4 out of 4 stars
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Being only 18, David is in trouble of finding himself. According to him, for life to be as comfortable as he needs it to be, all he needs are money, sex, and power. As a result, he reads Friedrich Nietzsche’s philosophical books, trying to determine a better way to view the word. Well, the books never disappoint him.
In his book, Read My Mind, Stephen McLeod takes us through the life of David, or rather his major life events as he struggles to find the meaning of life.
Though divided into chapters, a keen reader will realize that the stories in this book are independent and can be read in any order. Besides the main story, the author breaks the monotony by introducing related poems and songs at the end of each chapter. Although the major theme is catharsis, there are several minor themes that include religion, love, humanity, and culture. On love, David spends more time alone than he spends with someone, not because he chooses to but because he’s single. In fact, he admires couples walking around together, sunbathing and enjoying each other’s company. He wishes he had the opportunity too. When he finally meets his love and were sunbathing, his thoughts were, “If we sunbathe naked, imagine what else we might do.”
Since this book is philosophical, I have to talk a little about some of its major philosophies. Stephen uses a book within a book style to introduce the philosophy in this book. For instance, a book by Friedrich Nietzsche, being read by the character, David, is the main source of philosophy here. I found some of these beliefs so interesting. For example, “If life is an ocean of suffering, then the true meaning of life is to be happy, at no one else’s expense.” (Page 27).
I really loved the book, not only because I could identify with David, especially in his young atheist belief, but also because I agreed with most, if not all the theories in this book. I’m a great fan of poetry. The added poems at the end of each chapter just added to my excitement. By the time I picked this book, I had been reading a book about religion and it’s the origin. Then this line from my book just got me thinking so hard, “The goal of humans is to know everything, live forever and never suffer. Hence we invented God as someone who looks like us, knows everything and never gets sick or dies.” (Page 27). I’m yet to reach my conclusion on religion though. Since I didn’t get any error throughout the reading, the book is adequately edited.
Although the book was generally well written, I didn’t like the way the poems were introduced. This is because, in as much as they shared a single theme with their associate chapters, the author did not tell us whether the poems were written by David or someone else.
Although the author had several chances of including erotic and explicit sex scenes in this book, his aptitude for dodging them impressed me. I only found a single borderline sentence, as far as profanity is concerned. This book, therefore, is suitable for readers of all ages. Although the poems and songs weren’t properly introduced, that was a minor mistake that didn’t affect my reading. I, therefore, rate this book 4 out of 4 stars and recommend it to anyone who likes philosophy. Highly religious people who get easily offended by atheist beliefs may not enjoy the book as much.
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Read My Mind
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