Fozzie wrote:
SPOILER
IBIS wrote:
Now that I’ve finished SOUL CATCHER, I feel emotionally drained. I feel as though I've traveled both the physically arduous journey, as well as the emotional and psychic ones that the novel revealed to us in Cain’s heart and mind.
I, too, felt a bit drained after completing the book. I think it was all the violence at the very end. Whew! I don't like to watch violent shows or gory shows (even the hospital or CSI or police shows) because I find them too upsetting, but I can usually handled reading about these things better. It is an emotional experience though.
I take it you two have not read "The Road"?
IBIS wrote:
Vivian,
I'm terrified to read Cormac McCarthy. I thumbed through THE ROAD, and visited some of the threads when B&N Bookclub was discussing him. I even caught his interview with Oprah Winfrey. Hard to believe that such a shy, gentle-looking gentleman would have such a violent imagination.
There is a movie currently out NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN, and my husband had to bribe me with dinner out for me to accompany him to see it. And I spent half the movie covering my eyes.
What an incredibly evil story.
IBIS
Any movie or book about any war, the civil war or some apocalyptic war (or what ever caused the world to be what it became in The Road) is going to be violent. But the thing is, some, as with this one or with The Road, there is something to learn, to take away with you from the book besides just a sense of violence. The stories, human relationships in these two, that go on in the midst of such violence brings us better understanding of others, what violence does to people and what not only their reactions but what our reactions to it can be. Some of the hardest books for me to read but the most interesting, have been stories about the holocaust. I am not talking here about the movies and books that are violent for violence sake, the ones that the kids seem to be so drawn to these days or the video games that sell out like crazy. When I saw Schindler's List, I didnt even know one thing about Schindler before this, and there were scenes in there that really tugged at my heart but the one that finally had me in tears, was at the end when he broke down, and was looking at any little piece of jewelry or anything he had and saying, I should have done more, this was one person maybe two, I should have done more. I lost it, he had such a revelation at that point that he didnt really let himself feel before that he nearly couldnt stand. He was doing good but he still didnt think about them in that particular way , out loud, until then. Cain's feelings were changing too about the "humanness" of these people he just allowed himself to make money off of before thinking of them as property.
The Road is utterly frightening (I like a good fright tho once in awhile too, I like horror movies but not "gorror" movies
) . And it has some really frightening scenes because he is such a good writer. But the relationship of the father and son, just really tugged at my heart throughout, there is such love there. When that little boy, just a little boy, would ask his father real questions and then even if he knew he father was maybe not sure himself but wanting to make him feel ok, when that little boy would just hold his fathers hand as they went on down the road and look down in thought and just say, "Ok". That one word moved me in such a way, because its not only understanding but love in his father, that makes him say, OK, and just go on from there. And when he called him Papa all the time, thats always a word that gets to me, I never had a papa, a father yes, a papa, no. When I finished that book, talk about rung out! I actually sobbed, not got teary eyed, not cried, I sobbed, for many reasons, and thought about it for days. I know men who had the same reaction.The thing is, sometimes out of the most violent situations, comes the most magnificent true meanings of being human. Not all stories end happy, The Road didnt, not for me. I would preferred a different ending to this one, wont say what here
but those who are finished reading know what I mean but the fact is, its real. And I got to know some wonderful characters and the character of those characters lol. So it was a great adventure book,historical book, and love story book. I really liked this book. It would not have been the same without knowing the violence around all this.
Fozzie wrote:
vivico1 wrote:
I take it you two have not read "The Road"?
Believe it or not, I did. I even did the B&N discussion. I don't think I could watch the movie of The Road, if such a thing were ever to be made though. As I said, I can read much more violence and horror than I can watch.
I worry that if they try to do it as a movie, as I am told they are going to, that they will just turn it into an apocalyptic horror story. The cannibal scenes described, tho we did not read any eating, but you didnt need to, I am afraid they will turn it into just that, a zombie type (which they werent) flesh eating thing, instead of how it is in the book. There are a lot of books, that I would love seen made into a movie, I would love to see Soul Catcher turned into a movie! But some books, you just need to leave them as books, to me anyway.
Oh yeah,btw I read The Road a month after the club did it in here but went in there to try to discuss it anyway, since they said they would run it a second month. Not much activity AT ALL, the second month and all the threads I read from the first one, they tried to dissect every single thing he put in there, like it was all in code or something and it nearly took away from my experience of the book. I kept wanting to say, well maybe the bird was just a bird ok? type of thing lol. And when the author appeared on Oprah and didnt answer any of those types of questions, there were a lot of people upset LOL. I thought, this is a book you feel, stop looking for all these hidden messages and just feel. And I am not talking about things having a deeper meaning, or representing something else, those were there and worth talking about, but not looking for something in every line, instead of the story as a whole, or scenes as a whole.
I am glad I read that one without the club first and thats not something I have ever felt before about the clubs. I love this author monthly forum and I sure hope they dont do away with it for just talking to the authors for one week about ALL their books, like in dec. I like that as an addition to this, but I like discussing ONE book with you guys and I dont know any of those authors anyway to discuss their works, and since its not about one book, I have nothing to get, read and focus on to know what we are doing. This way, we get to know an author we hadnt known before, like Michael
and discuss one book and I guarantee you, I will be buying others, but if it were just one week, and I didnt know his work and I go in there and they discuss them, all I am going to have I think, is a bunch of books spoiled for me before I got to read them or know the author. So I wont be doing any of those in Dec. and waiting to see if the author discussions this way come back in Jan. Granted it has been a bit slow lately, but these are holiday months and stuff and so what they are going to do in Dec, I understand.
