I Am The Messenger: a Book Review

I've been meaning to write this for a long time so here goes.

Here's to one of my favourite writers of all time; Markus Zusak. My favourite-est writer of all time is Micheal Crichton :)

Anyways, I've admired his work for a long time now after randomly picking out The Book Thief in a book store somewhere years ago. I Am The Messenger, in my opinion, doesn't even fall in the same ball park as The Book Thief but not because it is any less good, the two books are just so entirely different, it's hard to compare. 

I Am The Messenger is about your regular village idiot, Ed Kennedy. An underachieving illegal young taxi driver who despite his lack of good educational qualification, is extremely well-read. The book begins interestingly enough; at a hold-up inside a bank where the book's main characters lie face down on the floor bickering while a robber threatens the cashier at gun-point. This miraculously ends up with Ed saving the day and that's when the whole story unfolds at a very rapid face. 

Ed receives a poker card: an ace, in the mail with instructions for him on the back. The results of this one card are both touching and frightening at the same time. 

I don't know how Zusak came up with such a great premise for a book, however far-fetched it is, but he did. I found the characters in this book very believable and they just stick to you. You'll easily find one that you can relate to and just feel for them. This is the kind of book I can't read before going to bed cause then I won't be able to fall asleep for wanting desperately to see what happens next. It's a very fast-paced unpredictable story and I highly recommend it to anyone over eighteen at least. The language is quite explicit, which is one of the things that sets it so far from The Book Thief. But plot wise, amazing work of fiction. Many effectively laugh out loud moments here and there which are equally balanced with stuff that make you cringe and some that just simply break your heart. 

I'm planning to buy more of Zusak's books some time soon :) *cough*birthday present sebab aku tulis post kat blog mu*cough*

p.s. kat Sarawak buku muroh ke?