An amazing and unique creation: JJ Abrams and Doug Dorst created what reads like a classic work of fiction - something you can easily imagine having rAn amazing and unique creation: JJ Abrams and Doug Dorst created what reads like a classic work of fiction - something you can easily imagine having read in English class - and then wrote a intriguing side story in the margins. A grad student (Eric) has left his annotated copy of SOT (Ship of Theseus) in the library, and an undergrad (Jen) finds it and replies to his annotations. This leads to them making exciting discoveries about the book, and also falling in love.
The first thing is this book is just beautifully printed. It looks and feels like a classic book, to the point where people would ask me why I'm reading such an old book. The marginalia feels real, and I can only imagine how hard that was to print. This is one that will be cool to keep on the shelves. Only complaint is the inserts are a cool idea, but they fall out all the time, and at this point I have no idea which pages they were supposed to be on.
The most interesting thing about this book to me is that it's a blueprint for how people discuss books. Sometimes they discuss the content of the book. Other times they use the content as a jumping off point to have a personal discussion. The nature of this book shows both, almost split 50/50. A key difference with this book - and the genius of it - is that most of us have to rely on memory to start a conversation with someone about a particular event or passage in the book. Here, our characters can literally underline a phrase like "relationships" and then talk about what is happening in their relationship at the moment.
One thing I didn't realize until later in the book is that the ship of Theseus is a real thing - it's an ancient Greek philosophical question - if you replace all the parts of something, is it still the same object? This inspires the ship that S is captured on, which sails through the mists of time, always getting fixed when needed. It's a ship that can't die. Or a series of ships :)
I found the story of Jen & Eric a lot more compelling than the SOT story. They were real characters that you could relate to. SOT felt like books you read in english class - a bit obtuse - and I still don't understand it all. But don't get me wrong - it's a pretty cool story. I particularly enjoyed the themes - like how it all begins and ends with water, and also how it was a lot about Straka's regret to fulfill his mission instead of living his life with his true love. Kind of like how S was on a mission, but didn't really know why - he just found himself caught up in it.
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