elingunnar's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
dutchtineke's review against another edition
3.0
I finished this book today and I don´t really know what to think. I´ve enjoyed it, but somehow I need a reason, a point, for this story, and I can´t really find it. The book probably doesn´t need a point, sometimes a point isn´t even needed, but for me right now there needs to be a point. So in that respect, it´s not the book, it´s me. But that doesn´t mean that the book isn´t any good, because I believe it is very good for the right reader at the right time.
anabananaz's review against another edition
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
strangemanners's review against another edition
4.0
Este foi o meu primeiro livro do Mia Couto. Confesso que por ser aclamado imaginei que a escrita fosse um pouco mais difícil mas ela flui. Assim como a escrita, inicialmente a história pode se arrastar por falta de costume com a forma de descrição e o contexto da história, que parece mais que começa de um meio do que do início. Conforme as páginas passam você vai entrando na história e consequentemente, conhecendo e se importando com cada um dos personagens que são bem distintos um do outro. Não é uma leitura pra se absorver de uma vez, mas aos poucos.
Ansiosa e curiosa para ler outros livros do autor. :)
Ansiosa e curiosa para ler outros livros do autor. :)
tiffasaurusrex's review against another edition
2.0
Not sure if it was full or nonsense or just lost a lot in translation. The things he had to say about women were ridiculous.
sawyerbell's review against another edition
4.0
For eight years, Mwanito lives with his father, brother and two other men in his father's silent and self-created land of Jezoosalem, while his father waits for an apology from God. Mwanito has been told the rest of the world is dead. He has never seen a woman. Then one day, a woman arrives, throwing everything Mwanito thinks he knows into chaos.
The first half of Mia Couto's novel, set mostly on a deserted game reserve in war torn Mozambique, is achingly sad and atmospherically beautiful. There are startling scenes with magic realist elements and breathtaking images. From the first page, I was immediately drawn into Mwanito's world and felt I was going to be giving this book both five stars and my heart.
Alas, once The Woman arrives around half-way through the tale, the spell was bruised if not broken. What Couto doesn't know about women is a lot and the chapters (thankfully few in number) written in The Woman's voice were quease-making.
Overall, though, this was an impressive introduction to Couto's work and I'll be reading more by him.
The first half of Mia Couto's novel, set mostly on a deserted game reserve in war torn Mozambique, is achingly sad and atmospherically beautiful. There are startling scenes with magic realist elements and breathtaking images. From the first page, I was immediately drawn into Mwanito's world and felt I was going to be giving this book both five stars and my heart.
Alas, once The Woman arrives around half-way through the tale, the spell was bruised if not broken. What Couto doesn't know about women is a lot and the chapters (thankfully few in number) written in The Woman's voice were quease-making.
Overall, though, this was an impressive introduction to Couto's work and I'll be reading more by him.
catarina_fernandes's review against another edition
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.5
mhall's review against another edition
3.0
3.5 I liked the poetic language and the dreamlike feel of this novel set in Mozambique and translated from Portuguese. It reminded me a lot of [b:My Abandonment|5603935|My Abandonment|Peter Rock|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1348118650s/5603935.jpg|5775303] by Peter Rock, about a girl and her father living in Forest Park in Portland.
The Tuner of Silences is about a father who takes his sons to live in the middle of a national game reserve, where he tells them the rest of the world has died, they are the only people, and they are waiting for God to come and apologize to them. The first sentences of the book blew me away:
The images and words in this novel create a slow-paced story narrated by the eleven-year-old Mwanito. The story of a crazy tyrannical father whose strange rituals and fanatical beliefs shape his sons' lives and, in Mwanito's case, are all he knows of the world. Things are often inverted or reversed in the descriptions of this world. As his father lowers his older brother Ntunzi into a dry well, the rope in his hands is "the opposite of an umbilical cord."
The quasi-mystical language and weird lives depicted give mysterious weight to small things, like clothing thrown into and floating in a river, the moon. There was not much in this novel that evoked a particular setting for me - I could imagine the characters and story being taken out of the Mozambique setting and put into the desert of Utah, or perhaps set someplace nameless.
There were a few small things about the translation which bothered me: specifically, the overuse of 'my old man' for father and 'broad' for woman.
The Tuner of Silences is about a father who takes his sons to live in the middle of a national game reserve, where he tells them the rest of the world has died, they are the only people, and they are waiting for God to come and apologize to them. The first sentences of the book blew me away:
"I was eleven years old when I saw a woman for the first time, and I was seized by such sudden surprise that I burst into tears. I lived in a wasteland inhabited only by five men. My father had given the place a name. It was called, quite simply, Jezoosalem. It was the land where Jesus would uncrucify himself. And that was the end of the matter, full stop. My old man, Silvestre Vitalício, explained to us that the world had come to an end and we were the only survivors."
The images and words in this novel create a slow-paced story narrated by the eleven-year-old Mwanito. The story of a crazy tyrannical father whose strange rituals and fanatical beliefs shape his sons' lives and, in Mwanito's case, are all he knows of the world. Things are often inverted or reversed in the descriptions of this world. As his father lowers his older brother Ntunzi into a dry well, the rope in his hands is "the opposite of an umbilical cord."
The quasi-mystical language and weird lives depicted give mysterious weight to small things, like clothing thrown into and floating in a river, the moon. There was not much in this novel that evoked a particular setting for me - I could imagine the characters and story being taken out of the Mozambique setting and put into the desert of Utah, or perhaps set someplace nameless.
There were a few small things about the translation which bothered me: specifically, the overuse of 'my old man' for father and 'broad' for woman.
txfonseca's review against another edition
5.0
"Quem viveu pregado a um só chão não sabe sonhar outros lugares."
“Ninguém é de uma raça. As raças – disse ele – são fardas que vestimos.”
“Hoje ele sabe: os soldados estão sempre feridos. A guerra fere mesmo os que nunca saíram em batalha”
“Ao fim e ao cabo, só existe um verdadeiro suicídio: deixar de ter nome, perder entendimento de si e dos outros.”
“Hoje sei: nenhuma rua é pequena. Todas escondem infinitas histórias, todas ocultam incontáveis segredos.”
“Ninguém é de uma raça. As raças – disse ele – são fardas que vestimos.”
“Hoje ele sabe: os soldados estão sempre feridos. A guerra fere mesmo os que nunca saíram em batalha”
“Ao fim e ao cabo, só existe um verdadeiro suicídio: deixar de ter nome, perder entendimento de si e dos outros.”
“Hoje sei: nenhuma rua é pequena. Todas escondem infinitas histórias, todas ocultam incontáveis segredos.”
abeatrizmateus's review against another edition
5.0
Quero morar numa cidade onde se sonha com chuva. Num mundo onde chover é a maior felicidade. E onde todos chovemos.