It’s been almost a week since I finished this book and I’m still not sure whether I liked it or not. It was an assignment, so I didn’t really have a choice between reading it or not, but I definitely got hooked by it. Don't get me wrong, getting hooked doesn't have anything to do with it being educational or that got that necessity of having to know what came next, no, I think it had more to do with how raw and harsh the writer's words were.
The story revolves around a Spanish boy that lives his life without giving a single thought to consequences or future. He is just there, going from bar to bar, from girl to girl and from drug to drug. He isn’t rich, but he is clearly well accommodated, and very aware of the struggles he isn’t even going to try put himself into. He enjoys his parents money and has no remorse about it. Neither is he a teenager since the story develops in one of his college’s summer breaks he managed to have free of failed subjects, which is made very clear that doesn't happen very often.
Feeling like he is above everything around him, nothing really gets to him, and the writer puts the story in the precise words this character, Carlos, ought to have while feeling this way. He swears, he misspells every English word he comes across, he's obsessed with the idea of death, having no issue with talking about how appealing it seems to him, and doesn't hold back anything in what his sexuality concerns. It’s almost his main priority, if you also include the drugs and alcohol of course.
Nor did I dislike “Historias del Kronen” nor would I read it again. It seemed a basic book that tried to push the boundaries but stayed only on the surface of those actually important subjects. But maybe this was the author's intention, to show us how you can do and break so much without a true meaning behind it or determination of achievement of any sort. It does must be kept in mind that this book was published in 1997, so maybe it was revolutionary then and it just isn’t anymore with how overexposed we all already are with this subjects. Either way, it seemed like a rough reading that you hope will, at least, leave you thinking but you stay there searching for a meaning it doesn't really arrive.
The story revolves around a Spanish boy that lives his life without giving a single thought to consequences or future. He is just there, going from bar to bar, from girl to girl and from drug to drug. He isn’t rich, but he is clearly well accommodated, and very aware of the struggles he isn’t even going to try put himself into. He enjoys his parents money and has no remorse about it. Neither is he a teenager since the story develops in one of his college’s summer breaks he managed to have free of failed subjects, which is made very clear that doesn't happen very often.
Feeling like he is above everything around him, nothing really gets to him, and the writer puts the story in the precise words this character, Carlos, ought to have while feeling this way. He swears, he misspells every English word he comes across, he's obsessed with the idea of death, having no issue with talking about how appealing it seems to him, and doesn't hold back anything in what his sexuality concerns. It’s almost his main priority, if you also include the drugs and alcohol of course.
Nor did I dislike “Historias del Kronen” nor would I read it again. It seemed a basic book that tried to push the boundaries but stayed only on the surface of those actually important subjects. But maybe this was the author's intention, to show us how you can do and break so much without a true meaning behind it or determination of achievement of any sort. It does must be kept in mind that this book was published in 1997, so maybe it was revolutionary then and it just isn’t anymore with how overexposed we all already are with this subjects. Either way, it seemed like a rough reading that you hope will, at least, leave you thinking but you stay there searching for a meaning it doesn't really arrive.