Stuck in a dead-end job, single, and discontented…Lily receives a most unexpected visitor: an “heir finder” who informs her she is the sole beneficiary to an unclaimed fortune—$16 million left behind by a grandfather she never met. The boon comes with a caveat: the money can only be claimed if the remains of her grandfather—a man who went missing in action in World War Two—are located and he’s … located and he’s proven legally dead.
The Far Shore follows Lily as she embarks on a global odyssey—from the shores of South Carolina to the deepest jungles of Myanmar—in a quest for answers. In the process, she uncovers an incredible story—that of a stricken, shell-shocked soldier who left the battlefield and went to the ends of the earth in an attempt to answer the age-old questions of mankind: Why do we suffer? Is there a God? Is there a way out? It is a journey that will change Lily forever; for, like her grandfather, she finds herself going further afield in search of answers, deeper into harm’s way, into both the unmapped places of the world and of the heart, where she will find either unimaginable wisdom and wealth . . . or madness and death.
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Very graphic descriptions of violence and suffering. People speaking rambled on and on. Never really gets to the point, desperate people focused on suffering and boringly self indulgent.
I am finding this book difficult to read. Until you get to the letters between brothers, you don’t know which character is saying what – I have to go back and count lines to see if I ‘know’ who said it, that is why I am saying ‘twisted’ and ‘unpredictable’. So I guess this a big note to the author and the styling. I am not very far into the book, so I cant rate it differently at this point in time.
If it makes me too crazy to follow, which will probably happen when she has finished reading the letters, I will read a few other books and then maybe come back to it.
Unusual first person prose style. Defined characters engaged in search for truth and what suffering is and can produce. Description of combat very realistic. The novel describes suffering and transformation and seems to do so from a Buddhist perspective.
This is unreadable. Don’t waste your time. It’s dreadful.
Unusual story line—far fetched.
Hard to follow.
This book was a different view of WWII. It was interesting to see how two people change due to outside circumstances they have no control over. The ending was somewhat unexpected and satisfying.
Kept my attention and thoroughly entertaining!
Good book, it kept you wondering and hoping to the end. Interesting ending. Darker than it needed to be at times, but very interesting and well thought out.
This book has a ton of potential, but instead it just ends and leaves you feeling very empty and like – wait, WHAT? It was like the author just got tired and quit and some bitter awful person wrote the end.
One of the better books that I’ve read in a long time – a significant book! AT times it was so gloomy in the beginning, and the prisoner of war camp section was gut-wrenching. But, as I came to the end of the book I felt that I had experienced and learned something. I haven’t identified it yet, which could be how the author intended it to be. This book has a lot to say about the human condition and how senseless so much of our striving to achieve might be. What matters about our lives is what kindness we leave behind. I thank the author for this book!
Couldn’t put this book down!
Hard to keep track of the characters because of the way it’s written
This was a pretty good book. Good descriptions of what war can do to a man and his relationship to all those around him. Didn’t think it was ended particularly well, although the ending was appropriate.
It was difficult to get a feel for the character, Lily. Parts of the book about her were often confusing and somewhat twisted. I just didn’t care for the voice / writing style the author used in these parts. I read nearly 20% of the book before information about Lily’s grandfather began to surface. This was written in an entirely different way and held my attention better. I persevered and finished the book but can’t say I enjoyed it.
Quite literary- difficult to hear of some of the horrors of war- interesting venue through which to tell the story
I really enjoyed this book. There were a few errors that editing may have caught, but it did not distract from the book at all. I enjoryed the plot and found myself unable to put the book down as I had to find out what would happen next.
A little hard to get used to the jerky text in parts, but the letters were fantastic
I couldn’t get into this book, mainly due to the style in which it was written. Way too many 1-word, or incomplete, sentences, each on their own line, instead of put in paragraphs. Lots of profanity, which to me was a distraction. I didn’t care for the characters. Maybe if I’d gotten through to the end I would have, but there wasn’t enough to pull me in.
Just started and I am still trying to get into the story. Hope I can finish it.
Theresa H. Wessman