Sophie’s World

Dear Amber,

Thank you for letting me read your favorite book.

In my opinion books that make the reader think about life are the perfect books. While reading those it’s as if time has stopped. I find myself in situations that seem much more important than the life of a twenty one-year-old journalism student.
A part of “Sophie’s World” managed to do this. The philosophy course taught me things of which my education should be ashamed not to have taught me. The lessons provide great insights in the evolution of mankind. Actually, all the knowledge I learned through this book gave me that Eureka! feeling that you can only get when you’ve learned something really important. In a way this book was a success but in another way it wasn’t.

Because the story doesn’t just contain the philosophy course. Jostein Gaarder also fabricated a story around it. In the beginning I decided I liked Sophie because of the whimsical names she gave her pets. That quickly disolved. I’m just gonna say it. Dang, she was annoying!
I’m dissapointed in the story. It felt like a burden. I had to put away the book when the philosophy course switched from letters to dialogue. I didn’t really enjoy having Sophie’s comments. What did it add to have her ask stupid questions that were so perfectly suited to the rest of his story that it felt fake? The dialogue made it harder to seperate the story from the knowledge that I gained. It’s actually quite an accomplisment that the facts about the philosophers felt so imaginative but the fantasyworld was very shallow. The author ties in characters we all love and uses them as mere decoration. It’s a trick he uses way too often: he “borrows” things from other stories but doesn’t tie them in to the plot. Even his own characters don’t act like real people. Which parents would circle around their daughter when she’s making out with a boy?! Situations like these annoyed me to no end. The story felt so flat that it makes me wonder if I missed a double layer.

To be blunt this was a book of dissapointments apart from the philosophy course. Which doesn’t mean I didn’t like anything about the story. Hilde’s actions near the end did make me laugh.

I read this book as a part of the 20 bookrecommendations book challenge. I still need three more bookrecommendations. Can you recommend me one?