Second Review + Some Pleasant Ramblings..

MIDNIGHT'S CHILDREN BY SALMAN RUSHDIE

Ok, so my first experience with Salman Rushdie has been a bit of a bust. I have to be honest, as they say, honesty is the best policy, and I am also protected by the anonymity of the internet so any mad, die hard fans of the man cannot come and suffocate me in the night, or perhaps ninja into my kitchen and start a fire.

I did not enjoy Midnight’s Children. I was lured by his reputation and the promise of magical realism, which, is a weakness of mine. But somehow, he did not draw me in. The book is divided into three books, and the first book was full of long-winded paragraphs and strange convoluted segues. And don’t get me wrong; I’m a fan of strange. Give me a strange sandwich and I will eat it all up. But it just didn’t seem relevant or, quite frankly, interesting.

Believe me, I gave it the old college try. I have this issue, where I feel morally obliged to finish a book that I have started; no matter how much I am not enjoying it. I don’t know where this illness came from, or how to get rid of it, but its there. No matter how many people tell me, ‘life is too short for bad books’ I get this twinge of uneasiness if I even think about giving up. What if the last few chapters, sentences, words even, are the most poetic and beautiful prose I have ever read? What if they open a pathway to myself that I never knew even existed? Plus, if you find yourself in possession of a book, it has naturally been bought, borrowed, or stolen, and in all situations it is your duty to finish said book. If you buy it, I believe you have entered a sacred contract with the author to read their book. If it is borrowed, then with the borrower, and if you stole, you put at risk your criminal record and reputation as an upstanding citizen of society, so for all this trouble, you should at least FINISH IT! Ok, so I haven’t finished it yet, but I promise you, I will. I have the amazing capacity to compartmentalise when it comes to reading, I can pick up a book that I started years ago and remember (this memory never seemed to work when it came to maths or science in high school, I still don’t remember my times tables, go figure) the storyline and just pick up where I left off.

Do not be one of those people who sees one bad review and never reads that book as a consequence, because if that was happening, I'd never write one again. I firmly believe in forming your own opinion, so read the book. Enjoy it, hate it, dislike it, love it, want to have Salman Rushdie’s children, its up to you. But read, read, read.