niamhbereading's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
this book is not plot based at all. the plot is introduced in the first chapter: yossarian, a fighter pilot based in pianosa, has flown enough missions to be released from service & sent home in the states. however, everytime he Should be sent home, colonel cathcart raises the mission requirement, so yossarian and the other pilots are stuck there. this is elaborated on further into the book: the only way to be sent home other than flying the required missions is to be crazy, but in order to be found crazy you must admit to the doctor that you're crazy, & that in itself is proof that you're not crazy. that's the catch 22! but as soon as that's established like 50 or so pages in, the book shifts. most of the book focuses on other side characters, like the chaplain, milo, nately, & so forth. though yossarian is the protagonist & holds the main conflict, the book is not about him. it's an ensemble piece focusing on everyone in the squadron.
i, personally, loved that this book was an ensemble piece! each character's story was so unique & fleshed out, balancing comedic scenes & darker ones. the book is constantly moving, though the pace is manageable. i said that this book has a slow pace because the plot is very loose & doesn't move quickly. however, a lot still happens in this book, it just doesn't always play into yossarian's conflict.
the one thing about this book that irked me is the cast of characters. it's just so Huge. there's at least twenty-five characters who each have their own backstory or importance to the plot. they're all well written & distinct, but i just don't know how to imagine that many characters LOL. after a while, when a new character was introduced, i'd struggle to give them a face. then later on, when characters from earlier were being called back, i forgot how i imagined them. it didn't help that this book is about american wwii soldiers so most of the characters were white men. this may not be a problem for you if you're good at imagining characters, i just felt the need to mention it.
catch 22 has a lot to say on the impact of war & how it functions in american society. so much so that my brain is kinda blown apart from it. but this book is NOT preachy! overall it is more fun than anything else. you could have a field day dissecting this book. it is a surprisingly intellectual read.
Moderate: Death, Violence, Gore, and War
Minor: Rape
this book is about world war II. there are discussions of soldiers who died and, in the second to last chapter, a detailed scene of a soldier dying w gore. there is also a mention of a woman being raped and then killed by a soldier.lizardflake's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Graphic: Death, War, and Violence
Minor: Rape
loki_the_cat's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Graphic: War and Death
Moderate: Rape
addictedtoanntations's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Moderate: Violence, Cursing, Racial slurs, War, and Sexual content
Minor: Terminal illness and Sexual assault
whoischels's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Spoiler
characters have died off and been replaced by new, untrauma-ed characters.As the classic comedy of war book, it's a very comedic read. The comedic style throughout the whole thing undergoes its own character development in a way that is quite satisfying. It works to keep the horror of the experience of war at arm's length for the majority of the book and then slowly brings it closer for the end. Heller captures the comedic dichotomy between the very visceral body horror that people experience at war and the slow machine of bureaucracy.
My only complaints are that it's a behemoth to read. Heller can be describing an event that is comedic in its conception, but do so in a way that obstructs feeling, particularly in the first 2/3. I understand this to be intentional, but was still a bit frustrated with the masculine boringness of the prose. It's an odd experience to read something that has these features but still manages to be so dynamic and flexible in its plot structure.
Graphic: Panic attacks/disorders, Death, War, Medical trauma, Injury/injury detail, and Sexual harassment
Moderate: Sexual assault and Misogyny
bibliorama's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Enjoyment - 2.5
Start - 2
Characters - 3
Atmosphere - 2.5
Plot - 3
Ending - 4
Style - 3.5
Overall - 3
Graphic: War, Injury/injury detail, Racial slurs, Domestic abuse, Death, Murder, Physical abuse, and Misogyny
Minor: Sexual violence and Rape
paperknotbooks's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
Graphic: Racial slurs, War, and Forced institutionalization
Moderate: Gore and Sexual content
loverboy's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Death, War, Gore, Injury/injury detail, Sexism, and Violence
Moderate: Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Rape
Minor: Religious bigotry, Car accident, and Suicide
nnannanna's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
The way Joseph Heller writes isn't to my liking in the slightest. The explanations of events are verbose, jumping from place to place and character to character. You start a chapter from a plane in the middle of a war and end it in a fully unrelated story that happened 10 years prior. Finally I gave up on trying to understand everything and just plowed through to reach the end.
Lastly the role of women in the book was just... Not? Every single female character is somehow connected to sex. Either they're a sex worker, a nurse that gets sexually assaulted or somehow sex is written into their description. Maybe there is a point to this and it belongs to the satire but I did not catch that.
Graphic: Sexual assault, Sexism, War, and Injury/injury detail
mahamsiddiqui's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
I felt like the novel dragged in places, it also felt like I'm reading someone's diary instead of a novel, sometimes felt like a college student looked up the synonyms in a thesaurus and put every word that they could find in the book.
The book certainly is witty and funny. The characters are well written. Their humanness and fallibility and their complexities make you think or forces you to think, human beings are not black and white. War is evil. Human beings are mere pawns in it, and at the mercy of the fascists, who invoke wars to stroke their tiny egos. Through Yosarrian you see how a person in trying to do the right thing is always caught in exasperating circumstances. The skepticism of Yosarrian is something that I guess all of us go through after a certain point in life. It's relatable and quite understanding.
Moving on, I absolutely did not like and was quite frankly disgusted by the rape and sexual assault scenes. They were described jn graphic details, and I believe for which there was no need. The treatment of women as mere sex toys was very disturbing. And we know that, that's how men treat women especially those who go to war. Women and children and elderly suffer the most. Women and children are raped, brutally assaulted and all because the men who go to war think that it is their right for defending their country to gain sexual pleasures by hook or crook. I just wish that the sexual scenes were described to a minimum.
All in all, book is good, okay. 3.5 stars, .5 extra for Yosarrian. I loved him till the end. You cannot predict that the characters will have this human aspect to them when you first start the book but as you go by and the book explore similar scenes from different POVs you understand them and mildly condemn yourself for judging them too hastily.
Graphic: Bullying, Rape, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Torture, War, and Violence
Minor: Injury/injury detail