author: kim echlin
completion date: 09/08/10
method: borrowed (mum)
i don't know what it is about these love stories. i just don't feel them lately. mainly because i do believe that absence makes the heart grow fonder but the heart is a fickle and forgetful muscle. it does not remember after so many years that there is someone out there who might love it back, it is more interested in love as a whole. but maybe i am defeatist and a downer. maybe these stories are true but i have a hard time believing in this extreme dedication. maybe it can happen, but i feel like its an easy thing to fictionalize. funny to think about love being romanticized...
i felt like a dummy reading this book because i didn't know about this horrifying massacre that happened in cambodia. and it seems like the kind of thing that is so monumental you would hear about it. there were sides to this story that i wanted the author to pursue, but they focused too much on the dreamy love element. the narrator, anne, is more focused on finding her love than she is witnessing what is going on around her in this country. i wish that her lover had included her, but she is an outsider so he never really explains anything to her. he just lets her believe whatever she wants without making her see what is really happening.
i was glad i read this book however. i was glad that i learned about something that i didn't know about otherwise and it will be something that i research because i don't understand how i could be so oblivious to such a horrifying massacre, but i feel like the focus was too much on this unreal love story and not enough on what happens to the survivors of these situations.
however i have to add that i loved the way this book was narrated. it is written as almost a love letter to serey, anne's lover and this does help build her character, but i feel like she is built as an accessory to him. serey is a strong character, who faces incredible trials and suffering, and anne is very weak in comparison. but i don't know maybe it makes him seem stronger because she romanticized and idealizes him.
xo-ellebee
Thanks for reminding me of this book; I had forgotten the title but I'll never forget the cover of this book. I was drawn to it because of the candles and marigolds floating in the river, blessings that are common in the ceremonies along the Ganges River in India.
ReplyDeleteAw, I can definitely relate to coming onto a subject that takes you totally unawares. Learning is fun, I'm glad you feel the same (if only just about this topic)
ReplyDelete