Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer

This book has been on a must read list for a few months now but I never purchased it or checked it out.  I was browsing the KC Library ebook section and saw that it was available to rent on Kindle right away and figured it was a sign, so I finally read it.  I hope to watch the movie soon!

The book is about a boy named Oskar who's dad died in the World Trade Center attack.  He and his father were very close, since his dad understood his behavior.  Oskar was always very curious and wanted to learn new things, and constantly wrote people like Jane Goodall and Stephen Hawking.  He has a hard time with his father's death and finds a key in a vase in his dad's closet, with the work Black on it.  Since it's capitalized and obviously a proper noun, Oskar realizes it relates to a person and starts visiting and talking to every Black in the NYC area.  He meets many different kinds of people in his search across the city.  The book is about his journey to find the lock for this key and properly grieve for his father.

Oskar's mom and grandmother are also very important characters in the book.  Throughout the story, we learn more about his grandparents as well.  His grandfather left as soon as he found out Oskar's grandmother was pregnant with Oskar's dad.  His grandfather lost his true love, Anna (Oskar's grandmother's sister) in the WW2 bombings in Dresden and wasn't ready for a family.  Outside of Oskar's story we learn about their strange relationship and history and how it affects Oskar.

The book started moving quickly, but towards the middle just turned into these different stories of strange encounters with people in NYC.  It was interesting but a bit of a slow read.  It wasn't until other characters started to develop in the novel and cross into Oskar's journey that the book picked up the pace.  I won't reveal much about the end but there are multiple twists to the story.  It, in the highest overview, is a story of a young boy grieving and coming to terms with the loss of his father and the guilt he carries.

It is a good book, but it's like one of those books you read in Honors English in high school where you have to stop after each chapter and discuss/figure out what was said.  It's not an "easy" read in the sense that you can just put the story down and pick it back up.  However if you have the patience, and the desire to dive deep into what you read, you will really enjoy this book.

<3, jacq