Some of David Mitchell’s books reviews

I liked Cloud Atlas so much I wanted to read more by this authos. Here are the reviews of 3 books I have managed to read; there are more reviews of more books by more authors here… goodreads

Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

Six books in one, each a different genre. The most amazing thing of all is how history, in the author’s mind, will wrap up just as it started, in a full circle. And how logical the outcome actually looks. Pity the film was all a mess to understand, with the only perk of seeing the same actors in different roles and different characterisations. In the book the continuity between stories is done with a particular birthmark shared by some characters alongside history, like there is a weird connection between the sotries. All of which are mesmerizing – hipnotizantes. You really want to know what happens to each of the characters, how they will end up, and however they end, their deeds were worth it.

The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell

Another one of Mitchell. Like Cloud Atlas it makes a strong bet on how this world – or at least our world – will be / is bound to change beyond recognition. It is good that readers of a mainstream novel are reminded how lucky we are to have endless and reliable supply of things like heat, electricity, communication channels. Journalists in not-sto-lucky places don’t transmit this enough when reporting how life is in war torn countries, or even not officially at war, where there is no internet and electricity is available randomly. The story itself falls in the fantasy genre, but tehre are themes of human interest that makes one put the book aside and think – the greatness of true love, teenage problems, family, tenderness, and the arrogance and privilege, revenge and sorrow. And personal sacrifice. The setback is that in too many passages there are sentences that are puzzles that will be solved only later in the plot. There are so many of them I only fully enjoyed and understood the book the second time I read it – but then it was sublime and most moving.

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell

It is so funny when you find the same character in two different books yet in two different registers. It is good to meet them again, it is like re-encountering an old acquaintance. This historical novel has this and that – merchants, scribers, nuns, samurais, captains, the rich, the dispossed, all so full of life, some even bigger than life. All bring to our attention issues like loyalty, honesty, corruption, fear, bravery, lust, eligion. How unthinkably big power can get to be, yet how it can be defeated when enough people are determined to fight for justice and space for love no matter what.

I found especially touching how, when the main character seemingly looses all because he refuses to be corrupted, he gains the simpathy and respect of all around him (except his bosses) all who again seemed ruthless and selfish at the beginning. May be that is why I loved it, because it gives us the triumph of good over evil that we all long for, in such a logical terms, like it is the natural thing to happen because alongside this triumph we have witnessed human and natural miseries too.
And I thought the epilogue touching and emotional, not unnecessary at all.