Review: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer takes an intimate look at grief and the way in which people handle an array of emotions including but not limited too: pain, fear, loneliness, and of course grief. In order to do this Foer used the most recent disaster that Americans can identify with, the 9/11 attacks on the world trade centers. The entire country is still attempting to heal both as a country and on an individual level. This book takes a look at the individual level and the effect that the attacks had on people for years to come by looking at one family.

The book revolves around the character of Oskar a young boy whose father died in the 9/11 attacks. It follows Oskar as he attempts to reconnect with his father and deal with his grief and hysteria about the incident and the entire world. Oskar finds himself afraid of many things such as “scaffolding, sewers and subway grates, bags without owners, shoes, people with mustaches, smoke, knots…”. Oskar’s inability to move on from his father’s death leaves him constantly fearful of the world around him and ultimately leads him to search all over the five boroughs of New York for a lock in an attempt to reconnect with his father.

The character of Oskar is highly entertaining but unbelievable at times. While the reader is led to believe that Oskar is simply an extremely advanced young boy, his character seems pushed beyond this at times creating mistrust in the reader. The constant questioning seems to fit with what would be expected of any young child but the complexity of the thought process behind these questions seems at times to go overboard. In doing this Foer looses the audience to questions of how realistic the character of Oskar is. Even though Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close is fiction the reader is able to fall into the story to the extent of believing it to be reality until Foer has one of his character usually Oskar do something too unbelievable breaking this belief. Also at times the language used by Oskar is actually the problem with his character, especially when held up to the language of other children his age. Oskar gives a presentation to his class in which he discusses a disaster. Oskar describes the incident with individual words and combinations of words that seem unlikely to be in most children’s vocabulary. Having Oskar nonchalantly state that “the radiant heat traveled in straight lines from the explosion” and use words such as: “hypocenter” and “intervening objects”, “indication”, and “diameter” as well as “maximum charring effect” looses the audience. Especially when followed by the question of Jimmy Snyder “Why are you so weird”. Foer’s attempt to show the depth and complexity of Oskar fell short due to the unrealistic nature of his character and caused the audience to questi
on the reliability of the narrator. Many people have suggested that Foer wrote himself into the character of Oskar and are unappreciative of this fact.

Foer uses a variety of visual aids in Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close to draw the reader into the book. While some of these pictures and blank pages do draw the reader in there are times when the reader finds themselves distanced from the story due to their now inability to create their own images in their mind. They must rely on the images supplied by Foer.

Oskar’s grandparents also seem to turn readers away. They are so over the top and at times much too forth coming with their sexual experiences. Even though Foer used the grandparent’s sexual experience as a way to show their past and demonstrate how they became the people that they are today, some readers will find it too over the top. The grandparents do effectively serve as an example of people who were able to get some sort of a second chance and who were able to find a small amount of closure in their personal lives.

Foer manages to wrap up parts of the story while still leaving the reader wanting more. The reader finds themselves attached to the character of Oskar. Even when his character seems to be unbelievable he is never unlikable. The reader is constantly hoping for Oskar’s life to miraculously turn around. Wishing for everything in Oskar’s life to be okay and for him to be able to connect with his mother. All in all the book is a good read and looks at subjects that most people would not like to think about. Just because we don’t want to think about disaster and grief does not mean that it is not there. Sometimes facing our problems and pain is the best answer.