be really effective if the intent is to either dehumanise or highlight the scale of an issue where a characters experiences are representative of a wider group but I am not sure either of these are accurate for this one and it jarred throughout.

Even whilst being touched by the writing and the boys story this was a plot line that has me pretty angry – the behaviours of the adults in his life in keeping him locked away and the lies they tell him were awful and as the reason for why they are locked away becomes clear I wanted to scream at all of them.

So to the Room compassions, yes both are set in scenarios where the main characters have been locked away – however in Room the victims and criminals were clear and there was an underlying thread of hope. This is significantly darker where the good guys and bad guys are more ambiguous and hope is harder to hold onto. show less