Mister Pip | 
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| Editorial Review / Publisher's Information:
Product Description
In a novel that is at once intense, beautiful, and fablelike, Lloyd Jones weaves a transcendent story that celebrates the resilience of the human spirit and the power of narrative to transform our lives.
On a copper-rich tropical island shattered by war, where the teachers have fled with most everyone else, only one white man chooses to stay behind: the eccentric Mr. Watts, object of much curiosity and scorn, who sweeps out the ruined schoolhouse and begins to read to the children each day from Charles Dickens’s classic Great Expectations.
So begins this rare, original story about the abiding strength that imagination, once ignited, can provide. As artillery echoes in the mountains, thirteen-year-old Matilda and her peers are riveted by the adventures of a young orphan named Pip in a city called London, a city whose contours soon become more real than their own blighted landscape. As Mr. Watts says, “A person entranced by a book simply forgets to breathe.” Soon come the rest of the villagers, initially threatened, finally inspired to share tales of their own that bring alive the rich mythology of their past. But in a ravaged place where even children are forced to live by their wits and daily survival is the only objective, imagination can be a dangerous thing.
From the Hardcover edition.
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Customer Reviews:
• Became A Chore To Read 22 October, 2008
The coming of age novel of 13-year-old Matilda against the backdrop of a endless, bloody civil war in the early 1990s where Redskin soldiers terrorize the population and the rebels to re-establish New Guinea's sovereignty. The only white man left on the island, Mr. Watts, becomes the teacher for the island children, alternating his lessons between reading from Dickens "Great Expectations" and and short lectures by mothers about mundane, sometimes practical matters. Matilda is attracted to the alternative life and character of Pip, and uses the Dickens novel to distract her from the daily horrors and hopelessness of the island natives who seem to have been forgotten by the world.
From beginning to end, I found reading the book a chore because it lacked character development other than in superficial, black and white terms. In addition, for me, the books was simplistic and lacked depth in that the major idea explored was that of using literature to transcend earthly realities and circumstances. A secondary theme, the complicated development of the mother-daughter relationship, was relatively simplistic as well and not explored in any great depth.
Ordinarily, when reading a book that entirely captivates me, I dread reaching the end. With this book, I kept counting the number of pages to the end, and was usually disappointed that many pages still remained long after my interest had waned and become indifferent.
- Reviewed by customer ID: AN318BD3CD6GW
• Island Fever 08 September, 2008
If there's one thing this book did for me it was a desire to read Great Expectations just because of the way the author uses it as an important prop for his island based story.
This was a mix of Lord of the Flies and Treasure Island though it remained a mystery right to the end. It's probably one of the most unusual books I have ever read but I liked it because it was a story told honestly with no frills and it was set in a part of the world among people I would not be familar with. This in itself attracted me to the book.
It certainly set the scene for me and I transported myself totally into the story and for the duration of the read I was on that island. It also reminded me of the Life of Pi for some reason.
You could just imagine a scenario where people are faced with moral decisions but the gruesome event towards the end of the book took me completely by surprise.
This was an unusual, easy read but a rich and rewarding experience.
- Reviewed by customer ID: AXTE0KJFEIVEO
• Popeye 10 October, 2008
"Everyone called him Popeye." Thus begins Mister Pip, an eloquently written story about how profoundly literature can influence lives. As Popeye evolves into Mr. Pip, the personalities and character traits of the islanders also emerge. Mother and daughter, war and resistance, husband and wife, civilization and nature, life and death, black and white, nurturance and abandonment - these are dichotomies around which this novel plays out. Mister Pip is narrated by a young woman looking back upon her teen years on a remote Pacific island, who begins to come of age under the tutelage of the substitute school master. His true name is Mr. Watts, and he is the only white person on the island, having married one of its inhabitants. Every day, he reads part of Great Expectations to his mixed-age pupils, and the world opens up to each of them in a different way.
Dramatic, evocative, and filled with hope, sorrow, and a touch of mystery, Mister Pip has deservedly won numerous literary prizes. This is an important book with a timeless, unforgettable message.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A3NLJZI5NEOT0K
• An Unusual Find 07 October, 2008
bought this book in New Zealand because it was shortlisted for a prize. found an amazing story that weaves together the challenges of life in the developing world with the power of literature to take us all beyond ourselves and allow us to construct new understandings.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A1RIXHVUY49BGQ
• Not Interesting 31 August, 2008
Perhaps, in some way, this could be considered good literature. But, there is one thing it certainly ISN'T, and that is interesting. It's also not "sheer magic," as the back of the book attests. Be wary.
- Reviewed by customer ID: AAOEE6KIZ5AQE
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