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Summary: Feels like a translation.
Review: When you read a novel that has been translated from another language, you can sometimes sense it's a translation. Maybe some forced metaphors or strange syntactical constructs, something always gives it away. But saying that, I enjoyed the book and it was refreshing to see a heroine like Smilla; both ballsy and smart. If anything, the 'translation feel' of the book for me added to its foreignness. I don't think I have ever met an Inuit person and this book definitely held my interest, describing cultures and people I have never encountered.
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Summary: A soft,searching study of one loners belief of true justice
Review: This book is sensual, violent, erotic and a true Great Book.Part of its appeal may come fom being reasonably ignorant of Danish culture but it leads you to many points that you might not have trodden without a push and when you get there it shows little bias then leads you on further.I can't stop crowing about it.Thankyou peter ,thankyou.
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Summary: 20 ways tyo describe snow
Review: It is not the danish, who has 20 ways to describe snow! It is people from greenland, who so many ways to describe snow. Smila is half danish, half greenish ;-) Thats why she know so much about snow. If u want to read a fine book u should look for Michael Larsens "the snake in sydney" another briliant danish writer
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Summary: Exceptional writing, ridiculous ending.
Review: This book is beautifully written and translated. The most compelling aspect of "Smilla's Sense of Snow" is clearly Smilla herself - an intelligent, fascinating, but also cynical character, who is often as emotionally cold as the snow she "smells". Hoeg has done a wonderful job of creating an intriguing and believable character. As a Swede, I also appreciated the sense of melancholy, which is so very Scandinavian, and I find, an often rather depressing element in the book. As a writer, however, I was not very impressed with the plot. (Worms and meteorites, indeed!) Also, many of the love scenes - if you can call them that! - appear to be more the exercise of bodily functions (one physically impossible!) than acts of affection. This may, of course, only be a reflection of Smilla's emotional paralysis. All in all, a beautifully written book that is strong on characterization and social issues, but weak on plotting.
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Summary: The best book I've ever read!!!!!!!!!
Review: This is the best book that I have ever read. I can't explain it. I just didn't want to stop reading it.I think anyone who says the characters are unbelievable or that the plot is too complex, have just not understood. I highly recommend it to anyone who has some time to spend on it and doesn't only want a book that's easy to read. There is only one thing I'm left missing, and that's a happy ending for Smilla and the Mechanic,but hey, if there would have been one ,this book hadn't made us readers think for ourselves.
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Summary: Brilliant!
Review: You have to know a bit about Denmark to be able to understand the fascination with snow shown in this book - did you know that Danish has more than 20 different words with which to describe snow? I could not put the book down once I've started reading it and finished it in 5 hours.
As I said, brilliant!
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Summary: What is going on???
Review: This book was recommended to me by a co-worker--raving about the herroine in the plot and how powerful the plot is. WHAT was she talking about? Maybe the plot was lost in the transaltion, but I found the book boring and hard to follow. I kept losing track of what was going on and who was who? After a few chapters of complete confusion, I finally put it down without finishing it. I did happily hand it over to my father--a well-read and educated man. I thought maybe he would appreciate this recommendation, but he as I could not follow the events, and said goodbye to the story before the end.
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Summary: This was one fantastic book!
Review: Peter Hoeg has a writing style like no other author I have read. He is one of the best writers I have read. Smilla's Sense of Snow is so gripping ans suspenceful I could not stop reading it.
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Summary: Great...but I'm glad I saw the movie first
Review: For some reason, I just could not get this story out of my mind, once I saw the movie. When I finally found the book, I was again caught up in it. The plot is not the most linear one I've ever read (that's ok...the poetic, hypnotic nature of the prose is why it's great). But I was glad to have already seen the movie so I could keep a grasp on what actually was happening. As for the ending - I had thought for a moment that the last pages were torn out (really!) but when I went back, re-read and pondered about it, it seemed fitting.
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Summary: Memorable & fascinating
Review: I loved this book when I read it a long time ago. I read the British version entitled "Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow" which I prefer, it being a literal rendering of the Danish. I thought the characters a little flat, the story vaguely improbable, but no worse for that, but I loved the insight into a place and people I knew practically nothing of. I had always thought that the Eskimos having 27 (or however many it is) different names for snow was similar to the British having 60 or so names for penis; pointless and a bit weird. I now understand why; to an eskimo there are that many kinds of snow and to specify which is which is a matter of life & death. Living, as I do, in the Middle East, I found it wonderful that Hoeg brought his world of ice & snow to where I could see it & feel it and begin to understand it. Disregard those who disliked the ending, found the prose turgid or too dense, or hated the plot. Read this book for it's eloquence on the subject of a persecuted minority you will probably never get to know.
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