Weekly Reads: S

When I first heard rumblings of the new book S., co-written by amazing screenwriter/director/producer/etc etc etc J.J. Abrams, I knew I needed to get my hands on it. When the book trailer came out, I was beyond obsessed.


I currently have the first copy at my library and I'm afraid if I don't make time to read it before it's due back, some of the pieces will be missing from the book and I'm somehow miss out on part of the story! Genius, GENIUS idea. Man.

Addendum 11.23.13:

Ok, so I'm actually starting this in a few moments. I opened the book and thought, wth, where do I begin???? So being the good little budding librarian that I am, I started to research just *how* this book should be written. (This book clearly should've come with a User's Manual!). I found this information from a review on Amazon by C. Childs  (I hope this is enough credit for this individual, but this is taken from his review of Amazon and is how I plan to read the book. Go here and tell him how helpful this was so I don't feel bad about posting his "how to").

"As cool as all the inserts are, trying to keep them from falling out of the book as you're reading is a pain, so take them out and use post-it notes to mark what page they came from, then put them in an envelope that you can easily access.

Now, J&E's notes are not entirely in chronological order. You can generally go by the color of the ink between them to tell what phase of their story you're at.

First, there's Eric's pencil notes to himself about the actual book. Then, the convo between J&E begins when Jen picks up Eric's book and sees his notes and begins commenting on them in the margins. He sees this and writes back. Those early messages are Jen: Blue Ink - Eric: Black Ink

At some point after they go through the book a first time, they go through again. This time Jen: Orange Ink - Eric: Green Ink.

Then a third time Jen: Purple Ink - Eric: Red Ink

Finally, a fourth time (which seems to be after the denouement, in which they retrospectively discuss what has transpired). These are less frequent, and both Jen and Eric are in Black Ink.
***Read each chapter of the main text of SoT, ignoring all of Jen & Eric's notes. Upon finishing each chapter, you're going to want to go back and read only the blue/black notes and any referenced inserts. Then, move on to the next chapter. After you finish the whole book, go back and read only the orange/green notes and referenced inserts. Then purple/red, then black/black.***"

So now I'm off to dive in!


Summary from goodreads:

J.J. Abrams and acclaimed novelist Doug Dorst create a reading experience like no other in this dazzling novel of love and mystery. 

One book. Two readers. A world of mystery, menace, and desire.

A young woman picks up a book left behind by a stranger. Inside it are his margin notes, which reveal a reader entranced by the story and by its mysterious author. She responds with notes of her own, leaving the book for the stranger, and so begins an unlikely conversation that plunges them both into the unknown.

The book: Ship of Theseus, the final novel by a prolific but enigmatic writer named V.M. Straka, in which a man with no past is shanghaied onto a strange ship with a monstrous crew and launched onto a disorienting and perilous journey.

The writer: Straka, the incendiary and secretive subject of one of the world’s greatest mysteries, a revolutionary about whom the world knows nothing apart from the words he wrote and the rumors that swirl around him.

The readers: Jennifer and Eric, a college senior and a disgraced grad student, both facing crucial decisions about who they are, who they might become, and how much they’re willing to trust another person with their passions, hurts, and fears.

S., conceived by filmmaker J. J. Abrams and written by award-winning novelist Doug Dorst, is the chronicle of two readers finding each other in the margins of a book and enmeshing themselves in a deadly struggle between forces they don’t understand, and it is also Abrams and Dorst’s love letter to the written word.