Review:
Title: I am the Messenger
Author: Markus Zusak
Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf
Publication Date: 2002
Format: Paperback
Source: Local Bookshop
Genre: YA, Mystery, Contemporary
Blurb:
Ed Kennedy is an underage cabdriver without much of a future. He’s pathetic at playing cards, hopelessly in love with his best friend, Audrey, and utterly devoted to his coffee-drinking dog, the Doorman. His life is one of peaceful routine and incompetence until he inadvertently stops a bank robbery.
That’s when the first ace arrives in the mail.
That’s when Ed becomes the messenger.
Chosen to care, he makes his way through town helping and hurting (when necessary) until only one question remains: Who’s behind Ed’s mission?
Thoughts:
I read Markus Zusak’s other book, The Book Thief, in the summer of 2013. I fell in love with that book, and have been meaning to read this for a very long time. I have recently been spending some time at a new bookshop in my town, helping out in their YA sections with little shelf reviews and book recommendations.
Anyway, they have a small section of used books. I was casually browsing through since their prices were so cheap when my eyes were excited to find this title among the mix. Of course, it came home with me and that night I began my journey into this book.
As I was reading this book, I enjoyed it not as much as I thought that I would. I was dawdling as I read, taking unnecessary breaks and stretching it out. In retrospect I think that I was avoiding the seriousness of the book, trying not to think about it’s numerous implications and just read it. But that’s not what readings about. Reading is about conveying emotion through the story and the characters. In the aftermath of reading this book i started crying because the characters lives finally hit me and the genuine goodness of the characters was so overwhelming. I hand’t let myself feel anything for the majority of the book so all of these emotions came pouring in all at once.
This is not a particularly paced book and I think that calling it a mystery is rather misleading. By the time that you get to the end you realize that the whole concept of the mystery is completely irrelevant to the characters in our story. For a moment I felt angry but then I realized that the frivolous stuff was unimportant to the ending. It wasn’t about what it was made out to be about.
Ed is such a conforming protagonist, at least to me. He comes across at first as lazy and someone who will just stay in this rut for the rest of his life but when you look closer you realize that he is so much more. Yes,old Ed is a poor 20 year (but how many 20 year olds aren’t) that is struggling to make ends meet, but he also has feelings and cares so desperately for the people in his life, even if he doesn’t realize it. He cares enough about humanity to even give a shit about strangers, and it says so much about his character. Our secondary characters were plenty filled out as well; leading their own lives and dealing with their own problems that are richly highlighted throughout the card messages.
Conclusion:
Markus is often revered for his later novel, The Book Thief and some even claim that I am the Messenger is nothing compared to that. I, first of all, don’t think think that the books are comparable at all since they are different genres and are about different things. I think that Markus stretches his writing in two completely different directions in each book and neither is better than the other.
This book resonates on a more personal note for me more than The Book Thief did. I’m not sure why. Perhaps it has to do with how insignificant this book made me feel, which is a good thing in my opinion. Reading this book about all of these peoples problems and the goodness and light throughout it makes my problems seem small and all but makes me run out the door and give all my money away. This book makes me want to be a better person not because I’m sending messages and helping people with their lives or because I’m getting service hours or because I’m revered for it, this book makes we want to be a better person simply to be a better person. It’s not often that a book does that.
Leave a Reply