Book Review : Charlotte

Book Title : Charlotte

Author : David Foenkinos
Genre : Biography (Retelling)
ISBN : 9781782117940

Publisher : Canongate

Publication : 2017

Pages : 224

Binding : Hardback

Plot :

Charlotte Salomon is born into a family stricken by suicide and a country at war - but there is something exceptional about her. She has a gift, a talent for painting. And she has a great love, for a brilliant, eccentric musician.

But just as she is coming in to her own as an artist, death is coming to control her country. The Nazis have come to power and, a Jew in Berlin, her life is narrowing - she is kept from her art, torn from her love and her family, chased from her country. And still she is not safe, not from the madness that has hunted her family, or the one gripping Europe . . .

My Rating : 5 ☆'s

Review :

Charlotte is not just a Jewish girl, she is not just an artist either - Charlotte is an obsession! Her story is laced with melancholy but that depression is addictive - its gripping. This depression becomes your obsession.

It is not a fiction but a reconstructed retelling of a biography. The original work itself was written and depicted in a unique style - through texts, sketches and music. The author here had adopted the prose format - and there is everything in that format, from his wanderings to conversations between characters to scene descriptions to internal conversations.

Biographies, normally written like an essay seem repetitive and difficult to read, but this style of writing has actually made the book an easy and fast read. There is no rhyme or rythm but the writing is powerful and the writing style is impact-full.

Set amidst the German Nazi war, touching upon the horrors that were let loose on the Jews as well as the curse that the Salomon family had looming over their heads - each one of them killing themself and that too in a similar fashion... the story just grips you, it is addictive and it engulfs you.

At the end, you are left to wonder, how can tragedy strike a person in such a brutal manner and so many times - normally at such instances, I'm left with tears in my eyes. But this book left me shaking and shivering to the core. And the obsession had hit me too.

It was a classic read and a complete page turner that got better page after page.

Happy Reading!

Comments

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