I recently read Atonement by Ian McEwan for class. This was a marvelous book. Touching, mysterious, and tense, this novel weaves through and around the life of thirteen-year-old Briony Tallis as she grows into being a writer and an individual. Atonement doesn’t shy away from the idea that being a writer means taking risks that sometimes don’t always turn out — Briony seeks to attribute meaning to sometimes meaningless events, and worse, the wrong meanings.
Some notes, and some spoilers
View my jumbled-y class notes here.
The thing I am taking away from this as a writer is, again, the characterization, but also how the story kind of flawlessly weaves in and out of these stories. Robert’s section has some magnificent language — it feels surreal and distant at times, but at others is bitterly grotesque and realistic. The world that McEwan created, though it looks and feels like the real world that you and I live in, was absorbing and interesting. In short, I thoroughly enjoyed this whole novel.
Liz Makes Stuff 