Book - Life of Pi

Life of Pi
Yann Martel
Amazon Product Link

After the sinking of a cargo ship, a solitary lifeboat remains bobbing on the wild blue Pacific. The only survivors from the wreck are a sixteen-year-old boy named Pi, a hyena, a wounded zebra, an orangutan—and a 450-pound royal bengal tiger. The scene is set for one of the most extraordinary and beloved works of fiction in recent years.

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I can't give a 3.5 rating, so after some serious thought, I'm giving this a 3.

I first heard of this book a few years back, but didn't bother reading it. Then, last month, I saw the trailer for the Ang Lee movie, and thought it really beautiful (at least for the scenery!). That coupled with some friends highly recommending the book, I bought it and I read it.

I did not like it.

It started out quite well. The story itself was good too, I'll give it that. But, I didn't like how it ended in such an abrupt way.

So the way the story goes, is this author wanted to wrtie a book and someone had told him to look for someone else because he had a story that would make you 'believe in god'. OK. Fine. So with that whole story out there - and after, the ending was just a report on how the sink sunk. That's the great wrap up?

Maybe I'm like Pi himself, who needs a grand and symbolic ending, so I really disliked the ending of the book. Or I'm just stubborn.

A few things to note (spoilers)
- I will have to agree that the "first story" is a lot better than the "second story" without the animals.
- I got very confused, very, very confused indeed when Pi went blind and was either hallucinating or whatever that it was...
- however improbable, I liked the idea of that meerkat island