Acton reviewed Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
Review of 'Everything is illuminated' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
This is a superbly unusual book. A young American travels to the Ukraine to find a woman he believes saved his grandfather from the concentration camps. He's accompanied by Alex, a young Ukrainian who speaks English in a comical I-wore-out-my-thesaurus type way (as in "I was roosting at the beach," or, "Enough of my miniature talking. I am making you a very bored person"). Since young Alex doesn't have a driver's license, his grandfather (also Alex), who is haunted by memories of the war, is doing the driving. Oh, and the dog, the flatulent Sammy Davis Junior,Junior, is along to provide another touch of comedy.
The stories--both the imagined story of his ancesters written by Jonathan (he's a character in his own book) and Alex's more realistic one, are incredibly sad. It's an intelligent look at the unknowable "truths" that can haunt families, and how the past affects all of …
This is a superbly unusual book. A young American travels to the Ukraine to find a woman he believes saved his grandfather from the concentration camps. He's accompanied by Alex, a young Ukrainian who speaks English in a comical I-wore-out-my-thesaurus type way (as in "I was roosting at the beach," or, "Enough of my miniature talking. I am making you a very bored person"). Since young Alex doesn't have a driver's license, his grandfather (also Alex), who is haunted by memories of the war, is doing the driving. Oh, and the dog, the flatulent Sammy Davis Junior,Junior, is along to provide another touch of comedy.
The stories--both the imagined story of his ancesters written by Jonathan (he's a character in his own book) and Alex's more realistic one, are incredibly sad. It's an intelligent look at the unknowable "truths" that can haunt families, and how the past affects all of us. Of course, everything cannot be illuminated (Alex's word). There's SO much to this book! It will NOT have you "manufacturing Z's."
