Currently Getting Into...

Had this one for about 2 years in my room, finally gotten around to reading it. With the big "Booker Prize Finalist" sticker on the front, you can imagine the buzz surrounding it; but really, i'm about 1/4 way through and not liking it one bit. Let's hope I don't throw it out before finishing it.

Another Man Booker-associated work (this one won the award in 1999), Disgrace is the third book i've read from Coetzee, the first from him I actually liked after I was finished. It's an awesome work on post-apartheid relations in South Africa. The motifs and themes fit the story quite well, with some very memorable, heavily loaded sentences. It's a little morose, a little cynical, but it's a masterpiece.

The books follows the plight of Suleiman, a nine-year-old boy living in Tripoli in Libya, after his father is forced to flee the family household by Qaddafi's state police due to his involvement in anti-State activities. Almost through with this one. It's nicely written, but loses much of its power by never giving us the bigger picture of the unrest that Libyan residents experienced at the time of its plot.