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Friday, January 2, 2009

How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff

Fifteen-year-old Daisy is sent from Manhattan to England to visit her aunt and cousins she's never met: three boys near her age, and their little sister

Her aunt goes away on business soon after Daisy arrives. The next day bombs go off as London is attacked and occupied by an unnamed enemy. As power fails, and systems fail, the farm becomes more isolated.

Despite the war, it's a kind of Eden, with no adults in charge and no rules, a place where Daisy's uncanny bond with her cousins grows into something rare and extraordinary. The fact is, Daisy has the time of her life, and most of her exhilaration came from falling in love with Edmond, her first cousin. As she admits:

"Now let's try to understand that falling into sexual and emotional thrall with an underage blood relative hadn't exactly been on my list of Things to Do while visiting England, but I was coming around to the belief that whether you liked it or not, Things Happen and once they start happening you pretty much have to hold on for dear life and see where they drop you when they stop."

But soon the war, which had once been just rarely listened to rumors, is everywhere, and Daisy and her cousins must lead each other into a world that is unknown in the scariest, most elemental way.

What i thought: This book is a very emotional and filled with sadness and an endless void of desperation and a feeling of loss, but ends on a note of hope. This book teaches very many lessons, like how, although being without parents is fun in the beginning, eventually things will always start to go awry; there is a reason why we have parents sometimes, right?

Meg Rosoff creates a world where there is nothing you can do but hope for the best, while you watch the world fall apart around you. The entire story is told in Daisy's words, and I loved how the words really showed her personality clearly, and even how she viewed life. The one thing I did not like about Rosoff's writing technique was how there were not any conversations in quotations until the end of the story. I got a little lost sometimes during the story, because in most books, the conversations help you get to know the other characters better, and have a better understanding of what is going on. In How I Live Now you dont get that.

Also, another thing I did not like very much, was how it ended (i know i say that a lot, but this time it was not that I was upset the story had to end!). I am not going to spoil it for those of you who plan on reading this book, but I did not like the book's ending, as I do not feel Edmund and Daisy's conflicted relationship was resolved. But, despite these few downsides, How I Live Now is a riveting and astonishing story

Grade: B

WARNING: if you do not like books that discuss Wars, books with a bit of blood and guts, or books that you need to prepare for emotionally, this book is not for you

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Awww I love this book. It was sooo sad at times but I really liked it. After reading it, I thought, "wow, this would really make a great movie."

Flooring Installation New Jersey said...

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