Schindler's List by Thomas Keneally

2 stars

Sometimes I feel that the movie makers have access to my to-reads list and decide those are the books that they need to turn into movies. While I enjoy book adapted movies I do not like it when I read the book while the movie is out. I feel like people who see me read the book think I am jumping on the book/movie bandwagon even though the title may have been on my list for a year or so.

Now I know in reality people aren't judging me. I know that the majority of people out there don't care what I am reading. But, it is hard to get the thought out of my brain.

This year there have been a lot of books like this. What I have tried to do is read them before the movie is released so at least I am a bit ahead of the curve. It also means I will not have to read a copy with the movie poster as the cover. Shudder. Seriously is there nothing worse than that? I guess this is my book snobbishness coming out but if one doesn't have some sort of standards one doesn't have anything.

Synopsis

Oskar Schindler helps save Jews from Cracow from extermination.

My Thoughts

I usually like the book better than the movie, but this is one case where the opposite is true. Save yourself the time and trouble and just watch the movie.

This is a book that just didn't know what it wanted to be. Was it a historical fiction, as it was touted to be, was it a biography or memoir, was it a straight history text? I just couldn't figure it out.

There were some sections that read as a beautiful narrative. There were other sections that almost seemed like an outline waiting to be fleshed out. And then there were other sections that were written as a section from a history textbook. The different writing styles mad the story overall really disjointed.

There were a lot of names that made the narrative confusing. This was especially so as some people were mentioned and then not mentioned again until a hundred pages later. There was no closure with lots of the characters. We never knew if some got out or were killed. Why mention them at all? Along with this the timeline jumped around adding to confusion.

The one thing that was good about this book was that it showed what people were up against and showed the complex system in place to control the Jewish population. It showed why many Jews didn't fight back. It showed how unbelievable the treatment of Jews really were.

The story of Oskar Schindler is important to know, but, learn about it through the movie adaptation.