Oblivion: 9

the opening and closing chapters of this book were beautiful and chilling. but the large middle section of a play-within-the-book was less satisfying... which i suppose means it worked.

What I love best about Josephine Hart's writing is that even if I normally would be violently afraid of what ever message she was trying to convey in a given work, somehow she still makes it safe for me to read it I can read her words honestly, without either totally sacrificing my ideas for hers, or rebelling so strongly against her ideas in my mind because she has touched upon a wounded place, that I can not fully experience what she is trying to tell me. Such was my experience upon reading Oblivion. What is it about, you ask? It's about what's next for all of us, Oblivion! The book espouses a very clear philosophy, which states that when we die we don't really die until the people who knew us forget us, as in time they always do. That is when we reach Oblivion, and that is what we are truly afraid of, not of the passing of the body, but of the passing of our memory. Oblivion explores this idea thoroughly, an idea that is intrinsically, and primally terrifying to all of us. It traces a man haunted by the ghost of the woman he had vowed to spend his life with. He is cheated by the universe in is. He can not spend his whole life with her because she is dead now and he is still alive. His life must continue without her, and for that to happen successfully, he MUST forget her utterly! The topic of the book would be too true, and to horrifying to read if it had been written by anyone else, but Somehow Mrs. Hart can protect us from the fear of our own eventual Oblivion, while at the same time exploring it, and from this emerges Hope. For me all must explore and confront this fact someday, and only from confronting it can we become and be connected to the world while we are still here. Please read this book! Peace

I was first drawn to the cover in my local library. A naked chic tends to do that. I started to read "Oblivion" on the way home and literally couldn't put it down. The book is very indepth and inciteful. There is a lot of connectiveness to this book: You can read this and easily relate and sympathize. The characters are wonderfully portrayed in this story of sex, death, relationships and feelings. I have been trying to find this book for a long time and finally did. If you want something great to read and have a laugh and a tear then get this book! "Happiness is a choice, make it and don't cry!"