Week 1

I am currently reading the book The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers. This book begins by focusing on two characters; Spiros Antonapoulos and John Singer. Both of these men are connected by the fact that they are mute, meaning they don’t talk at all. The first few pages of the novel simply begin to describe the daily life of the two men. Antonapoulos works for his cousin at a fruit store, while John works at a jewelry store as an engraver. At first it seems like the first 10 or 15 pages of the book really have no point at all besides setting up a background story of our characters, but I feel that this might come into play later on in the story. The story picks up and conflict arises when Antonapoulos suddenly becomes ill, he eventually gets over his illness but John can tell that his friend is not quite the same. Antonapoulos suddenly becomes angry, stealing random items and getting into fights nearly every day and getting in trouble with the police multiple times. After a while John finds out that Antonapoulos is going to be taken away to an asylum, he protests but in the end nothing could be done about it. John seems lost after his only friend is taken away, the man goes to work everyday and then home to be alone. It is easy to see that the two men relied on each other and took comfort in the fact that they both were mute and could understand what the other was going through.

This ends the first part of the book. This sudden ending leaves me with many questions, such as why Antonopoulos was taken in the first place and why exactly his character so important for the story if he was just going to be taken away. Next the novel takes a sudden turn and introduces completely new characters, seeming to ignore the first part of this book. Right now I’m not sure why this was done, its as if someone started writing a new book right in the middle of the first one. But I think that it will make sense as the story progresses. Now the story switches to focus on a man named Biff Brannon. Biff owns a small restaurant in town and he spends his time observing the people that come in. The first thing that was easy to notice is that Biff and his wife do not have a very good relationship. They talk back to each other and fight even in the first few words on the page. I wonder why their relationship is this way and if they were ever happy. Biff’s wife, Alice is trying to convince him to do something about the very drunk man who has been practically living in their restaurant for the past week. Biff however thinks the man should stay, finding the stranger fascinating because he is just so weird. To me Biff seems like an interesting character, I want to find out more what he has to do with the whole plot and understand why the author decided to introduce him. I hope to find some connection in these parts of the book instead of just random stories here and there, John seems to me like he will be the main point in the story, someone that will connect everything. But for now I will just have to keep reading and find out. So far I think this book is interesting, not my favorite by any means but at least something that won’t make me fall asleep.