Buddy Reads : Life of Pi

[Sherin]

Anyone in for reading Life of Pi together?? :)

[Heather]

Hi Sherin,
I'm new to this group but I'm interested! I need to finish a couple of books I'm currently reading so I would need about a week before I could start. If someone else jumps in and can start sooner that's no problem! Let me know what you think.

[Sherin]

That's fine ,Heather.. :)

[Kay-tee]

I'm interested Sherin and Heather. This has been on my TBR for a while.

[JC]

I just started it on audiobook - I'd be happy to discuss!

[Sherin]

Life of Pi is the story of 'Piscine Molitor Patel' alias 'Pi'.
Both those names have interesting history & I'm not going to spoil it now. :)

The first part of Pi's life is lived in a, ahem, zoo, which is run by his father.
As I read on,it has a lot of insights into animal behaviour.
Fascinating,I shoud say..

[JC]

I finished the audio version - very good!

[Neko]

>_<; I'd take part if I didn't have 2 other book challenges on. I really, really neeed to read this book!

[Sherin]

Read it when you have time..
We can ,of course, discuss it later as well :)

[Laura]

I read this book a couple of years ago for a book club I was in. It created a whole lot of discussion, well more than average. I'd love to join this discussion.

[Neko]

Laura wrote: "I read this book a couple of years ago for a book club I was in. It created a whole lot of discussion, well more than average. I'd love to join this discussion."

Ooo..that's nice to know that the book created lots of talking...Was it good discussion or were people mostly complaining?

[JC]

I'd like to know that as well - my hometown book club is reading it in June and I've seen so much negativity about it GR book clubs, but I can't figure out what there is to be negative about. Mostly comments have been that people "hated" it - that's a strong word! Is it Pi's multiple belief systems, or the unbelievability of the story, or the ending? I'm curious what people are having a strong aversion to in this novel.

[Rachelle]

Personally, I hated it because I found it boring!!! Especially the second part! I didn't have any clue why this story was being told and what the point of it was. I did get an answer to this question at the end of the book, but it didn't entirely make up for the drudgery of reading the rest of it.

However my opinion definitely seems to be in the minority, as most people absolutely love the book!

[Laura]

What Rachelle eludes to is exactly what a lot of the discussion was about in my book club. Without giving anything away, the story is broken into 3 very unequal (in length) parts. Part 1 is Pi's life in India, part 2 is his journey and part 3 is post-journey. Each of us liked/loved/hated different parts. I was lucky enough to love the journey part which is the bulk of the book. Others loved part 1 and found part 2 boring (like Rachelle I suppose) which makes the book a hard slog.

Regardless there is a lot to discuss about realities, metaphors, cultures. All of which makes it great for a book club and just to enjoy on your own.

[Sherin]

I'm reading the journey part.
I really liked part 1 -His life in India.
The places were all well-known to me as I'm from South India too..

[Rachelle]

Great comment, Laura! And you're right, I liked part 1 a lot more than part 2.

[Neko]

In my Aussie readers group for our Winter Challenge I'll be finally reading this book :) So once June kicks in I'll hopefully start this book.

I'm now very curious to read since peoples opinions on this seemed to be so different.

I hope I enjoy it..haha.

[Rachelle]

I hope so too, Laura! :-)

[Sherin]

Now that I've finished the book, I should say I liked it.There were some really LOL moments in the book- When the priest,the imam & the pandit meet Pi's family, His family allowing him to follow religions as he wishes, Richard Parker getting his name etc.

It wasn't boring ,for a Booker prize winner ;)

[Rachelle]

Glad you enjoyed it, Sherin! :-)

[Laura]

Sherin, I agree with your comments about LoP. But to be honest, I think Booker has a bad rep of picking boring books when that's not quite fair. Have you read The White Tiger? Not boring at all!

[Sherin]

I was just joking! :)
Actually,I haven't read enough Booker winners to judge them .. :D

Thanks for the suggestion.
I'll try it for sure!

[Maureen]

Oh - I wish I'd seen this at the beginning of the month, because that is when I read the book - from May 3-6th! I would have loved to have others to discuss it with.

I am one of those who loved the book - a 5-star book for me. But then again, I like books that deal with religions and philosophies of life. Here is a link to my review. I found it really helpful after reading the book to read the Sparks notes about it to help understand it better.

This book provides some marvelous quotes about philosophies of life, death, and spiritual nourishment. It my opinion, it nails it! There is much food for thought and, if you are open to communicating with your soul, this book will feed it. It is NOT a slight to religion as one reviewer thought. It is an exaltation to the state of grace and the love that connects us all.

[Neko]

I finally started this book a few nights ago...And I'm only up to page 60. This afternoon while reading I started to fall asleep..haha ^^;; I'm not going to place a judgement on the book just yet.

[Neko]

I finished this book last night..It wasn't really my cup of tea.
I wrote a review..I didn't really get into the details of the book...I just gave my overal thoughts- http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

[Jessica]

Laura wrote: "Sherin, I agree with your comments about LoP. But to be honest, I think Booker has a bad rep of picking boring books when that's not quite fair. Have you read The White Tiger? Not boring at all!"

Laura, I actually read these two back to back just by coincidence. Both very intriguing with deep content.

I just finished this book and I have a question for those of you who have read it. I have seen a lot of people thought it was boring but I found it thrilling. I have a theory about that and I want to test it out.

As a rule I do not read anything about a book before I read it. I hate to know much about a story. That means I skip over introductions and other such material. Following that habit, I completely skipped the author's note. Those of you who liked it, did you read the author's note?

My theory is that the note sets it up as a frame story, so you see the man telling a tale, not the tale itself in your mind's eye. Without the author's note, you are free to see the journey as it happens so it is easier to get involved.

My advice to future readers is to skip the author's note and save it for the end.

[Laura]

I never read the author's notes, forwards and try not to even read the back of the book (or just skim it if I'm grabbing books randomly off a library shelf). I started this fanatical habit after reading the forward on Anna Karenina when it talked about her suicide. I may have been the only person in the developed world that didn't know this book ended with a suicide but it really irked me that this forward gave away such a critical point.

Jessica, I'm with you - I like to discover the book without being told how to read it or what to think about it.

That said, people I know who thought it was boring did so because they said the middle bit was too long with nothing happening. When I proclaimed a lot happened they gave me an odd look. At least some of these people read a lot of mystery type books and I think they've trained their brain to expect a murder, explosion or surprising clue to be unearthed every 15 pages or so.

How's my theory hold up? People out there who love mysteries (thrillers, crime fiction....) did you find this book boring?

[Sherin]

Jessica wrote: "Laura wrote: "Sherin, I agree with your comments about LoP. But to be honest, I think Booker has a bad rep of picking boring books when that's not quite fair. Have you read The White Tiger? Not bor..."


Really good advice,Jessica..
I generally make it a point to skip it.
Liked the book,even after reading the author's note. But I'm sure I would have enjoyed it more otherwise.

Last week I went on a trip to Pondichery where the first part of the story takes place(Awesome place,BTW:)).Reminded me about the story all over again.

[Sherin]

Laura wrote: "I never read the author's notes, forwards and try not to even read the back of the book (or just skim it if I'm grabbing books randomly off a library shelf). I started this fanatical habit after re..."

:D
For me, it was Far from the Madding Crowd.
Those idiots had given the entire story on the back cover :'(

[JC]

Laura wrote: "I never read the author's notes, forwards and try not to even read the back of the book (or just skim it if I'm grabbing books randomly off a library shelf). I started this fanatical habit after re..."

ummmm...I didn't know Anna K. ended that way!!! Did you know you can hide your spoilers in your post?

[Laura]

JenC. wrote: "Laura wrote: "I never read the author's notes, forwards and try not to even read the back of the book (or just skim it if I'm grabbing books randomly off a library shelf). I started this fanatical ..."

Oops - I guess I'm guilty of the same mistake the people writing the forward of my book were. I don't post spoilers when discussing a book in a no spoiler thread but I guess I should have realised that even if this thread isn't about AK, I should have kept that spoiler out. Apologies.

[JC]

That's ok - I'll still read it.