Review: Room by Emma Donoghue

Room, by Emma Donoghue, is one of those books that I heard about and never wanted to read.  To a claustrophobic person, the idea of reading a book about a boy and his mother confined to an 11' by 11' space paralyzing.  I don't know about you, but I wouldn't last 10 minutes without going insane.  But enough people raved about it, and I decided to give it a chance.

Warning: this review contains spoilers.

(From Goodreads) To five-year-old Jack, Room is the entire world. It is where he was born and grew up; it's where he lives with his Ma as they learn and read and eat and sleep and play. At night, his Ma shuts him safely in the wardrobe, where he is meant to be asleep when Old Nick visits.

Room is home to Jack, but to Ma, it is the prison where Old Nick has held her captive for seven years. Through determination, ingenuity, and fierce motherly love, Ma has created a life for Jack. But she knows it's not enough...not for her or for him. She devises a bold escape plan, one that relies on her young son's bravery and a lot of luck. What she does not realize is just how unprepared she is for the plan to actually work.

I've read many reviews that say the first half of this book is tedious, and it can be.  Donoghue chooses to tell the story from the POV of Jack, the five-year-old who was born and has spent his entire life in "Room".  I thought that was a much more interesting decision than to do the POV of Ma, the girl who was originally shut up in Room and has been there for seven years, obviously taking in and understanding a lot more of what happened than Jack did.  But, as one reviewer pointed out, reading a five-year-old's thoughts can get very tedious after even a page; within twenty pages, I was wondering if I had made the wrong decision in picking up this book.  It isn't until about 75 pages in, that the reader finds out exactly what Room is, and what Ma and Jack are doing in there (although it is fairly easy to figure it out for yourself without Ma spelling it out for you), and that is when things start to pick up, when Ma and Jack begin to plot their escape.

The escape plan is, at best, seriously contrived, and I found it hard to believe that Donoghue would imagine that such an plan would even have a chance in a million in working.  I was even more surprised when Jack was successful and Ma and Jack were freed from Room.  This is, of course, the turning point to the story, the part that we all seem to forget about when we talk about people like Elizabeth Smart and Jaycee Duggard.  What happens after?  Are you ever the same again?  Nobody wants to talk to Ma or Jack about how they are feeling now, or what they want, or how has the world changed?  They only want to hear about Room, turn Ma into a martyr and Jack into a hero, and all Jack wants is to go back to his little routine, his little space, back in Room.

I disliked Ma once they were out of captivity.  Granted, she was finally out of a terrible ordeal, but she immediately stopped all of Jack's routines and thrust him into a new life, thinking he would adapt right away.  And then when she "couldn't handle it", she foisted him off on his relatives, seeming to not even give a damn that he was lost and frightened and seemingly alone in the world that he knew nothing about.  You can't help but feel for Jack.  He really is a remarkable child in the book.

I give this book three and a half out of five.  I originally planned to give four, but the second half kind of did me in.  It's a good book, I just don't know if I'll read it twice.

Rating: *** and 1/2