Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

 

Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

I've seriously avoided this book review, because the book is so massive. I tried reading it a few years ago but DNF (did not finish).

My honest suggestion would be to watch the three movies before reading the book. That way you have the basic structure and plot in your head, but when the book fills in the gaps, you enjoy the book that much more.

The blurb from Amazon:

Peopled by larger-than-life heroes and villains, charged with towering questions of good and evil, Atlas Shrugged is Ayn Rand’s magnum opus: a philosophical revolution told in the form of an action thriller.

Who is John Galt? When he says that he will stop the motor of the world, is he a destroyer or a liberator? Why does he have to fight his battles not against his enemies but against those who need him most? Why does he fight his hardest battle against the woman he loves?

You will know the answer to these questions when you discover the reason behind the baffling events that play havoc with the lives of the amazing men and women in this book. You will discover why a productive genius becomes a worthless playboy...why a great steel industrialist is working for his own destruction...why a composer gives up his career on the night of his triumph...why a beautiful woman who runs a transcontinental railroad falls in love with the man she has sworn to kill.

The Genre:

I'm not sure whether to call it a political thriller (it is that); Rand called it a mystery novel (and it is also that)

Atlas Shrugged was always held up as a "you have to read this!" and it was a good book, but too long and a bunch of baggage.

Because the book is so long, some of the characters developed and grew, others were exactly the way they were portrayed at first and some were never what they seemed.

-TThe story (after watching the movies) was like watching an accident happen - you knew, but couldn't look away.  

I h(not a spoiler) - there's one point in the book where a factory worker describes what happened when a factory "family" chose to run the business in a communist style "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need"

Ironically, a day or two after I read that, my husband and I had a conversation with an old friend who had (in some areas) moved closer to the position of those factory owners.  I leaned over to Phil and said "you know he's talking about Atlas Shrugged."

TThere were places where the story dragged a bit, but mostly because there were a lot of moving parts.  Keep going, they'll fit together.

When I was done with the book, two emotions:

I was relieved that I could put it away and I wanted to know where society would go after the last page.

Read it because you'll understand what happens when the takers outnumber the producers and the elite at the top benefit from pitting them against each other

              

 ~~~

 

 

About the (fiction) stars: 

·         1 star = did not finish;

·         2 stars = I managed to finish but would probably tell somebody to not bother reading if asked;

·         3 stars = I happily finished, but wouldn’t go out of my way to recommend it;

·         4 stars = I would absolutely recommend a 4-star book;

·         5 stars = I would go out of my way to tell others to read this book, and I want to read everything the author has written!