I already had this book queued up on my Kindle to read when I joined the Reading with Style group, so I tried to fit it into one of the task that was lined up for the Winter Challenge. I was able to use it for the Play the Numbers task and some Style points as well. I am starting the challenge a month into it, but that’s ok. The people in this reading group are serious readers and I really don’t think I’ll come anywhere close to the top, but it is fun nonetheless. There are people with 400+ points so far and it’s only been a month into the three month challenge.
On to the point of this post, I read The Tiger’s Wife by Tea Obreht. I was expecting that it would be a bit of a disappointment because the novel has been so hyped up. I was not disappointed at all. It is beautifully written. I mean that as the whole kit and caboodle. There are so many themes at work it this book, the most prominent being how people deal with death. The weaving of the real and the mythological makes the story more enticing to read.
It is about a woman coping with the grief of losing her grandfather. She is searching elements of his past and reminiscing on the stories he told her in order to figure out what brought him to the place where he passed away. I was drawn to the authors depiction of how the individual characters rationalized their actions by moving back and forward through the characters histories.
Also, part of the story is from the point of view of the Tiger. How fun is that? It also shows how people turn things that they can’t explain or don’t understand into fantastical mythologies that become a history. A very interesting history.
“Come on, is your heart a sponge or a fist?” - Tea Obreht, The Tiger’s Wife.
