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The story is told by the main character, going by the moniker Greg, who makes a point to say that details such as names and descriptions are arbitrary and completely irrelevant to the point of the tale. The main point being that his life changed when he met The Gray Man, and the entirety of the story is spent telling about the events that led up to this meeting. Leaving their home country in search of a more meaningful life, Greg and his wife Carla settled in Bigcity, Bigstate, America. According to Greg, their lives then became even less meaningful, though Carla thrived, even in a horribly demeaning job, while Greg sank further into depression and survived only with his dream of being a published author. Then he finally met The Gray Man, and his life would never be the same again.
The first thing you will notice when reading this book is the language. It’s not casual at all; it’s hardly even modern. It reads like the typical classics we all had to suffer through in high school, and I would be lying if I said that I didn’t need a dictionary to look up a word or two (or ten) as I was reading. The vocabulary is like a graduate school entrance level exam at minimum, and anyone who is looking for some light reading would not find pleasure in this book. Because of this high level, I first thought the tone was a bit pretentious and condescending, but the more I read, the more I realized: that’s exactly the point. The character Greg is a pretentious and condescending man who feels that he can write classic masterpieces like the literary greats of our history. The author did a fantastic job conveying the main character in such a way.
I love how the story is just one big build-up to the climax, the meeting of The Gray Man. The suspense and anticipation of finding out what this Man was all about captured me. I read this whole story in one sitting, very late at night, which might have been a mistake. The surprise ending gave me goosebumps, and then I couldn’t sleep for a few hours after that. Initially, I was just disturbed and rather terrified, but upon further consideration, I became fascinated. Any difference to the ending would have been bland in comparison.
Despite the difficult reading level of the book, the ending is what sold me on this story. If others can patiently pace themselves through the story like I did, they won’t be disappointed. I give this book a rating of 4 out of 4 stars and encourage others to give it a chance as well. It wouldn’t surprise me if this book ends up in the classic literature section of the library one day, next to the works of Edgar Allan Poe.
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