The Color Purple

The Color Purple by Alice Walker
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I picked up this book because it is considered more of a classic novel and I haven't read a classic in a while. I also wanted to read the book before I watched the movie.  I think books are better than movies 99% of the time and if I don't like the book I won't watch the movie.  I probably won't watch this movie.
I loved the beginning of this book. I found it fascinating.  The grammar of Celie and her family intrigued me and I really liked it at first.  It got old after a while though and I found it confusing at times.  I had to keep rereading portions of the text to remember who was talking.  I think this would make a great audio book.  As an audio book the reader could really get into the different voices of character.  I think it would also be less confusing as the reader.
Celie is an amazing character!  I loved her strength and wisdom.  She had such a rough childhood and you can't help but feel sorry for her.  In the middle of the book Celie meets Shug and I didn't like Shug at all.  I thought Shug was a distraction to an otherwise amazing book of characters.  Just when I about couldn't stand the book Nettie enters the scene.
I love Nettie and her story of living as a missionary in Africa.  It was very intriguing and well written in my opinion.
Two main things bugged me about the book.  One being that "Mr. ____"  all of of the sudden makes a complete character flip. He was mean and abusive one minute and than all of the sudden he is Celie's friend.  I am ok with characters changing, but I like to be a part of the change.  The other thing that really bugged me was the lack of knowing how much time had passed.  I would have liked dates on the letters or something to let the reader know how much time had passed.  At one point I thought just a few months had gone by and than in one of Nettie's letters she mentions living in Africa for 30 years.  Holy smokes! How did that happen?
There was a LOT of swearing which I don't care for.  Some sex scenes including rape and same gender sex.


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