Room

a novel

by
No cover

Emma Donoghue: Room (2010, Little, Brown)

477 pages

English language

Published Jan. 2, 2010 by Little, Brown.

ISBN:
978-0-316-12057-9
Copied ISBN!
OCLC Number:
548642188

View on OpenLibrary

(3 reviews)

A five-year-old narrates a story about his life growing up in a single room where his mother aims to protect him from the man who has held her prisoner for seven years since she was a teenager.

Jack has spent his life in a small space his mother calls Room, and while Jack uses his imagination to create fantasies to entertain himself, his mother finds a way for them to escape. The plot contains disturbing scenes of violence and confinement.

44 editions

reviewed Room: A Novel by Emma Donoghue

Uncomfortable read

Five-year-old Jack and Ma, live happily together in Room, or so Jack thinks.

I hesitate to say I like this book, but I found it believable as a story told from the perspective of a child. I’m not sure that I could have stomached this written from Ma’s POV. The POV chosen allows the horrors visited upon Ma and Jack to unfurl obliquely throughout. Though Jack is the protagonist, it was Ma who occupied my thoughts. I can’t help but think about all the real Ma’s out there. This, for me, is true horror. The stuff that can and does happen, not the things that go bump in the night.

avatar for bluestocking

rated it

avatar for bluestocking

rated it

Subjects

  • Boys
  • Mother and child
  • Fiction