{"id":1149,"date":"2012-03-31T17:59:52","date_gmt":"2012-03-31T23:59:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wilsonld.com\/weblog\/?p=1149"},"modified":"2015-05-31T14:24:31","modified_gmt":"2015-05-31T20:24:31","slug":"freedom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/?p=1149","title":{"rendered":"Freedom"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>by Jonathan Franzen, Audiobook Read by David LeDoux, 2010, MacMillan Audio, New York<\/p>\n<p>This book was very disappointing.\u00c2\u00a0 The author attempted to provide a treatise on individual freedom and where it leads, but, instead, managed only a sad portrayal of some pretty unlikable, dysfunctional individuals.\u00c2\u00a0 It was difficult form me to connect to any of the characters in this novel, particularly in the first half of the book.\u00c2\u00a0 Then, when they suddenly seemed to become more likable in the second half, I was at a loss to understand how they manged to undergo the transformation.\u00c2\u00a0 While each of the characters struggled to deal with their various afflictions, the basic message seemed to get lost.\u00c2\u00a0 Is freedom a good thing or a bad thing?\u00c2\u00a0 Is too much freedom good or bad?\u00c2\u00a0 What are the consequences?\u00c2\u00a0 All of this seems to get lost as most of the characters, through no effort\u00c2\u00a0 or fault of their own, seem to overcome all their shortcomings and end up in pretty good situations by the end of the novel.<\/p>\n<p>If all of these individuals lived next door to me all my life, I am not sure I would make\u00c2\u00a0any effort to get to know them.\u00c2\u00a0 They all seemed to be just stereotypes rather than real, interesting individuals.\u00c2\u00a0<em><img decoding=\"async\" title=\"2 stars\" src=\"https:\/\/www.wilsonld.com\/weblog\/wp-includes\/images\/stars-2-0.gif\" alt=\"2 stars\" \/><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Jonathan Franzen, Audiobook Read by David LeDoux, 2010, MacMillan Audio, New York This book was very disappointing.\u00c2\u00a0 The author attempted to provide a treatise on individual freedom and where it leads, but, instead, managed only a sad portrayal of <span class=\"excerpt-dots\">&hellip;<\/span> <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/?p=1149\"><span class=\"more-msg\">Continue reading &rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[15],"class_list":["post-1149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","tag-fiction"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1149"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1149\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1635,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1149\/revisions\/1635"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}