Registered and bought for A secret santa

Thank you! I can't wait to start reading this!

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Coincidentally a friend of mine gave me another copy of the book as a late Christmas present. I know a lot of people are wishing for to read the novel, so I'll offer this copy to an international ray.

The ray will proceed somewhat geographically and will start in two weeks (around January 14th).

Tintti, Finland
LeishaCamden, Norway
missprisy, USA
Breeze144, Canada
supertellp, UK
veleta, Spain

The ray has now ended and the book's free to travel spontaneously. Thanks for participating!

The book arrived today. Thanks, Perdue! I'll start reading this soon.

I saw this book for the first time in a bookstore in Glasgow in April 2006, and almost bought it, but then ended up buying something else (they had those wonderful 3 for the price of 2 offers that I can't resist). Nice that the book has now found its way to me!

Wow, what a story! I was hooked instantly and would probably have read this at one sitting had it been possible. Luckily I'm on sick leave today, so I could read all day without distractions.

At first I found Shriver's style and language a bit complicated, and I found it weird that Eva writes such long and detailed letters to her estranged husband, but pretty soon I got used to it and just enjoyed the unraveling story of Kevin and his family. It was really well told story, and thought-provoking, too.

Was Kevin really as evil, even as a baby, as Eva describes? Why didn't Franklin notice there was something wrong with the boy, or was it only that he didn't want to notice, because of his idea of the perfect family (like his idea of America, which Eva writes about in one of the first letters)? Weren't there any good, or at least normal, moments with Kevin? Eva writes only about the bad things he did, but if the kid was that bad all the time, why didn't they take him to a therapist? Why was Kevin like that, was it his parents' fault or was he born evil? Or was it just Eva who forgot all the good things about Kevin, because she disliked him from day one? Did Eva and Franklin ever really, seriously, discuss about Kevin's behaviour, or its effect on their relationship?

I could write an overlong essay about this book, but I won't do it here as it would probably include some spoilers. I just say that We need to talk about Kevin is an excellent book and I highly recommend it. I might buy a copy for my permanent collection. This one I'll send forward as soon as I get LeishaCamden's address.

Thanks for setting up the ray, Perdue!

This book arrived in the mail today from Finland. Thanks, Tintti! And thanks to Perdue for starting this bookray. I first saw this book last November when I visited Glasgow for a long weekend. Unfortunately I couldn't buy it as I had already bought too many books and my luggage was uncomfortably heavy ... ! ;-) So I was thrilled to discover this bookray. Thanks!! I'll journal again when I've read the book.

I started reading this book on the train yesterday. :-)

So far I've only read about 80 pages, but already I'm pretty much hooked. There are a few things about it that I don't like, but I expected them (details to follow in my final review :-) if I can manage it without spoilers) ... but the story is completely fascinating and I hardly want to put the book down. I'm so glad I'm part of this bookring - thanks, Perdue! :-)

I finished reading this book yesterday.

First of all I have to say that I was really intrigued and fascinated by this book. I am a true crime buff and although the topic of this book isn't something that has interested me very much in the past, the questions raised by the story are extremely thought-provoking and important. It was a great reading experience - although of course there were things about it I didn't like, as well. Those first:

The language or style or whatever I should call it. The book is well written in the sense that the author has a good grasp of the English language. But IMO it is very badly written in the sense that it is completely unconvincing as a series of letters, which is what the novel purports to be. I had to really focus in order to, what ... force the suspension of disbelief :-) enough to 'look past' that. These letters tell the story of the narrator's life since before the birth of her son - he is 17 going on 18 when the letters are written, in the winter of 2000/2001 and the spring of 2001. Yet in these letters, supposedly written in settings as casual as cafés, the narrator's crummy apartment, etc, in scenes that have taken place in, say, 1984, she quotes looong passages of dialog verbatim, down to stuttering, even, and hesitation. Yes, I know I am compulsive :-) but it just is not believable. *Nobody* would write letters like these. It's not just the endless dialogs and monologs which she recalls word perfect, it's also the language generally that is in many places too studied and formal for a letter written 'on the spot'. This was the one big problem I had with the book.

But of course the issues the book deals with are so fascinating and thought-provoking that I liked it very much regardless. As I said, an engaging reading experience. I agree with some of the points Tintti raised. I do think it's possible for someone to be 'born bad' or at least with overwhelming odds of turning out bad regardless of circumstances ... but I find it hard to believe that anyone's childhood could be this complete shambles without anyone actually doing anything about it. It doesn't seem convincing that when their kid is six years old and still in diapers, they haven't already taken him to every specialist in the yellow pages. They're loaded, so money's not an issue. As Tintti said, it doesn't seem possible that *everything* *all the time* was all bad. Kevin's mother seems to not remember one single occasion when her son was in good health and something good happened. But how is it, then, that she hasn't gone off the deep end years ago and her kid landed in foster care ... ? If Kevin was nothing but bad all the time, it seems really bizarre that his father never once agreed with her that something was wrong. No matter how much he 'wanted to believe'.

The question the book raises, of course, is what could have been done. And it's very hard to answer that. Kevin obviously *wanted* to do what he did. I think it would have been very difficult to stop him from doing that, or something similar, without literally locking him up and throwing away the key. And even then, who knows. What needs to be addressed is obviously, at least in part, the origins of this appetite for destruction. But also, it wouldn't hurt to not have quite so many lethal weapons readily available. Like Franklin in the book, some people don't see the connection between lack of gun control and school shootings in the US. Personally, I don't see how it's possible to miss it. I think this book could help on that score; I think it would really make people think more deeply about child rearing and about the greater society that children are raised in.

Finally, in closing: What kind of name is 'Lionel' for a woman, anyway?? Thank you again, Perdue, for starting this bookray!!

missprisy confirmed her address in a PM today so I will get the book in the mail to her as soon as. :-)

RELEASE NOTES:

I sent the book off to missprisy in Massachusetts half an hour ago, surface mail. I hope it has a safe journey and that missprisy will be as intrigued by it as the rest of us have been. :-)

Arrived today! I have 2 books in front of this one, but I'll get to it soon.

Unfortunately this book isn’t doing anything for me! Instead of holding onto it, I plan on mailing it to Breeze144 sometime this week, just as soon as I can get to a post office.

Arrived here today! Thanks!

May 30 - Fuzzywuzzy asked to be skipped, have PMed next participant.

June 14 - I know my time is running out...I'm about half way through! This will travel soon!

I have to agree with the previous readers that the letter-writting was unconvincing. Would she really re-hash coversations in such detail? Doubt it...

But outside of that, I loved this story, I was really shocked at the end! I liked the questions from the book club guide at the back. Especially, the one along the lines of "is Eva's version of the truth really the truth?"

I'll be sending this along within a few days! Thanks for sharing!

Received to day and will start to read tonight....
Thank you to breeze144 for posting to me.
I am laughing as this is the book that I sent perdue at christmas for her secret santa....

RELEASE NOTES:

Send in on its way.....
I really enjoyed this book, it did make me think!! I work as a tenancy enforcement officer and every day I think " There are no bad kids, only bad parents".

Caught on Saturday morning in the mail. Sorry I forgot to do a journal entry yesterday when I checked my e-mail.

I love books that surprise me! My first surprise was the nice postcard inside. Thank you very much for it.

My second surprise: Lionel is actually a woman. I didn't know it could be a name for girls.

An excellent book! One of my best reads this year. I agree with some of the statements of readers before me: at the beginning, the language was too florid and bombastic. I suffered a bit to read the first 10 pages of so, because I thought the book was going nowhere. How mistaken I was!

I completely agreed with Eva, and felt so angry about Franklin's attitude!. For me, the problem was not to believe that the father could be tricked by his own son all the time, but to believe that Kevin would find it interesting to trick him all the time. Franklin seemed so eager to be tricked!

The editor's outline says that the mother's a emotionless freak. All the opposite. In my opinion, she feels a whole set of emotions, from guilt to helplessness, from confusion to depression, from a selfish and proud attitude as an entrepreneur to a low self-esteem as a mother and married wife. Probably, the incident which really put me off was the virus anecdote. However, I've seen many flamboyant women who took a break from successful careers to have children and the subsequent failure to make a complete comeback. And this is so unfair for Eva!

When that woman talked to her while waiting for her turn to see her son, and she offers some consolation to Eva saying something like "Society always blames the mothers", I agree so completely with her. Our western society still blames the women for whatever happens at their home.

10 out of 10

This book is heading for A Coruña through ****'s hands. I hope the final destinatary likes the book!!!

Pillado en el primer meetup de septiembre (Ourense 2007).

RELEASE NOTES:

Y allá que se va para casa de Lilly!!!

Espero que lo disfrutes, guapísima!!!

Hola, guapísimo !!!
Esta mañana he recibido el libro. Me hace ilusión porque he recibido muy buenas críticas. Ya te contaré...Bicos !!!

"We Need To Talk About Kevin" is a disquieting, provocative, and brilliantly written novel about a mother, desperately attempting to understand why her son, 15-year-old Kevin, brutally, with premeditation, murdered seven of his fellow classmates, a cafeteria worker and his English teacher in a Columbine-style school massacre. There have been nationwide discussions on the cause of events like these - especially during the 1990s when it seemed like school shootings ran rampant throughout the US. In Pearl, Paducah, Springfield, Littleton, seemingly normal kids, kids who had almost everything a child could want, became terribly derailed. Some argue that the proliferation of and easy access to guns is the cause; others that the excess of violence in movies, TV programs and video games induce violent behavior in children and adolescents. The one question almost everyone seems to have in common is, "What were these murderous kids' parents like?" "Didn't they recognize symptoms of violence in their own children?"

Eva Khatchadourian, Kevin's bereft mother, narrates this novel through a series of compelling letters to her estranged husband, Franklin. She examines her son's life, from conception to his terrible act of violence, trying to understand the why of it. What becomes clear early on is that Eva tortures herself with blame. She is guilt-ridden that her shortcomings as a parent might have caused Kevin's evil act, his violent behavior, his very nature. She must have failed, she must have been deficient as a mother, for her boy to commit such a chilling crime. She also considers that neither nature nor nurture are solely responsible for shaping a child's character. Her honest, introspective correspondence to her beloved husband causes the reader to consider that some children just might be born bad. How and when are psychopaths created? The reader is pulled back and forth between empathy and blame, anger and grief, and perhaps, ultimately to forgiveness.

Through Eva's perspective we watch a story unfold. A happy, almost idyllic marriage to Franklin; a brilliant career in a business which she, herself, created; her ambivalent feelings when she became pregnant, an event which interfered with her career; the indifference she felt when she held her son for the first time; Kevin's difficult infancy - he refused his mother's milk and didn't like to be held by her; his total manipulation of his father, who believed Kevin could do no wrong, putting a permanent strain on the marriage; Kevin's lack of empathy and cruel streak, which he blatantly flaunted in front of his mother and hid from his Dad; and Eva's fear that her dislike for her son, which she went overboard to conceal, would damage him - further escalating his already violent nature.

"We Need To Talk About Kevin" examines how a heinous event can impact a town, a marriage, a family and an individual. It also causes the reader to reflect on the concept of unconditional love. Lionel Shriver's clear, crisply crafted prose builds tension throughout her novel, ultimately leading to a stunning conclusion. Her narrative is almost perfectly paced. This is an extraordinary psychological study that gripped me, riveted me, from the first page to the last. And the author ably portrays the complexity and the horror of the act and the consequences. I was seriously left breathless and horribly saddened after finishing the book.

Normas del bring:

- Cuando recibas el libro envia un PM a la persona que te lo ha enviado para que sepa que el libro ha llegado a salvo y haz un journal entry.

-Cuando hayas leído el libro, consulta en la lista a quien se lo tienes que pasar pidiendo la direccion. Si la persona no contesta tu PM, envíame uno a mí y decidiré si pasamos a la siguiente persona o no.

- Envia siempre el libro por correo CERTIFICADO o entrégalo en mano si puedes (para eso está la lista por comunidades!!! =P)

- Si la cadena se rompe por cualquier motivo, envíame un PM e intentaré hacer algo al respecto.

- Escribe un journal al recibirlo, al leerlo, al terminarlo y siempre que quieras, así tendremos mucha más curiosidad por leerlo!!!!

Disfruta el libro!!!! =D

Lista:

-Algarabia (Barcelona)
-Sorgintxu (Bizkaia)
-Vanlat (Zaragoza) ---> Ya está aquí !!!

Listo para irse mañana por la mañana hacia Barcelona.

Buena lectura y molts petons !!!

Hoy recibí el envío de Li y ya empecé a leer el libro. Cuando tenga más que contar haré otra entrada.
Gracias Li!!!

Me gustó leer este libro, terminé con él hace algunos días y me ha hecho reflexionar sobre varios temas importantes: la maternidad, la familia, la violencia, la idea del hombre malo por naturaleza versus la del hombre corrompido por la sociedad.
El lenguaje que usa Shriver puede ser complicado y pretencioso algunas veces, pero creo que lo hace para caracterizar al personaje, Eva, que escribe en primera persona (No estoy segura ya que es el único libro de esta escritora que he leído).
A diferencia de varios lectores anteriones, a mi la elección del estilo espistolar me pareció afortunada, las cartas construyen el punto de vista del personaje narrador. Muy pronto en la lectura nos damos cuenta de que Eva escribe las cartas más para ella misma que para su marido ausente; en un último intento de comprender lo sucedido. Muchos comentarios de Eva pueden ser brutales y despiadados, como si el cinismo y el humor negro fueran la única manera de abordar la hisoria de su familia, la historia del país en el que vive y del cual no quiere ser parte.
Podría escribir mucho más sobre este libro, pero me temo que a costa de arruinar la experiencia de próximos lectores. Solo quiero decir que es un libro que merece la pena ser leído porque ofrece un análisis de la violencia escolar que no se vale de los tópicos siempre arguidos: la tenencia de armas, la exclusión social, la violencia intrafamiliar o la influencia negativa de los medios. Y lo presenta con la voz de la madre del adolescente criminal, un punto de vista jamás tratado en los espectáculos mediáticos que siempre generan las muy americanas masacres escolares.

Lo he recogido esta mañana de Correos. Tengo un par de libros pidiéndome a gritos que los lea, así que me pongo las pilas para no retrasarme demasiado (si es que no es demasiado tarde ya :S). ¡Gracias a todos!

Al final no lo he podido leer. ¡Dichosa crisis lectora! Siento haberlo tenido parado tanto tiempo para nada. Ya está camino de casa de Vanlat.

¡¡Ya está en casa de Vanlat!! Muchas gracias Sorgintxu y Li por dejar que me cuele al final. Ya contaré. Muackas

Recibido esta mañana !!! Se queda en casa...