By Jostein Gaarder
It all starts when 14-year-old Sophie Amundsen finds two mysterious pieces of paper in the mailbox. Written on them are the questions, ‘Who are you?’ and, ‘Where does the world come from?’. These letters are the beginning of her philosophy course, written by the charming philosopher, Alberto Knox.
But soon things start to go out of hand. Funny things start appearing in the woods, and Sophie becomes more and more confused. Who is this Hilde, and why is she in Sophie’s story?
The Good Bits
The book had some interesting philosophy in it, and it introduced me to philosophers that I didn’t know about. It got better at the end, and I almost felt sad when something bad happened to Sophie.
The Not So Good Bits
Finally! Free from this burden of a book that I have carried with me for so long! And the day before my birthday as well! This is how I felt when I finished Sophie’s World. So, let’s start the long list of complaints about this book.
It isn’t very well written. This one is pretty self-explanatory. The writing was boring and didn’t have any engaging way of telling the story. Actually, it wasn’t the plot line’s fault. That was quite good! It just did a bad job of expressing the plot line in words.
Sophie was the most annoying creature who ever walked this earth. And the other characters seem to know it too. When Alberto is talking to her about philosophy, Sophie will chip in with an annoying comment, and Alberto will ignore it, or give it a simple, ‘Yes’. In fact, when I found out that Sophie’s entire existence was threatened, I cheered and ran around the house elated. As Peter O’Toole once said to my dad, ‘That child should be ****ing executed!’
Near the middle, you actually have the characters commenting on how good the book is. Near the end, one even says that it isn’t a book that you can only read once! Since it was near the middle, where everyone who was thoroughly sick of the book would have stopped reading it (apart from me; I managed to read the book till the end for this review), it felt like the book was just reassuring itself that it was still good.
At the end of the book, I wasn’t longing for more. In fact, it was precisely the opposite of that. I felt like a weight had been taken off my mind, and now I needed to find something fulfilling to read.
Finally, this book took me waaaay to long to read. I must have started reading it in early February! Usually, a book that big would take me a few weeks at most. I could have read it in that time if I really wanted, but I couldn’t bring myself to go back to Sophie’s World. Hey, at least it gave me one thing! The ability to rant online!
Conclusion
You should be able to guess what I’m going to say. Yes. You’re right. Do not be fooled by the book stating it was a ‘million-copy bestseller’. Unless you want to submit yourself to several weeks of torture. I actually think that this is one of the few books I hate. If you like this book, that’s fine by me, but if you haven’t read it, but are considering it, I have one word for you. Don’t. (Does that count as one word?)
Bye for now!
Miranda xxx
Open A Book 