A review by travelgirlut
Beatrice and Virgil by Yann Martel

1.0

I just finished this book and I feel like crying, and it's not because the book was sad at the end; it's because I feel that everything good and happy has been stripped from my head from reading this book. It was depressing and dark and angry and all sorts of other things that I can't put words to. At first I thought I wasn't liking it because I wasn't looking deep enough into the story to see the symbolism and find the meaning in it. I read to escape, so the fact that the book seemed to be asking me to think was kind of a put-off. But I kept reading in the hopes that at the end I would nod to myself and say, "Oh, I think I get it," and be okay with the fact that I didn't grasp it all. But in the end I didn't get it and I don't need to get it. My emotions tell me all I needed to know. I can see that there would be those who find the writing in this book deep and brilliant, but I just can't. It was too much.