Reviews

The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki

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ferris_mx's review against another edition

5.0

A great book that made hearing voices real, scary, confusing, and comprehensible. Hoarding too. It's a thin thread that lets us survive and thrive as humans. Worth reading again, especially if I ever read Borges.

unclelazy's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This book affected me in a way that I haven’t been affected by a book in a while. Its creativity in perspective and narration draws you in, but the heart of the characters and the different ways it forces you to look at life in this world is what keeps you reading.

marmaelade's review against another edition

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4.0

This book took me a while to read--I'm talking months. You need to sit down and give some undivided attention to it to get all the details and understand what is happening. Despite that, I found it thought-provoking, and the way that Ozeki describes Benny's experience with mental illness and uses The Book as a narrative device was very clever.

I have yet to read a book by Ozeki that I would not recommend.

The only thing that's keeping me from giving this a 5/5 star is the density of it, but just because about midway, the book felt like more of a chore to read to make sure I wouldn't forget about it among the other books I've been reading. However I do also think that this is partially my fault because I was not being consistent with the time I was giving this book.