Extremely loud & incredibly close by Jonathan Safran Foer

Title in Swedish is "Extremt högt och otroligt nära".

The life of a nine years old boy, called Oskar Schell, changes forever one day, after several phone calls. It happens to be 11 september 2001. This is the beginning of a difficult time for Oskar, coping and struggling in the aftermaths of his father's death in WTC.

This book is very uneven. Sometimes Foer manages to hit all the right buttons, but then, suddenly the prose drift into a seemingly endless combinations of words and too many commas, and too long sentences which include the same words over and over again, like "crack up" and "heavy boots". Normally I like many commas and long sentences, but this was crazy.

It becomes a confusing mess, which is a big disappointment. Why the quotes from different persons on the same row, without explanation as to who says them? Is that a good distinguishing feature, or just messy and confusing? Sometimes, it's convenient because it creates a flow, but often it's not. The prose is too much, too often, and thereby there's no dramaturgy. That means the reader runs the risk of being desensitized. The 9/11-attacks are terribly sad and horrible, and therefor, when writing about it, it's very important to make it justice. However, occasionally Foer manages to capture the right words at the right time and portray it in a very moving way.