Jessica
For the first three-quarters of this book, the impression that I couldn't get away from was that it was basically a less painful version of “One Hundred Years of Solitude”. Both books essentially detail the fortunes of a particular family over the generations - but at least in the case of “House of the Spirits”, it's over a few less generations, and Allende also knows a greater variety of names.
At any rate, the first three-quarters of the book are very slow, and they're okay but honestly not very memorable. Every time I put the book down for a few days, I'd struggle to remember who all the characters were or what had happened to them when I picked it up again. By the time I finally got three quarters of the way through the book, my memory for it had improved a little... which was good, as the last quarter of the book is where it picks up a lot.
Basically, as this book is partly a portrait of Chile over the twentieth century as well as one of this family, the last quarter of the book is where Salvador Allende's government comes to power, and then there is the coup, and then the dictatorship. The impact this has on the family made me feel like those 300 pages of establishing all these characters in laborious and painstaking detail were almost worthwhile.
Overall, I did enjoy this book - I really did - but the first three quarters were just so slow and it got a bit tiresome. It's the kind of book that is probably much better the faster you read it, so you don't forget who the characters are between reading sessions - and maybe it'd seem less slow if I'd done that, too.
For the first three-quarters of this book, the impression that I couldn't get away from was that it was basically a less painful version of “One Hundred Years of Solitude”. Both books essentially detail the fortunes of a particular family over the generations - but at least in the case of “House of the Spirits”, it's over a few less generations, and Allende also knows a greater variety of names.
At any rate, the first three-quarters of the book are very slow, and they're okay but honestly not very memorable. Every time I put the book down for a few days, I'd struggle to remember who all the characters were or what had happened to them when I picked it up again. By the time I finally got three quarters of the way through the book, my memory for it had improved a little... which was good, as the last quarter of the book is where it picks up a lot.
Basically, as this book is partly a portrait of Chile over the twentieth century as well as one of this family, the last quarter of the book is where Salvador Allende's government comes to power, and then there is the coup, and then the dictatorship. The impact this has on the family made me feel like those 300 pages of establishing all these characters in laborious and painstaking detail were almost worthwhile.
Overall, I did enjoy this book - I really did - but the first three quarters were just so slow and it got a bit tiresome. It's the kind of book that is probably much better the faster you read it, so you don't forget who the characters are between reading sessions - and maybe it'd seem less slow if I'd done that, too.