Room

by Emma Donoghue

Book Overview

The award-winning bestseller that became one of the most talked about and memorable novels of the decade, Room is "utterly gripping...a heart-stopping novel" (San Francisco Chronicle). Held captive for years in a small shed, a woman and her precocious young son finally gain their freedom, and the boy experiences the outside world for the first time.

To five-year-old-Jack, Room is the world. It's where he was born, it's...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0316098337
• ISBN13: 9780316098335
• Release Date: September 2010
• Publisher: Little Brown and Company
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 1.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.2" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Books are better!

There was more details than I thought.

I’d say 3.5 stars

Book started out really great but just kind of went on from them. I enjoyed the read but definitely enjoyed the first half much better than the end.

Wonderful story

I love this story. I love the way the author writes, and deals with the woman’s PTSD after.

I wasn’t too sure

I didn’t think I would enjoy a book where the narrator is a 5 year old but somehow it was so much more sinister coming from the angle of innocence. The reader gets an idea of the terrible things that happened without needing to read pages of gruesome, traumatic things. The last third of the book dragged more than I’d have liked but it had very good points as well.

Great story

The story pulls you in from the perspective of a child, and really makes you think as you discover the plot in real time through the boy’s eyes

Room: Captivating

Once you adapt to the narration being from the point of view and language of a five year old child, this is a very decent read. The story follows the during and after of a young mother who had been kidnapped. While it could have been incredibly heinous and wrenching, the child’s perspective helped to shield the reader. This book made me laugh, cry, and shout aloud. It was so easy to get frustrated with Jack, but then remember his trauma and age and have to reorient myself. Overall would recommend this book.

good movie good book tough to read

i thought the movie was good so i wanted to read the book but didnt realize that it was in a 5year olds perspective and its a tough resding style to read. some sentences dont make sense or you just have no clue what he is referring to

I just couldn't

This was recommended to me by my sister. 25 pages in and I just couldn't handle the writing style and having it told in a child's voice. Awful.

Creative, emotional, and overall amazing book!

Honestly, I couldn’t put this book down! The perspective that you read it in makes it such an amazing and interesting book. I can’t really put into words how much I absolutely loved this book! I had seen the movie and loved it and had to read the book when I discovered it was one, and it was even better as a book!

Eh.

It’s quite an interesting story but I lost interest at the end. It seemed a bit boring but was still a good read.

Was a facinating read

This book will stick with you long after you read it. The perspective was unique and it stayed interesting the whole time. I very much enjoyed it.

This book was fascinating. I read it straight through and immediately started recommending it. It really made me think about what a mother would do for her children to keep them safe. Loved every second of it

Review of Room

I''ve started my review of this book about a half-dozen times. In the book trailer (and I hope you watched it), Audrey Niffenegger writes: "Room is a book to read in one sitting. When it's over you look up: the world looks the same but you are somehow different and that feeling lingers for days." I picked this book up around 7:00 in the evening. I put it down at around 3:00 the next morning. When I closed my eyes out of sheer exhaustion I had dreams that centered around Room. I woke up feeling dazed and heart-broken. Room is a book that requires intense emotional investment. That's all the warning I can give you about the story contained in this book, so when you pick it up prepare to invest in it and to lose yourself in Jack's voice. I was apprehensive for the first page or so in wondering if I could connect to Jack, the five year old narrating the story but... this worry was unfounded. I'm in awe of the power Emma Donoghue wields through the voice of Jack and think this book should be read widely. While reading this book I was reminded of a human interest story I'd read in the news a while back. In Plant City, Florida a 6 year old girl was found living in horrible conditions. They compared (as this story has been compared) her story to that of Tarzan and speculations were going crazy about her development and how she would be affected by this. While the similarities are not exact, Room brought back the memories I had of reading this story and evoked the same emotional rage I felt. I feel it's important to note that although this book is narrated by a 5 year old, this is not a story for children to read. This is a very adult story with adult themes. That said, I want to encourage every single one of you reading this review to move this book to the top of your to-be-read pile and experience it. There are few books that I really get the hype on, but this book is one that deserves it.

A Room Is Just A Room--Unless It's The World

A unique and challenging experience, Emma Donoghue's "Room" may be one of the biggest surprises I've had all year. Told in the language of a five year old boy with an extremely limited world view, my initial reaction to "Room" was not entirely positive. Within the first few pages, I was worried that the tone and cadence of this "child-speak" might be too precious, too constructed. But a funny thing happened rather early on as more of the story unfolded--I quit reacting to the novel intellectually and started to be affected viscerally and emotionally. I knew little of the plot in advance, so as the mysteries unraveled I became more and more invested. I am NOT a particularly sensitive reader (people would definitely describe me as unsentimental!), but halfway though "Room"--I was literally weeping. The less you know about "Room" going into it--the better. So, for my part, I'm going to only lay out the basic premise. The protagonist Jack, in his five years of life, has never been outside of this one room. It is his entire existence, everything he knows. He and his mother have constructed a daily and weekly regimen to maintain as much normalcy as possible within the confines of their situation. A mystery as well as a thriller, a tribute to the human spirit, an ode to mother love, a character study--"Room" taps into any number of subjects quite successfully. There are so many powerful sequences within "Room." Jack is such a fascinating and believably frustrating lead. When you don't know what the world has to offer, how can you miss it? The unknown and the unknowable play such a huge role in Jack's life, is there a way to relinquish everything you know for the chance of something better? There is a real dignity to Jack and his mother. As they confront their demons, real and imaginary, their journey is both harrowing and heartfelt. I won't soon forget this emotionally exhausting experience. Emma Donoghue has crafted, easily, one of my favorite books of the year--one that will stick with me for quite some time!

Highly Recommend!

"Room" the new novel by Emma Donoghue, is, in a word, riveting. I've never read anything quite like it. There is a part near the middle where I absolutely COULDN'T, WOULDN'T stop reading, it was that intense. It's a pleasure to give this unique novel a five-star rating. The story is told by 5 year old Jack, who is one of the most adorable, horrifying, precocious, interesting, pathetic and heartbreaking child narrators I've ever read. To see the world, even one as skewed and unreliable as Jack's, is to have one's eyes opened in a new way. Jacks discovery of the world awakens our own understanding. Jack and his "Ma" live in Room. Most of the things in the room have their noun for their names. For example, the chair is Chair and the bed is Bed. In Room there is Wardrobe where Jack sleeps when "Old Nick" visits Ma at night. I'm guessing that Donoghue got some of her ideas from several recent true abduction cases and built this fascinating and horrific scenario from them. The sense of dread builds exponentially as Jack reports on his daily life in Room. The reader, who is smarter than a 5 year old, begins to understand the gravity of the situation. The suspense builds beautifully and the pages keep turning. Donoghue masterfully creates a sense of horrible dread as well as any vintage Stephen King! She also builds a story of familial love and support that alternately both breaks and warms the reader's heart. When the scene shifts, what happens "After" is as interesting, suspenseful and touching as what happened in Room. I'm intentionally leaving out as many plot points as I can because part of the enjoyment of this story is wondering what will happen next to Jack and Ma. I highly recommend this unique novel.

Best Book I've Read in Years - WOW

I was a fan of Emma Donoghue since reading Slammerkin many years ago. I started this book this morning and just put it down. Thank goodness it was a holiday and I had nowhere to go! I just couldn't stop going back to it until it was finished. I was hooked upon reading the first paragraph, 'Today I'm five. I was four last night going to sleep in Wardrobe, but when I wake up in Bed in the dark I'm changed to five, abracadabra. Before that I was three, then two, then one, then zero. "Was I minus numbers?"' And the story of Jack and Ma begins. The entire story is told from the perspective of Jack, a just-turned five-year-old who is living in Room with his Ma. The only thing Jack has known is Ma and Room. His day is spent utilizing the few things they have, the songs and stories his Ma remembers and the five picture books he's had read to him over and over. Imagine being a parent living in an 11 x 11 foot room for years, trying to survive while keeping your baby growing, safe and entertained. Imagine Jack, a child who has only ever known Ma (and the late night visits from 'Old Nick' who he only sees from his vantage point in a wardrobe). Life is good for him since he knows nothing else. Empty egg shells become a snake when threaded together, empty toilet rolls become a maze when taped together, Phys Ed is sometimes Track which goes around Bed from Wardrobe to Lamp. For Jack, his days were filled with 'thousands of things to do'; for his mom, her days were filled with the knowledge of what was outside of Room before her captivity. Two different perspectives, two ways of looking at life. Donoghue has done an amazing job of letting us think like a isolated, innocent boy whose life is turned upside down when he learns that Outside of Room is a big world. Up until his 5th birthday, his world was balanced, controlled and he missed nothing since he didn't know of anything else. Everything beyond the room was Outer Space. Once he was told that the there was so much more out there, fear of the unknown crept into his world. What a wonderful job of creating their little world, of letting us into how Ma's imagination taught Jack, kept him safe, and kept him entertained. If you have children and have ever had to wait in a doctor's office or somewhere else for a few hours, it is sometimes an exhausting job of coming up with games to play to pass the time. Imagine that feat everyday, all day for years. I had such respect for Ma as she taught Jack about so many things in a world he didn't know. Her imagination for passing the time with games using so few resources was incredible. Her love of Jack so deep and primal it made me hug my kids many more times today than usual. And just when you think that escaping is the best thing for them, imagine what it feels like to a boy who has only known Room. This was a fantastic story, imaginative, creative, unique and beautifully written. I never tired of reading from Jack's perspective. I was reminded of what the