Philin

I didn't know what this book was gonna be about when I got it but I knew I wanted to read it since I had heard it talked about previously as well as the fact that the setting was for the first time geography and culture that I knew first hand.

I spent a portion of my life in Kottayam and, regardless of whether I asked for it or not, have been steeped in the world this book portrays. This book is very real to me, it's characters, it's setting, its premise. They all comprise of bits and pieces of information I've picked up and experienced through the years forming my picture of the place I grew up and the people I grew up with. The actions, motivations and internal thoughts for these characters are what I've come to understand to be true of the people around me and recently on returning to visit I find that to still be accurate to the point where reading this embarrassed me deeply as though I was being exposed by every new page I read. Offhand comments through the years by people close to me have informed me of the bigotry this book represents as well as the insecurities of the characters it portrays. It reflects such a picture of this place that I'm bewildered that anyone outside of this place can truly understand the depth of this book in how damning it can be at times. But that would assume that these themes aren't universal which I've also learned from leaving this place that they are. Universal. And so I understand how this book, written almost like a Shakespearean tale could cut through the divides and relate to people of its contents.

What struck me most about the book was how it felt as if we were given puzzle pieces without reference and slowly but surely start putting them together until we have the full picture. Reading every page felt like another piece slotting into place.

I'm glad I read this book. I'd recommend it heavily though I'd also understand if it turned another person off due to the dense language and themes as well as the characters, but for everyone else I hope this book excites you as it did me.

This book has multiple perspectives and jumps around in timeline. Now it is a post-apocalypse book with few human survivors whom we follow though there's no zombies thankfully cause that totally hasn't been done to death. No, this book is a more character driven story focusing more on the thoughts inherent to losing the world you know and how sometimes we take what we have for granted.

I'd say overall I really enjoyed the story though it didn't have any insane plot twists or anything like that but was very contemplative and definitely worth a read.

I read this book when I was in high school completely unaware of what it would be like since I had checked it out of a local library and finished it in a couple days.

At the time I was very confused by this book since I didn't really have the context (as a dumbass high school boy) with which to properly understand the themes and experiences this book was trying to represent. Even now, with 7 years of experiences I've been through I'm made uncomfortable by the very thought of this book.

But it also occurs to me that was intended and that the reason it's maybe stayed with me so long is due to it's fundamentally distressing premise about a young girl in the midst of growing through her adolescence, trying to understand the world around her and being taken advantage of by people who should know better and being abandoned by the people who were supposed to protect her.

I'm not really sure even this many years on whether this is a good book, but through reading it, I have been impacted in a way I would not have been otherwise and for that I believe it has accomplished the goal it set out to do and allowed me to view life through a perspective I would never have experienced.

So this book is kinda odd for me. I was considering a career in Pediatrics when I had heard the This American Life episode about this book last year and that peaked my interest enough to buy this book.

The book definitely outlines a lot of interesting points about the science behind cognitive and non-cognitive areas for kids in the first half and has some great excepts from interviews with professionals and children trying to improve the system. Whereas the second half kinda posits more about character features that help in the long run like grit, curiosity, perseverance, self-discipline etc and weirdly enough I ended relating to a lot of the people in the book and their struggles.

Currently at the time of finishing this book, I've moved away from that initial career path more towards Public health and with that comes a daunting new move forward into more education and that means that a lot of the character traits outlined in this book would be things I need to focus on. So almost in a way this book has been a self help book for me? It was definitely an interesting read and one I'd recommend to anyone interested in this field.

Also who names their kid Ellington??? lol