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3rd out of 20 books
—
12 voters
The Children's Hospital
by
Chris Adrian
A hospital is preserved, afloat, after the Earth is flooded beneath seven miles of water. Inside, assailed by mysterious forces, doctors and patients are left to remember the world they've lost and to imagine one to come. At the center, Jemma Claflin, a medical student, finds herself gifted with strange powers and a frightening destiny. Simultaneously epic and intimate, wi...more
Hardcover, 615 pages
Published
August 22nd 2006
by McSweeney's
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I have never been very good at describing books to people.
Mostly, I think, because the story has already been told in a way uniquely perfect to itself.
And how could I try to improve upon that?
So I will not describe this book to you, at least not in detail.
It is 615 pages long, so even the description would be rather lengthy.
But I will tell you to read it.
Because you should.
I don't even know if you will like it.
I have read some reviews of it that weren't too enthusiastic.
But I have also read some...more
Mostly, I think, because the story has already been told in a way uniquely perfect to itself.
And how could I try to improve upon that?
So I will not describe this book to you, at least not in detail.
It is 615 pages long, so even the description would be rather lengthy.
But I will tell you to read it.
Because you should.
I don't even know if you will like it.
I have read some reviews of it that weren't too enthusiastic.
But I have also read some...more
A children's hospital is the only surviving structure after a great flood, and then all sorts of who knows what huh why oh why what a waste of my life happens. Ugh, even now, I think I would still read a book with this premise, because it sounds like it could be so great. That this book ruined this premise so thoroughly and in so many distinct ways is a feat on par with a magic hospital with an angel in the basement and a replicator machine, that organically opens up new rooms while upon the sea...more
9 likes · like · see review
I was reading this for a book club -- I couldn't get it from the library or as an ebook, so I ended up buying it, and I was quite excited about the idea. But I really could not get into it: the length didn't deter me too much, but the utter lack of sympathetic characters or action in the first hundred pages or so was a turn off. So I confess to not having finished this, and not planning to.
I'm not the only one in the group who found it impossible, so I don't feel too bad about it. There are some...more
I'm not the only one in the group who found it impossible, so I don't feel too bad about it. There are some...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
8 likes · like · see review
Mar 13, 2008
Drew
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
people who enjoy magic realism or are into the mythology of religion.
Shelves:
favorites
Let's start with, "...Oh, my god..." in a very, very good way. So good, I kissed its cover when I finally finished it. What - you've never done that?
Now, first of all, I'll admit that there are a good 100-150 pages that could really be lobbed off the top. That being said, you must understand that it is these 100-150 pages that could either pull you in further or annoy you incredibly. Fortunately, myself belonging to the former category, there is a payoff to getting to know these people so well....more
Now, first of all, I'll admit that there are a good 100-150 pages that could really be lobbed off the top. That being said, you must understand that it is these 100-150 pages that could either pull you in further or annoy you incredibly. Fortunately, myself belonging to the former category, there is a payoff to getting to know these people so well....more
5 likes · like · see review
Even though I have slightly less than zero recreational reading time these days, I borrowed this fat hardcover book from the library last week. I'm about 20 pages into it, and loving both the premise and the style. It'll probably take me months to get through it.
Hmm, I just read all the other reviews on this site, and wonder if I should have chosen such a deep and dense book to read in my snatched ten minutes here and there ... we'll see how it goes.
11-19: Well, it took me six weeks, but I final...more
Hmm, I just read all the other reviews on this site, and wonder if I should have chosen such a deep and dense book to read in my snatched ten minutes here and there ... we'll see how it goes.
11-19: Well, it took me six weeks, but I final...more
Finally finished this epic on Sunday night. The sheer size of the book itself -- and the fact that it's a beautiful product and I didn't want to mess it up -- made it a bit difficult to lug around for subway reading. Anyway -- this story is phenomenal. I've never read a book like it, and I always appreciate originality, and not only is it original but it's beautifully written, the characters -- unlike this run-on sentence -- are extraordinarily well constructed (Pickie Beecher should go down as...more
4 likes · like · see review
Apr 20, 2012
Daniel Roy
rated it
1 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
taw-bookclub,
fantasy
What a chore this book turned out to be. It started strong enough that I stuck with the first few hundred pages despite the lack of significant plot development, hoping something in the overall novel would redeem the whole. But by the time I got to page 400 or so, I realized I had been duped.
The premise of The Children's Hospital is pretty cool: it's a modern-day Noah's Ark story, but with a floating hospital, and rare diseases instead of animals. But unfortunately, and perhaps deliberately, Adr...more
The premise of The Children's Hospital is pretty cool: it's a modern-day Noah's Ark story, but with a floating hospital, and rare diseases instead of animals. But unfortunately, and perhaps deliberately, Adr...more
11 likes · like · see review
The only reason I picked this up, and the only reason I stuck it out for all 615 pages, was because I was captivated by the initial premise of the story -- people marooned in a children's hospital post-apocalypse -- and I wanted to see how it would resolve itself. Maybe it was because of my attachment to the premise that I found myself bogged down by the huge amount of (very well-written) detail about the characters' interior lives and the activities of a children's hospital. These things by the...more
4 likes · like · see review
Aug 22, 2007
Kristen Boers
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Anyone who is a fan of literature.
One my my biggest gripes with modern fiction is that there are so few epic tales told in interesting ways. Say what you want about Stephen King, but I have never put down one of his books feeling bored or, worse, uninterested. One of the reasons I love the Harry Potter books is it's grand scope of story. The books I've been most attracted to recently are the ones that manage to tell a story in an interesting way. That's all. Not so hard, right? I read this book, The Children's Hospital, about fo...more
"I have such violent dreams, and yet they are never nightmares. The nightmare is the one where I wake up fifty years from now, happily married, and see a picture by my bed of the family I have happily fathered, every face smiling, every heart black with the sin I put in it."
I read this book months ago and I'm still thinking about it, so I figured it deserved a bit more of a statement than just 5 stars. That quote above is, I think, a representative one from the book. If it resonates with you, th...more
I read this book months ago and I'm still thinking about it, so I figured it deserved a bit more of a statement than just 5 stars. That quote above is, I think, a representative one from the book. If it resonates with you, th...more
This book kept me up at night, NeverEnding story style, rain pounding the windows -- I was left paranoid and enchanted, wondering, hoping it would all come true. My wife would wake up to me shouting out the window into the deluge, "JEMMA!"
The ending left me bewildered and wanting more, but not in a bad way. It felt that it couldn't have ended any other way; it seems complete honest and personal, and I am left needing to know more about Chris Adrian. Did he have a brother that killed himself? Di...more
The ending left me bewildered and wanting more, but not in a bad way. It felt that it couldn't have ended any other way; it seems complete honest and personal, and I am left needing to know more about Chris Adrian. Did he have a brother that killed himself? Di...more
2 likes · like · see review
This is one of the latest offerings from McSweeney's Rectangulars. It's gotten a lot of press from unexpected corners, even including Oprah's magazine. And it is all deserved--this book is sensational. The plot is dazzlingly original, the characters are compelling, and the voice is just fantastic. This is one of the best books I've read in a long time.
*****************************************************************
(update:)
I've just finished reading and crying both. What a stunning book. It is...more
*****************************************************************
(update:)
I've just finished reading and crying both. What a stunning book. It is...more
4 likes · like · see review
I hit the biggest brick wall ever while reading this novel. What could have been a wonderful piece of modern fiction was instead an overblown, poorly-presented, self-assured, long-winded and ultimately unsatisfying attempt at science fiction.
To be fair, parts of this novel were wonderful. These parts were all contained in a young gay cruise ship passenger's diary, where he documents his sexual exploits in code using Presidents' names.
But in the end, my housemate and I decided that we hated it...more
To be fair, parts of this novel were wonderful. These parts were all contained in a young gay cruise ship passenger's diary, where he documents his sexual exploits in code using Presidents' names.
But in the end, my housemate and I decided that we hated it...more
4 likes · like · see review
Oh Yeah, SPOILERS.
A fairly strange book, in the sense that I never knew exactly where it was taking me. Two hundred pages of hospital melodrama with hardcore medschool level diseases and afflictions start this one off, albeit there's quite a bit of "Angels" and whatnot thrown in, plus the world ends. However, this doesn't seem to faze the Hospital peoples, as they basically go on about their daily business of trying to keep the kids alive and whatnot, even though they have a machine that will ma...more
A fairly strange book, in the sense that I never knew exactly where it was taking me. Two hundred pages of hospital melodrama with hardcore medschool level diseases and afflictions start this one off, albeit there's quite a bit of "Angels" and whatnot thrown in, plus the world ends. However, this doesn't seem to faze the Hospital peoples, as they basically go on about their daily business of trying to keep the kids alive and whatnot, even though they have a machine that will ma...more
6 likes · like · see review
This was a really amazing book, I read it in like a week which is really saying something. It's really hard to describe because it was like no other book I have ever read which is probably one of the reasons I liked it so much. I happened to be in public the night I finished it (won't say where because I probably shouldn't have been reading)and had to hide behind the book because I was crying so hard.
2 likes · like · see review
I waited two years for this book to come out and it changed my life accordingly. While I do not regularly muse on the likelihood of an angry God, Adrian's obsession with sin and consequences is ever fascinating, and his characters/their situation solemnly comment on all aspects of the human condition. I finished this on a plane with tears in my eyes.
2 likes · like · see review
After 615 pages of madness, the book has ended. This is the best book in the world. I understand that there can only be one best book, so if I find a better book, I will come back and change this review.
2 likes · like · see review
This book took a long time for me to read (its over 600 pages) but Chris Adrians words are beautiful and it was nice to savor them.
The first half of the book is smooth and quick reading. Not because its better than the second half-just because the author is very good at introducing his characters and forming relationships and surprising us. He never abandons these attributes. The story just gets more complex.
I felt a connection with Jemma that I have never felt with any other character. I could...more
The first half of the book is smooth and quick reading. Not because its better than the second half-just because the author is very good at introducing his characters and forming relationships and surprising us. He never abandons these attributes. The story just gets more complex.
I felt a connection with Jemma that I have never felt with any other character. I could...more
1 like · like · see review
Rage or sadness? From which emotion springs the better decisions and consequently the better reactions for individuals, for the world?
From Publishers Weekly
Medicine, magic, the biblical story of Noah and sociological ruminations about Americans in the throes of the apocalypse come together in physician Adrian's hip, wry and ambitious debut. When the world is submerged beneath seven miles of water, only those aboard the Children's Hospital, a working medical facility and ark built by architect tu...more
From Publishers Weekly
Medicine, magic, the biblical story of Noah and sociological ruminations about Americans in the throes of the apocalypse come together in physician Adrian's hip, wry and ambitious debut. When the world is submerged beneath seven miles of water, only those aboard the Children's Hospital, a working medical facility and ark built by architect tu...more
I am struggling to get through this book, of which I have read about a third of. For a short time I found the chraracter study chapters interesting, but then they became routine, and the characters are lacking the development they should by this point in the story.
I am also thinking that had Adrian written less about arcane medical terminology, I would be much more excited about this book. I don't have the time or desire to look up the diseases and procedures he write about in length. I really...more
I am also thinking that had Adrian written less about arcane medical terminology, I would be much more excited about this book. I don't have the time or desire to look up the diseases and procedures he write about in length. I really...more
this book, to me, feels like playing pretend on a huge wonderful scale. it exists in the most real way in the world of imagination. and it is so blissfully long! i don't really want to finish.
update:
okay but now i did finish, and i was not disappointed. In a lot of ways, I was reminded of Harry Potter in the scope and magnitude and level of imagination and complete definition of an unfamiliar world, except The Children's Hospital soared over all of Harry Potter's weaknesses, and doesn't give you...more
update:
okay but now i did finish, and i was not disappointed. In a lot of ways, I was reminded of Harry Potter in the scope and magnitude and level of imagination and complete definition of an unfamiliar world, except The Children's Hospital soared over all of Harry Potter's weaknesses, and doesn't give you...more
It's hard to know what to say here: I have a distinctly personal relationship with this novel. I want a copy issued to every American, but I don't think I can ever talk to anyone else about it.
"Children's Hospital" mercilessly pokes holes in whatever shield each of uses to ignore (forgo) recognizing what's happening around us: what we do to each other and how little we think about it. Lazy optimism and contented abstractions crumbled.
But despite how this might sound, the experience of reading "...more
"Children's Hospital" mercilessly pokes holes in whatever shield each of uses to ignore (forgo) recognizing what's happening around us: what we do to each other and how little we think about it. Lazy optimism and contented abstractions crumbled.
But despite how this might sound, the experience of reading "...more
I liked this book. I did. But, at the same time, I found it unsettling, and not beacause it's about the end of the world. Many, many mysteries were brought up in the book, but very few were solved (or maybe I just didn't get it). I liked many aspects of the writing style (flashbacks, sudden gear changes in a chapter, people's thoughts interjecting the narrative without warning) though the beginning of the book, dealing with the hospital and illnesses, was quite technical and, as a layman in the...more
1 like · like · see review
Oct 08, 2007
Hannah
rated it
3 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Med students, OCD sufferers, Scholars of the End-Times
In the eddys between high-voltage plot progression (sex! apocalypse! code blue!) and scintillating character exposition,(creepy little kids with dark minds and incomplete bowels!) I prodded my out-of-literary-practice brain to understand the loftier aims of this novel.
The best I could make of it is an allegory about grief; the obsessive, ego-centric and circuitous process of letting go. What other prerequisites for the heroine role has Jemma fulfuilled but a tremendous amount of loss? And not l...more
The best I could make of it is an allegory about grief; the obsessive, ego-centric and circuitous process of letting go. What other prerequisites for the heroine role has Jemma fulfuilled but a tremendous amount of loss? And not l...more
When a great deluge covers the world in 7 miles of water, nobody survives except for the people inside the Children's Hospital. Luckily for them, most of the patients went into crisis and did not notice that the children's hospital had detached from the rest of the hospital and was floating on it's own. Well, sort of on it's own - but you have to read the book to find out how the hospital stays afloat. After the initial shock wears off doctors, med students, patients and their families spend the...more
Okay. So I brought this on a trip with me--lugged the damn thing across the country--only to barely open it. I admire Adrian's prose, and his ambition, and I like the marrying of the hyper-realist and the surreal in this novel, but it moved so slowly, and tediously, and I never wanted to read it. Finally, finally, after 276 pages, I gave up. I rarely do this, but I wanted so badly to read on my vacation. I wanted a good, juicy, smart, beautiful read. A good read! Anything to get some pages turne...more
A beautiful and ruthless combination of science, religion, and natural human progression. This is not a book that praises the unseen force of faith or the steady hand of practice but humanizes them and makes them fallible. There are moments in The Children's Hospital that are perfectly written. You know where you are, who you are with and what you are feeling even if you cannot understand the why of it. Some may say it is slow in places and that is not entirely untrue. These brief moments are ne...more
Dec 14, 2008
Kristin
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
those with a vivid imagination who enjoy medical fiction mixed with religious fantasy
This is a thick book and when I discovered the many Biblical undertones, I was unsure of whether I would be able to finish, because while I am Christian, I have never read the Bible and thus have only minimal understanding of the text within. However, this book took me beyond my ignorance by intertwining the religion with the stories of those individuals trapped within the hospital. I won't put any spoilers here because I was glad no one had spoiled the book for me, but to me there were two halv...more
I can't bring myself to recommend a 600-page book that loses so much momentum after the first half. One day, God sends a second flood to destroy all life on earth, except for the inhabitants of a children's hospital full of a Catch-22-like cast of hyper-quirky adults and surreally ill children. As the ark floats through an almost entirely deserted ocean-world, the inhabitants are left to ponder ethical social and spiritual questions, to wonder how we lost our way and what the new world will be l...more
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| Challenging Read | 2 | 41 | Aug 28, 2009 04:14pm |
Chris Adrian was born in Washington D.C. A graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop, he attended Harvard Divinity School, and is currently a pediatric fellow at UCSF. He received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2009. In 2010, he was chosen as one of the 20 best writers under 40 by The New Yorker.
More about Chris Adrian...
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“It takes four angels to oversee an apocalypse: a recorder to make the book that would be scripture in the new world; a preserver to comfort and save those selected to be the first generation; an accuser to remind them why they suffer; and a destroyer to revoke the promise of survival and redemption, and to teach them the awful truth about furious sheltering grace.”
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6 people liked it
“But as surely as the moon rises and the sun sets, depravity passes down through the ages, because there is always a gap between who we are and who we should be, and our parents, molested by regret, conceive us under the false hope that we will be better than them, and everything they do, every hug and blow, only makes certain that we never will be.”
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5 people liked it
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Oct 06, 2007 11:15pm
Nov 19, 2012 01:41am