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Chargement... Before: A Novelpar Joseph Hurka
Aucun Actuellement, il n'y a pas de discussions au sujet de ce livre.  TheReadersCove | Sep 29, 2012 |  aucune critique | ajouter une critique
Over one September night on their small suburban street, the neighbors of Joseph Hurka's novel Before connect. Whether they're strangers, acquaintances, or ultimately closest allies, the familiar residents of a street in Hurka's Cambridge, Massachusetts, fascinate and terrify, and Hurka's debut novel offers us the depths of their strange and secret lives. Seventy-three-year-old Jiri Posselt and his wife, Anna, are survivors of the Nazi horror in Czechoslovakia; they have befriended a neighbor named Tika LaFond, a college student who has faced great challenges of her own. And as night descends we meet another character, a man who enters the apartments of neighborhood women when they aren't home, taking a peculiar inventory of their lives. We discover why this ghostly man, haunted terribly by his past, is so twisted. When he becomes increasingly violent and, in the early hours of morning, fixes his attention exclusively on Tika, it will fall to Jiri Posselt---weakened by age but an utterly determined soul---to help his young friend. As we come to know the characters of Before through their own memories, we begin to understand their lives before terror affected them. As their lives converge, we see how good can work in the face of evil. And as they come to understand fully their own pasts in this thrilling and meticulously crafted fiction, we realize how the absolute power of knowledge and redemption can counter the true birthplaces of terror. Aucune description trouvée dans une bibliothèque |
Discussion en coursAucunCouvertures populaires
 Google Books — Chargement...GenresClassification décimale de Melvil (CDD)813.6Literature English (North America) American fiction 21st CenturyClassification de la Bibliothèque du CongrèsÉvaluationMoyenne: (4.13)
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Tika, is a budding photographer, young and full of exuberance. She has become attached to an older couple in her apartment building. Juri, the husband, is recovering from a stroke and having difficulty adjusting to his current limitations. Anna attempts to care for him alone, but appreciates Tika’s helpfulness.
Juri is plagued with vivid images of the past, as he struggles with memories of the Nazi invasion. His losses were so great they still rip at his heart. He tries diligently to separate these events from current reality but waivers back and forth. Writing, he is always writing down what he remembers. The doctor says it is good for him, so he tries. But the memories bring unbearable pain and tears fall unbidden.
The residue of Ghost-Man’s deplorable youth still lingers, triggered by the simplest of things. He fights with his own inner demons and recollections as well, but they are more recent. Tragedies of the Gulf War were experienced in a gruesome and personal way, adding to the well of sorrow and pains from the past. His special training was meticulous and careful but also deadly. When things don’t go as planned, events spiral out of control and many lives are endangered.
Past and present collide and the results bring Tika, Juri and Ghost-man into a battle of wills, determination, and a triumph. But who will ultimately win the day?
Before is filled with vivid descriptions and emotions. However, the character’s stories are so intermingled from past to present and back again they are at times difficult to follow, thus making the overall flow a bit bumpy. There is also a tad of explicit material that could be offensive. (