I have a love-hate relationship with Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Some sections I thought were beautiful and moving, some sections I felt dragged the story and were outright boring, and a lot of the sections were extremely bathetic and incredibly heavy handed.

The story focuses on Oskar Schell, an eight year old upper middle class boy trying desperately to grapple with the tragic death of his father on 9/11. As the plot unfolds, we become silent partners on Oskar's journey and concurrently are intertwined in the complicated history of Oskar's paternal grandparents.

I didn't feel like the transitions between the different narratives were always seamless and I did not appreciate various artistic devices Jonathan Safran Foer used. The pictures, the changes in font, the pages of numbers - kind of made me roll my eyes. Also, I get weary with precocious children. The whole child wise beyond his years yet innocent, is a little gimmicky for my taste.

I know people cry and cry over this book, and are so overwhelmed and touched by the subject matter, and think Foer's writing is stylistic and awesome. As for me, it is just not my cup of tea.