Customer Reviews

Room

5 star:		(61)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Jack is the narrator of `Room'. Jack is excited by his fifth birthday, is curious about the world and full of energy. But Jack's physical world is contained within an 11 by 11 foot space called Room where he and his Ma live. This is Jack's world: the room and its contents, and his mother. Because we are viewing this world through Jack's eyes, we are protected in part from his mother's awful reality. Jack recounts what he sees and experiences and the reader knows the situation that Jack and his Ma are in. But Jack does not: this is his life and this is the only world he knows.

In Jack's world, he has songs and stories. He has a snake made from egg shells, and a maze made from toilet roll inserts. He has the unreal world of television which he sometimes watches in unlimited amounts when Ma doesn't get out of bed. For Jack, these are the days `when Ma is gone'.

One day Ma tells Jack that there is a world outside Room. And this becomes the beginning of another story, one which is best read uninfluenced by reviews and story synopses.

I added this book to my reading list because it is on the Man Booker 2010 longlist. I had some misgivings about reading it given the subject matter but once I started reading it, I couldn't put it down. I would have found it unbearable if it was written from the perspective of Ma. Our view, through Jack's eyes, is more focussed on the relationship between son and mother than on the situation itself. The book ends, but the story isn't over.

It's like a crater, a hole where something happened.'

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Reason for Reading: With this subject matter, who is *not* wanting to read this book?

A 26 year old woman has been kidnapped and held captive in a soundproof, escape-proof 11 x 11 foot Room for 7 years. She has a five year old son, Jack. She cares for him fiercely and has created a world for him out of that Room, giving him everything she possibly can that he needs to grow properly, physically and emotionally. They do daily exercises, she teaches him, etc. This is their story, of their day-to-day life, their escape and how they cope on the Outside. A truly fascinating story to start with is only topped by the fact that it is told in the first person narrative of five year old Jack.

I'm going to start by saying this is a hard review for me to write. I agonized over my rating. There is not doubt that Room is a wonderful piece of writing. The subject matter is enticing and the reality of the situation has been explored to such detail that one is amazed the author could have thought of some things without having actually experienced captivity herself. The book is divided into distinct sections, each one focusing intensely on a certain stage of Jack and Ma's story. Donoghue has managed to write about a horrific situation without ever actually putting in print any scenes that show the obvious s*xual violence that was perpetrated. In the hands of a lesser author this could have become a much more graphic story thus losing Ms. Donoghue's perceptive touch. The book reads fast, is compelling and is tremendously well written.

So why is this review hard to write? I didn't love the book. Yes, it was good. Good enough to keep me reading, and reading quickly too. The second half was better than the first, as in enjoying the story and the characters. I really enjoyed the introduction of Grandpa Leo, Steppa. He was the most real character in the whole book. I often found myself annoyed while reading the book. The child's narrative just didn't win me over. I didn't hate it but it felt detached somehow and thus I felt detached from the characters. I never had any great emotional response to the boy and his mother, which I *really* wanted to have. None of the other characters were fully developed, even Steppa , but he at least had the behaviour of a real person and came to life for me.

As you can see I had problems with the book, while appreciating it. Now that I've finished it, my immediate response is "Yeah, it was good." I wouldn't grab people and say you *must* read this book, but if anyone asked me I'd recommend it with my reservations as noted above. I may feel differently about my rating a month (a year) from now but it's been 6 days since I've written this review and I still feel the same way. Very well written, but only good, not great.

It took me a while to figure out why I have a problem with this book: it's too cute. It seems paradoxical to say this about a novel which deals with such horrific subject matter. In a way, Room is a sort of Uncle Tom's Cabin for our times. Rape, forcible confinement and child abuse have the same power to move us to disgust and outrage as slavery did for progressive minds in the 19th century. It's therefore understandably difficult while reading to separate our moral feelings from our critical responses.

But there's a basic weakness at the heart of this novel. As many reviewers have stated, this is a story of survival and the mutual love of a mother and her son. No problem with that. But it's not survival in itself but rather the decisions and choices made to achieve that survival that supply the substance of a fully realized novel. When the central character is a five-year-old the possible development of that character through purposive action is severely limited. It's the same problem Faulkner faced with Benjy in The Sound and the Fury. Like Faulkner, Donoghue tackles the problem head-on by exploiting the character's limitations to the maximum. Her invention of a child-like language to express a child's perceptions is without question original, ingenious and brilliantly carried out.

However this very considerable "tour de force", extended over 300 pages, can't entirely disguise the thinness of the storyline. This can be simply summarized: Ma and Jack are confined, they escape, they recover. Though we rightly have feelings of sympathy and compassion for them in their predicament, they don't develop as characters and therefore don't command our deepest response. And who are they? They have no history and only the barest social context. As in Gothic fiction the villain, Old Nick (the Devil), is a plot device rather than a character. There is a curious insubstantiality about the whole thing.

As a consequence, the many circumstantial details of Jack's daily life, which fill out the narrative, are interesting rather than compelling. Though as readers we are required to do some work in order to "interpret" Jack's understanding of reality, his experience of the world is too immature (inevitably) to prevent this exercise from resembling a clever game. Hence the "cutesy" quality of, for example, this episode in the Cumberland Clinic: "She says the persons are here at the Cumberland because they're a bit sick in the head, but not very. They can't sleep maybe from worrying, or they can't eat, or they wash their hands too much, I didn't know washing could be too much. Some of them have hit their heads and don't know themselves anymore, and some are sad all the time or scratch their arms with knives even, I don't know why. The doctors and nurses and Pilar and the invisible cleaners aren't sick, they're here to help." The disjunction between adult and child perceptions is amusing but teeters between comedy and sentimentality.

There's a famous precedent, of which I'm sure Emma Donoghue is aware, for her inventive use of a child's point of view. James Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man begins like this: "Once upon a time, and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and this moocow that was coming down along the road met a nicens little boy named baby tuckoo...." But the "nicens little boy" (Stephen Dedalus) soon grows up to be an active, intelligent adult whose story fully engages our adult attention.

This book bothered me. The story, in case you haven't heard is told from the perspective of a five year old boy. The boy has lived his whole live in a small room, 11.5 feet by 11.5 feet. And the story deals with the boy's realization that there is more to this world that what he sees on TV.

Based on this, I thought the book would be an interesting read. What I didn't understand is that the boy is living in this room because his mom (and by extension him) are held captive and that his mom gets raped on a repeated basis. This, I found very disturbing.

If I recall the press clippings at the time, the plot of the book was quite controversial. Having read the book, I now understand why and I do agree with much of the controversy. In spite of the controversy, I did not like the book. The writing style - while intentionally written in the way a five year old talks - gets annoying quickly. Then of course there is the disturbing nature of the story itself.

I'm glad I read the book because I can now I understand the controversy that surrounded it. My advice. Read the book at your own peril.

Where to start?! This is one of the best books of the year for me. I really love Emma Donoghue's writing, but was a little afraid of Room. The subject matter seemed a little frightening and I wasn't sure I wanted to venture inside. I am soooo glad I read it.

Room is the story of Jack and his Ma. Jack has just turned 5 when the book opens. Room is where Jack and Ma live. The world is 11' by 11' to Jack - that's the size of the room his mother has been imprisoned in since she was kidnapped seven years ago - and where Jack was born.

The day to day life, routines, games and learning Ma has developed to raise an imaginative, intelligent, happy little boy under seemingly overwhelming circumstances were simply amazing. The relationship between mother and child had me in tears - it was unbelievably poignant. The book is told in Jack's voice. And what a voice Donoghue has created! Jack's view of his 'world' is by turns heartbreaking, funny, frightening yet joyful and optimistic. Just think - this little boy does not realize that there is a world outside of their space. space.

It is when Jack turns five, that Ma fears the room is getting too small and that time is running out....

I've tried many times to put my thoughts into words for this review and have come up short every time. All I can say is it's a book you want to read. A gut wrenching, emotional, terrifying, addicting, hopeful, satisfying read that you won't be able to put down. Really.

When I first read the synopsis about Room - I was skeptical to say the least.

How could a novel written from a five year old's point of view get such high reviews.

My only regret with this book - is that it took me so long to read it!

5-year-old Jack is a great protaganist. This is one of those books where I laughed and cried at the same time. A great peice of literature!

I will admit it took around 15-20 pages to get used to Jack's train of thought. Emma Donoghue does a great job at making this characters voice sound like a typical five year old.

The story starts out light and fun. As it progresses the darkness of the reality of Jack and Ma's situation is revialed.

I am a slow reader. So when I say I read this book in three nights. It means this is a true page turner. I love this book.

UPDATE:

SO I am now finished this book. The writing held my attention until the very last page. Definitally a five star book. One that everyone should read. Full of twists and turns. Jack truly steals your heart.

Simply AMAZING!

I really enjoyed this book.. I can imagine it isn't for everyone... it took me a while to get used to the writing style = )

In picking up the book and reading the first page I was instantly captivated, the book was being narrated by a 5 year old boy. I had only meant to scan a few pages so I could decide whether or not I wanted to read the book that I had heard so many good things about, but when I started reading I couldn't put it down.

Jack and his Ma live in the room, a small garden shed constructed to be their prison. Ma was taken from her college campus when she was nineteen years old. That was seven years ago. Held captive in the room and subjected to her captor Ol' Nick's every demand; Ma eventually becomes pregnant and gives birth to her son Jack. Her whole life becomes her son teaching him everything at the same time shielding him from Ol' Nick by making the child sleep in a small wardrobe during his nightly visits.

After a severe beating by the man Ma decides she has had enough; that she must find a way of escape to save both herself and Jack's lives even though in the past she had made unsuccessful attempts only to enrage the man and be subjected to punishment. In a daring escape young Jack makes contact with a man and his daughter who calls the police and eventually rescues Ma. Once free from their captivity Jack is overwhelmed with the world. He had never been outside so each stimuli would bring him running to his mother for protection.

Through Jack we see the world as he experiences every breeze, insect and even people for the first time often breaking the reader's heart with the realization that this horror actually happens in shocking cases like that of Josef Fritzl.

This is an amazing and heart wrenching read simultaneously thrills and horrifies the reader. With awards an nominations such as Man Booker Prize Nominee (2011), Indies Choice Book Award for Fiction (2011), Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize (2010)and Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best Book in Caribbean and Canada (2011), Emma Donoghue proves she is a gifted author.

I have this bad habit. I buy way too many books. I'm terrible for falling into the hype of a book, buying it when seeing it online or in a grocery store or a bookstore. Then what do I do? I forget about it and it sits on my shelf forever and ever, until I forget what the book was even about.

This is what happened with Emma Donoghue's stunning novel, Room. In fact, as with most books, I picked it up'determined to read it once and for all'not knowing what the book was about. I knew it was suspenseful and I knew that people loved it, but that's about it.

Room is a unique book. It's told from the point of view of 5-year-old Jack from an 11×11 foot room. This room is the only home he's known and, in the beginning, it's a delight to hear him speak of it. But as the story progresses, we learn that this room is where his Ma has been held captive for years and now needs to escape.

I really enjoyed this book, though it was a little jarring reading it at first as Jack is only 5'he doesn't speak in normal sentences as a normal adult would. Thrilling and suspenseful, it's hard to imagine what it would be like for him when faced with the idea of leaving his home. As a reader, I felt frustration and had a lack of understanding as to what he was going through, but I'm sure most readers did. I mean, he's five years old'what can we expect?

Because the story is told from Jack's point of view, we learn everything about all the supporting characters from him. There's no narrative to support what Jack's saying, so what he tells us, we believe. Sometimes the reader has to think about what he's saying because he might not say it as we would, but, in the end, it works.

I can't help but recommend Room to all lovers of fiction. You will be kept on the edge of your seat with this thrilling tale of the bond between a mother and her child. It's a heavy read, but completely worth it.

Everything worked great. It shipped on time and even at Christmas. Very glad I purchased the book with Amazon. I recommend using this company.