"All the world will be your enemy... and when they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you."
I'm sorry. I have to do this. I have to just burst forth with this book experience that I've had on my trip, because it just has been so, so long since any book has touched me this way. Ladies and gents, this is not The Hunger Games. This is not fucking Twilight. This. Is. Bunnies.
Finally, after being told for my whole life that I need to read this book, and shoving it off because I assumed any book written about rabbits would be dumb, while on this trip I read Watership Down by Richard Avens.
And then I read it again. Cover to digital cover.
This isn't a review. Partly because I have not a single freaking thing to nitpick apart, and what fun is a review if you can't do that? This is just a gushing because I have no one to talk about it to over here and I am going to bust if I can't find some way to throw quotes back and forth, punctuated with "Holy crap that was so awesome!"
I've been thinking hard about the last time I loved a book this much. The first one that comes to mind is Sunshine by Robin McKinley, and although I did read that one twice through back-to-back as well, I'm fairly certain Watership Down is better.
I want to say this cuts all the way through the chaff and up to the true measure of a book -- one Lord of the Rings. But it can't be that good. Can it?
I'm not going to say any more. This isn't a review. But for serious, if you haven't read Watership Down and you have any kind of imagination and empathy inside you at all, make that the next novel on your list. And then talk to me about it. We can banter in Lapine.
I'm sorry. I have to do this. I have to just burst forth with this book experience that I've had on my trip, because it just has been so, so long since any book has touched me this way. Ladies and gents, this is not The Hunger Games. This is not fucking Twilight. This. Is. Bunnies.
Finally, after being told for my whole life that I need to read this book, and shoving it off because I assumed any book written about rabbits would be dumb, while on this trip I read Watership Down by Richard Avens.
And then I read it again. Cover to digital cover.
This isn't a review. Partly because I have not a single freaking thing to nitpick apart, and what fun is a review if you can't do that? This is just a gushing because I have no one to talk about it to over here and I am going to bust if I can't find some way to throw quotes back and forth, punctuated with "Holy crap that was so awesome!"
I've been thinking hard about the last time I loved a book this much. The first one that comes to mind is Sunshine by Robin McKinley, and although I did read that one twice through back-to-back as well, I'm fairly certain Watership Down is better.
I want to say this cuts all the way through the chaff and up to the true measure of a book -- one Lord of the Rings. But it can't be that good. Can it?
I'm not going to say any more. This isn't a review. But for serious, if you haven't read Watership Down and you have any kind of imagination and empathy inside you at all, make that the next novel on your list. And then talk to me about it. We can banter in Lapine.
I notice that both LotR and Watership Down have made up languages. Are you a big fan of any other books with made up languages?
ReplyDeleteLanguages are usually a big plus, because it's a pretty good indication that a writer has given a lot of comprehensive thought to his world. And that's really what I love -- an author that is able to create a convincing culture, history, mythology, language... of course, even with all that the story can still fall flat (ex: Perdido Street Station) without the two most important things, plot and character. Both of which Tolkien and Avens do *very* well.
DeleteEvery once in a while, out of *nowhere*, I think of the bit at the beginning when they're talking about how "the Rowan" isn't just "Rowan."
ReplyDeleteI really don't have a clue why.