Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta

[lightreads]

On the Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


It’s Marchetta writing contemporary young adult, and I didn’t totally love it, I know, I know. I found this book a little airy, a little insubstantial. I could see the gossamer filaments of the story float past me and not snag. But I think I learned something important about Marchetta and what she does. Her books lift me out of my life in this sincere, from the heart and the old, old memories way. They draw me out of myself and make me feel. But when I read this, I was already there. I was living in sleepless, striving, soul-searching intensity, trying really hard to listen to myself and someone else, and make us meet somewhere in the middle. So this book and I passed each other going the wrong direction, I guess.



And you know, I think it’s actually really cool that I don’t love every Marchetta. My extremely unscientific analysis suggests that there are wide disparities in the books of hers people love. I mean, they’re all pretty good, but the special one is different for all my friends. Which says something good about her, that she’s tapping into something so deep, so personal, but so different every time.





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Comments

[cahn]

... Yeah. I think there's a class of young adult books like that, where they are all good for most people, but for some it speaks really deeply to them. I forget which of the Marchetta books I read on your rec, but it didn't stab me through the heart (as, um, I guess you can see by the fact I don't remember the title) -- and I could see it was specifically because my personal character/experiences didn't happen to mesh with the kind of situation that was presented, and not because it was not a good book, or that I'm not a decent reader.

So... this is a good reminder to me that I need to read more of her stuff!

(But Sugar? Gets me almost. Every. Time. It's a little disconcerting.)