Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, written by Jonathan Safran Foer, is narrated by a nine year old boy living in New York City.This book is not like most, it is a story that continues to switch view points and jumps around in time. There are three main stories being told in this book all of which converge in the end to give you an overall sense of understanding of these peoples lives and experiences.
It is narrated in the present by Oskar Schell, a nine year old boy who has lost his father in the 9/11 disaster. He is a very smart intellectual person who, although pessimistic about the world, is a very determined and straight-forward thinker for someone his age. He finds a key in his dad’s belongings and becomes obsessed with finding what it unlocks, hoping that it will help bring him closer to his dad’s memory even though he knows that his dad is not alive he is not ready to let go of the idea of his father. Being a smart kid he knows that there are millions and millions of locks in New York that the key could go to, but he is not about to give up so he sets out going door-to-door talking to people and meeting many interesting people and unintentionally learning their stories and becoming involved in their lives.
The second story is from his grandmother’s view, only it is not her voice in the present. Her sections of the book take you back to Dresden, Germany and the disasters and loss that she experienced there. Jonathan Safran Foer brings this back to Oskar’s story as the overall book progresses and teaches you how similarly people deal with traumatic situations and major loss. The last story is the Grandfather’s whose story runs more or less alongside of the grandmother’s, but from a very interesting perspective. Of all of the people in the book the grandfather seems to be the most affected and broken from the tragedies that he experienced in his life. The grandfather reaches a point where he has spent his whole life just trying to figure out how to live, which although sad, gives his story a very special voice.
All of these people are very different, giving you different insight into their lives and these well known events from a more personal view. The book overall is about loss and how people cope with life after loss; but, don’t get me wrong this book is not a depressing account of peoples’ horribly depressing life stories. It is quite the opposite. While it covers very serious events and issues, it is written with an almost humorous tone. The humorous tone comes mainly from Oskar’s views on the world. He is only nine, he is so young yet he has such strong opinions about the world and is so determined to do what he thinks is right in life. I think that anyone who can remember being nine can relate to him.
Overall I thought that this was an amazing book–Jonathan Safran Foer is an incredible writer, and in my opinion this is one of his best books. It displays how people deal with the problems and obstacles of life whether that is a loss of a loved one or just the day-to-day issues that everyone faces.This book has all of them from different points of view that really create an incredible reading experience and I highly recommend it!
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