Book ReviewOnce upon a time, there was a bird. He was adorned with two perfect wings and with glossy, colorful, marvelous feathers. In short, he was a creature made to fly about freely in the sky, bringing joy to everyone who saw him.One day, a woman saw this bird and fell in love with him. She watched his flight, her mouth wide in amazement, her heart pounding, her eyes shining with excitement. She invited the bird to fly with her, and the two traveled across the sky in perfect harmony. She admired and venerated and celebrated that bird.But then she thought: He might want to visit far-off mountains! And she was afraid, afraid that she would never feel the same way about any other bird. And she felt envy, envy for the bird's ability to fly.And she felt alone.And she thought: "I'm going to set a trap. The next time the bird appears, he will never leave again."The bird who was also in love, returned the following day, fell into the trap and was put in a cage.She looked at the bird everyday. There he was, the object of her passion, and she showed him to her friends, who said: "Now you have everything you could possibly want." However, a strange transformation began to take place: now that she had the bird and no longer needed to woo him, she began to lose interest. The bird, unable to fly and express the true meaning of his life, began to waste away and his feathers to lose their gloss; he grew ugly; and the woman no longer paid him any attention, except by feeding him and cleaning out his cage.One day, the bird died. The woman felt terribly sad and spent all her time thinking about him But she did not remember the cage, she thought only of the day when she had seen him for the first time, flying contentedly amongst the clouds.If she had looked more deeply into herself, she would have realized that what had thrilled her about the bird was his freedom, the energy of his wings in motion, not his physical body.Without the bird, her life too lost all meaning, and Death came knocking at her door. "Why have you come?" she asked Death. "So that you can fly once more with him across the sky," Death replied. "If you had allowed him to come and go, you would have loved and admired him even more; alas, you now need me in order to find him again."So now I think that passage from the book already ate up my review so I'll just add some extra things.First: As expected from Paulo Coelho this is another philosophical somewhat self-help, inspirational novel. This book was actually dedicated to a fan named Maurice Gravelines and Coelho met this guy unintentionally when he visited the Grotto in Lourdes. When they met the guy was like "You know, you look just like Paulo Coelho." And then Coelho said that yeah it was really him. And then the guy embraced him and he said to Coelho that, "They(Coelho's books) make me dream." I think that pretty sum up what kind of books Coelho's are.Second: This book actually talks a lot about sex so I really recommend this book to adult readers, 18 years old and above. The novel has some masturbation scenes, BDSM, a blowjob scene etc. It just talks a lot about orgasm and in the other hand it also talks about the sacredness of sex and some history of prostitution blah blah blah. So really, adult readers or if you're sensitive about sex or anything about it maybe this book is not for you.Third: My only complain about this book is that...there's actually a Filipino character in this book and she's a prostitute in the book and she's Maria's friend. My only problem about her is her name which is Nyah. I just really find her name weird and not very quote and quote Filipino. Maybe the author did not have time to research on it but the common names of Filipinos are similar to Spanish names and American names so I just really find it odd that her name's Nyah since it doesn't sound like a Filipino name. Maybe he could just name that character Juana or Ana or Susan but to name her Nyah, it was just odd. *shoulder shrug*Thoughts before ReadingFinally this has been available in our library. So many people have been borrowing it, and when I go to the libray its always unavailable. Now it's my time to read it and I'm so excited since one of my classmate really like it and he said that this is his most favorite Coelho book. I'm curious to know why.
-- ثاني قراءاتي للكاتب بعد " الخيميائي " .-- ترجمة " ماري طوق " .-- أعجبني استغراب "ماريا " لانفعالات النّاس في مدينة الألعاب قبل و أثناء خوضهم الألعاب . -- أعجبني جو سرد الأحداث ، ومذكرّات " ماريا " في نهاية كل يوم .-- لي ملاحظات كثيرة على الترجمة ، لم تعجبني مثل كلمة البيروويات " أهل بيرو " ، والأصح البيروفيّات ، وكلمة " رومانطيقي " ، قصدها تقول رومانسي أو رومانتيكي! ، " ضيّعت أي رومانسيّة موجودة في الكلمة !:D " -- طوال حياتها فهمت الحب شكلًا من أشكال العبوديّة المبرّرة .-- " إحدى عشرة دقيقة " تمثّل معاناة فتاة ليل ، ساردة لنا خبراتها في الحياة و معاناتها ، وشوقها للحب لتتخلّص من هذا الذل و العبوديّة . -- في صفحة "55" : ألمح كويلهو على لسان بطلة روايته " ماريا " لروايته " الخيميائي " ، لا ينبغي لكاتب " من المفترض أنّه فذّ و كبير " أن يتحدّث على لسان إحدى شخصيّاته عن رواية سابقة له ، من الآخر جو دعاية رخيص لم أستسغه و لم أقبله بالمرّة .--سؤال بس لإخوتنا اللي زعلانين من علاء الأسواني ، تفرق ايه الرواية دي عن رواية " شيكاجو " ؟! :Dبالعكس . شايف شيكاجو أعمق منها لأنّها متشعبّة في أكثر من قضيّة . -- ملاحظات على آخر صفحات الرواية : ذكرت يا كويلهو حوالي عشرة أسماء أو أكثر وبعد أن تذكر الاسم تردف قائلًَا " و هذا اسم مستعار " ! إذا كانت تلك ليست أسمائهم الحقيقيّة .. لمَ ذكرتهم من الأساس ؟!
Do You like book Eleven Minutes (2015)?
I haven't read any of his works before, a friend told me that "Eleven Minutes" is very good, a story of finding true love and where sex should play part in the search for it but without a sense of vulgarism in the plot. Other friend told me that it is Paulo Coelho at his best. So I decided to borrow the book from the bookshop where I work and read it all the way till the last page. And I have to say both of my friend is right, this book is so good to read. It talks more than just finding true love and sex, for me it's more about searching and understanding yourself where at the end you'll find true compatible feeling in loving someone. So many quotable lines, if the book is mine I'm sure I've mark most of the pages. I think I need to buy one and put it in my bookshelf. One day, I'll make "that someone" read this book, this book is a must read book for any couple who want to understand each other better.
—Arch_angelic
رغم فجاجة موضوع الرواية، فالبطلة عاهرة، والأحداث كلها تدور في فلك رحلتها، إلا أنّها تدفع بك إلى التفكير في الروح البشرية، والأسباب التي تجعلك تتصرّف أحياناً دون هدى.كما أن كويلو البارع في سبر الأغوار نجح في رأيي هنا أن يتناول قضية الجنس بصورة مميزة رغم بعض الإغراق، لكنّه في النهاية أوصل قضيته التي أراد التعرّض بها لبر الأمان.البحث عن هدف، واقتحام المغامرة قد يكون دافع يحرّك أحدهم، لكن عليه ألا ينجرف في التيار الذي لا مرد له، كما أن العيش في تعاسة وجلد الذات في كثير من الأحيان يكون من صنعنا نحن، وباستمتاعنا أيضاً، رغم أن سبل السعادة تكون ذات طريق مفتوح.راوية قرأتها مشتركاً دفعة واحدة في انسيابية، وقضيت معها وقت أعمل فكري، وأظن أن لو أحداً آخر كتب هذا العمل لكرهت طريقته.
—حازم
I wouldn't recommend this book to just anyone because of it' explicit sexual content. It's about a young women who falls in love and then is heart broken over and over again every time she falls in love. So she decided not to fall in love. She becomes a prostitute and makes good money and never falls in love with any of her clients. She finally meets an artist that is drawn to her, he knows what she does and yet wants her to teach him to find love again. They discover it together. It has a happy ending but, it's not the type of story you hear about. It's based on true events. There is one part in the book that I particularly liked, "I have reached the conclusion that sex has come to be used as some kind of drug: in order to escape reality, to forget about problems, to relax. And like all drugs, this is a harmful and destructive practice. If a person wants to take drugs, in the form of sex or whatever, that's their problem; the consequences of their actions will be better or worse depending on the choices they make. But if we are talking in terms of making progress in life, we must understand that 'good enough' is very different from 'best.'" I think in today's world sex is getting to familiar with all of us. We need to make it sacred again.
—Kim
