Bridge of Clay

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Characters swear somewhat frequently, including, "s--t," "bastard," "goddamn," "f--k," "pr--k," "Jesus," "bulls--t," "hell," "God," "Christ," "bitch," "t-ts," "balls," "piss," and "Jesus Christ." Also some Australian swearing, including "bloody," "bugger," and "arsehole." Hunt, Jonathan (Winter 2018). "Bridge of Clay". The Horn Book Magazine. 94 (6): 95 – via General OneFile. This is a story about family and the narratives that underlie them. The idea of personal history forms such a central part of the plot and the novel’s structure. The chronology of Bridge of Clay drifts around, from the story of Penelope – the Dunbar’s mother – to the history of Michael – their father – to Matthew’s present-day writing of the narrative, to the eleven years earlier that Clay left school to help ‘the Murderer’ build his bridge. It is an expansive story and, admittedly, the elliptical nature of the various revelations and histories can be a little tough to follow in places. However, this is something that Zusak pursued consciously: “You have to do a bit more work but I think the rewards are greater, too” ( Entertainment Weekly). For me, the payoff is most definitely worth the patience required as the various narrative threads come together. Rory is shown after heavy drinking several times. Penny and Michael have a beer or a drink a few times. Penny takes the whole family for a pint at the pub before she dies, even her underage kids. Parents shown smoking cigarettes a few times.

What parent hasn’t either enjoyed, or wished they could enjoy, being in cahoots with another adult when there’s a roomful of kids?

I ended up loving every single one of these characters: Matthew: the protector, Rory: the fighter, Henry: the charmer, Clay: the runner and, Tommy: the boy with his legion of animals. I even fell in love with the murderer, with Penny, and everything they go through. Markus Zusak makes his long-awaited return with a profoundly heartfelt and inventive novel about a family held together by stories, and a young life caught in the current: a boy in search of greatness, as a cure for a painful past. Frequent references to ancient myths, especially The Odyssey and The Iliad. Information on the Pont du Gard, a Roman-built aqueduct in France. Details on horse racing. Some references to Michelangelo's work and personal history. The crisp imagery of the prose descriptions is undermined by the self-congratulatory end-rhyming of the final two sentences. Zusak’s rhyming, here, is emblematic of a more general tendency to break every narrative into small paragraphs or sections, and to end each of these with an apparently telling or teasing line: “Until now”; “We loved what you did next”; “In months ahead, she would push too soon.” This sense of trying to intrigue the reader, to draw them through the narrative, begins to feel like a prolonged delay of information, and risks losing us before the stories of Zusak’s novel begin to fall into place.

I found the ramped-up testosterone of every Dunbar boy tiresome - not a single one of them is anything but Hypermasculine. He is writing the story of his family from his own point of view (when he’s part of the action), but from an author’s (or omniscient narrator’s) point of view in all the scenes that took place before he was born or that were between other characters. I found it always easy to distinguish, and it made me feel he was acting as the family historian to whom everyone had entrusted their innermost thoughts. Then the official date was announced, and it seemed like all these MZ fanboys/girls went off the rails. Late in the night, fourteen-year-old Sam Watson steps onto a quiet overpass, climbs over the rail and looks down at the road far below.

As I could notice, the narration was a problem for many. If you open an English grammar book on morphology and syntax you could use this story as an example. But I’m now convinced it was all part of the author’s evil plan. The only thing worse than not liking a book is knowing you are probably in the minority with that opinion. I'm left with a feeling of what did I miss? The plot is good but I just could never get into the writing style. I'll go sit in my corner alone now while everyone else has an amazing reading experience. This just wasn't the right book for me but I do hope others enjoy it. The right ideas are usually buried beneath several wrong ideas first – and those wrong ideas can take months, sometimes years to get through – but in that time you accrue what you need for when the right ideas come together. In this case, I stumbled over the thought of a boy building a bridge when I was nineteen or twenty years old – but I had a lot of growing up to do, both as a person and a writer – before I was able to write it. I tried, of course. I even finished a version of BRIDGE OF CLAY that I didn’t send off to attempt publication. I was a long way from having anything published at that stage – but I knew even then that the version I’d written wasn’t the right one…I didn’t know it would be another twenty three years before I’d get there. Do you have any coping mechanisms or things you like to do to take your mind off your troubles? Such as running, painting, writing, or other hobbies? I'm writing a book called Bridge of Clay—about a boy building a bridge and wanting it to be perfect. He wants to achieve greatness with this bridge, and the question is whether it will survive when the river floods. That's all I can say about it for now—not out of secrecy, but you just don't know what direction a book is going to take, no matter how well you've planned.

Warm and heartfelt. . . . This is a tale of love, art and redemption; rowdy and joyous, with flashes of wit and insight, and ultimately moving.” Times of London Common Sense is the nation's leading nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the lives of all kids and families by providing the trustworthy information, education, and independent voice they need to thrive in the 21st century. Well, it was harder, and definitely longer. There were a lot more failures, too. People would say, ‘Just write a different book. It doesn’t have to be better than the last one.’ But I’ve always tried to write a better book than the last one, so why stop now? There was also the thought of writing a different project, but there was a problem with that as well – there were no other projects. Every idea I had was going into BRIDGE OF CLAY, and I’m glad now that I persevered.The Book Thief 10 Years Later: Markus Zusak Reflects on His Iconic Novel 14 March 2016". Paste Magazine . Retrieved 28 March 2017. En esta novela conocemos la historia de 'Clay Dunbar', el silencioso, el chico con demasiado corazón. Uno de cinco hermanos inadaptados, el corredor incansable, imparable, una inmovible fuerza de la naturaleza. Entrenando fuera de cualquier sentido, sin descanso, desconociendo, y de alguna manera consciente, de un fatídico día por llegar. El día de ajustar cuentas. We can’t do anything. One of us writes, and one of us reads. We can’t do anything but me tell it, and you see it.” References to movies and some board games, including Bachelor Party, The Goonies, Chariots of Fire, Gallipoli, Mad Max, Monopoly, Connect Four, and Sorry.