Everything Is Illuminated : A Novel

Rating:
Summary: Everything is Illuminated Illuminates Everything
Review: Incredible. Brilliant. Wow. Yes, genius. GENIUS. This is good. It is good that we have a writer like Jonathan Safran Foer who commands debilitating laughter with the same and uncommon ease with which he draws out tears, it is good that this is a book that has something to say, it is good that what Jonathan Safran Foer has to say is good. When you finish Everything is Illuminated, you will catch your breath, wait for your heart to slow down, and slowly come to the realization--like recovering from a coma, like waking up from a nightmare, like surfacing from a pool full of sewage into the light of day--that everything is, indeed, perhaps, just maybe, illuminated. And that is good.

Rating:
Summary: Everything is Overrated
Review: If you think there is no way a book could live up to the hype this book has surrounding it, you are right. This is a perfectly average tale told with enough gimmickry to, apparently, convince most people they are experiencing literary genius. If you are one of those discriminating readers who is automatically suspicious of "popular opinion", be advised that there are, in fact, better books out there, contrary to what the hubub over this novel would have you believe. (Anything by Garcia Marquez or Saramago comes to mind...)

Rating:
Summary: Illuminating the Fire Within
Review: There comes a time in a person's life, where memories of family, community, events, life becomes mythical...reaches mythical proportions. The actual events, or the memories and perceptions of events, that threaded together become the weave of a life take on weight of epic relativity. It is that which elevates the mundane to significance. It is that which gives our lives meaning.

I say this because Jonathan Safran Foer has woven a tale that rises above the fray in "Everything is Illuminated." His age, a scant 24, tells me there is quite a reservoir of latent talent. He doesn't have the years to go through the endless molding of writing schools. There is a hint of the Mozart boy genius.

Foer has managed to elevate life events to myth in "Everything is Illuminated." It is a beautiful tapestry of a Ukrainian village, or shetl, in which magical things happen to magical people. The main character, a young American Jew, goes on a spirit hunt to reconnect himself with his ancestral heritage in Eastern Europe. He does this through a cast of characters to include a Ukrainian youth, who himself is unknowingly coming to an awakening, a crotchety grandfather, and a flatulent horny aged dog named Sammy Davis Junior, Junior. They go in search of unraveling the past of a now all but forgotten and extinct Ukranian village named Trachimbrod. Through the journey they are confronted with themselves and a spiritual awakening is realized.

If I had to categorize this book it would be elements of Heller's Catch-22, James Joyce, Marquez' One Hundred Years of Solitude, and Weisel's Night with a little David Sedaris thrown in the mix. Granted that's lofty company and the book most likely won't stand up over time to that crowd, but Safran Foer is to be watched and his language and gift is to be relished. If a weakness of the book needs to be identified, the characters sometimes become muddled leaving the reader wondering who is who and what exactly happened to them along the way.

"Everything Is Illuminated," stands as one of my more recent faves and I am thankful for the brother in Texas that knows me well enough to send it my way.
--MMW

Rating:
Summary: Not perfect, but brilliant.
Review: Most of the reviewers on here are correct, whether they agree with each other or not. "Everything Is Illuminated" is a captivating, though-provoking, hilarious book. It is also marred by a few affected devices that may lessen the overall enjoyment depending on the reader's ability to see past them.

The reason I gave this book 5 stars however, is that this book, warts and all, probably deserves a 6. The scope, the very attempt of what Foer is trying to do here is more than admirable, it is groundbreaking, and it deserves to be read by every reader of contemporary fiction. Very, very few books can combine humor and drama with such success.

"Everything Is Illuminated" is fiction in its highest form: words that move you to joy and sorrow, all powered by such energy that you can't help but get caught up in the story. What else can I say?

Read this book.

Rating:
Summary: Everything is Illuminated
Review: Those who want to know about the destruction of the Jews in Soviet territory would get a more truthful story from Anatolii Rybakov's excellent novel "Heavy Sand" (available from Amazon) than from this book. Rybakov was born near the time and place he describes and knows what he is talking about--he's a great writer. An account of the destruction of the Lithuanian Jews can be found in "Kaddish for Kovno: Life and Death in a Lithuanian Ghetto 1941-1945" by William W. Mishell. (Mishell is a survivor of the Kovno ghetto). Mishell's book is also available from Amazon. Even though I admit that "Everything is Illuminated" is somewhat well written, to me the characters do not ring true--they read like an American's fantasy of Eastern European Jews. Since I myself am a Russian Jew, it is very clear to me that this author doesn't know how my compatriots think or feel--or, thought and felt. As creative writing teachers never tire of telling their students, write about what you know. It looks like Foer has taken their advice in his forthcoming novel.

Rating:
Summary: So rare..
Review: It is so rare to find a book that moves you to laugh out lound and cry, all within a limited number of pages. This book caused me to do both. The conversations between Jonathon and Alex and hysterical. The depth of the characters and what they discover about themselves during this adventure are profound and moving. Absolutely must read this book

Rating:
Summary: I read this amazing novel with violence and more violence!
Review: In case any of you missed it, an incredible debut novel entitled "Everything is Illuminated" was delivered by a 24-year-old Jewish prodigy in 2002. Jonathan Safran Foer's aptly named masterpiece provided a reading experience not unlike an adrenaline-induced head-rush such that nerve endings galvanized, inactive neurons fired and previously unknown senses triggered. Once illuminated, I worried that no other author or any other written work could achieve the same level of enlightenment again. If there was ever a tome designed for a book club, this was it. So many beautiful words to dissect, fragments of truth to investigate, oodles of diction to analyze and eons of magic to disseminate! The story involved a Ukrainian translator's inimitably versed diction of the ordeals encountered when Jonathan Safran Foer attempted to find the woman who supposedly saved his grandfather from a Nazi demise. The uniquely botched verbiage was a hoot.

I read "Illuminated" with violence and then more violence. The absurdity also made me laugh with hostility and anticipate with bumps on my skin the consequent riotous humor associated with sex lights (signifying historical carnal acts) perceived from outer space. I was appeased rather than injured by what I perceived. After reaching the book's apex, I felt urges to utter luminous remarks because I was ravished by the novel's lumin. Nevertheless, I amputated some of my heart felts to quell my zealous talkings. All of you would be best served by individual dissemination of the lumin within the novel with as little dispersion from me as possible. I'd be a tickled pink person to inform you that early phraseology of the novel instigated uproarious laughter (some based on infantile sex dialogue) while the waning chapters ushered utter chagrin and commanded elephant tears. I must manufacture your anticipation for what will undeniably be the most cherished prose you have ever encountered. Those infatuated with enchanting words will feast upon each and every utterance presented by phenomenal author Safran Foer. You will learn many momentous lessons from Jonathan's writing. I'm covetous of the uncharted journey many of you will hopefully feel compelled to embark upon. Personally, I plan on re-reading this novel again someday very soon. Mazel tov!

Thank you Sue for getting me to read this novel! Unlike some of the novels assigned by previous English teachers, this novel rocked and rotated my world. Sue don't stop-spleening me!

Jay's Grade: A+

November 27, 2004