Ostrich

Ostrich by Matt GreeneMy husband has a way of ordering steak Make it rare to have it still embarrassed, but make sure the vet cannot save it any So I immediately connected to the story when I read in the prologue that Alex s dad ordered his steak Cooked long enough that his family aren t in denial but not long enough that they re at acceptance Anywhere between bargaining and depression Just so long as it s seen the inside of a warm room This observation of Alex will actually become the embedded [...]

This was a very, very strange read indeed The story is told from the perspective of Alex, a 12 year old boy up to and following the weeks after an operation to remove a brain tumour.He is a very interesting, quirky character and the author really has got right into the head of a 12 year old boy there were times when I really laughed because I could quite clearly see and hear my own sons at that age in Alex Then there were times when his precocity came to the fore and I did wonder if he was perha [...]

First, as a middle school librarian, let me publicly and forever divorce this book from Wonder by R.J Palacio This book is NOTHING like Palacio s Wonder and it actually gives me night terrors to think that any parent of a child who has read Wonder might purchase this as a companion novel Ostrich is about a 13 year old British boy named Alex who begins having seizures, which leads to the diagnosis of a brain tumor The novel is written in a stream of consciousness and Alex puts me in mind of Hold [...]

I m pretty sure that I enjoyed this, there were definitely times were I laughed out loud at ALex s thought processess, however I am at a loss at what happened at the end I think the book beat me.

This novel by Matt Greene is written in the first person by the protagonist, Alex He writes as if he is practicing for his English composition exam, using large vocabulary words because he says the teachers think they are better words and it helps your score He also loves to use parentheses which is a better word for brackets The things he talks about are usually the normal things a boy just becoming a teenager would be interested in girls, growing up, school, friends, etc But he also talks abou [...]

I knew right away this was something unique Not just unique was one of a kind, a mesmerising, detailed look into the complicated life of Alex He was a character that many readers long to read about Matt Greene gave us a deep look into the life of Alex with a witty, quirky character with a real story tell Half way through Ostrich, I recalled that it reminded me of when I read The Perks of Being a Wallflower because of in the way Matt Greene had given us a detailed look into Alex s life in the way [...]

Ostrich is a book that should come with a serious health warning If you don t want you head utterly messed with, if you like your narrators reliable and your endings predictable, then run a mile when someone presses this book on you Because they will Oh yes, they will.It all begins in such a familiar way, you ll think you re on safe enough ground Alex Graham, is a precocious twelve year old with health issues and possibly mental health issues learning about relationships, and sex, and infidelity [...]

I really really liked this book It made me laugh and I kinda enjoyed how Alex s friendship with Chloe developed It was also quite touching as well I had tears welling in my eyes at the end.

I ve wrestled with whether I should give this three stars or four, and as usual I end up wishing that allowed for half stars or something Or even quarter stars For the most part, I quite liked it I enjoyed Alex s voice, although I did feel sometimes like he sounded too much like an adult writing in a kid voice Part of the problem was Alex s malapropisms, which are sometimes charming and often hilarious, but which also sound like an adult trying to sound like a precocious kid.Alex himself is inte [...]

It may be an overworked statement, but this is one of the best books I have read in a very long time, and I read constantly It is an endearing tale of Alex, narrated by himself at a difficult and growing up time in his life The book is full of humour and very clever original word plays The style feels original although it has been compared by other readers to works by Palacio and Mark Hadden All the characters in the book are excellently portrayed and Alex himself is a boy you can t help but lov [...]

Alex is an interesting character, he s 12 years old and on the verge of puberty There are also lots of serious issues happening in his life parental disputes, discovering porn and being ill.Ostrich has some very funny moments and Matt Greene has created a likeable chap in Alex However, I began to find the style of narration a little tedious after the first few chapters Alex often gets sidetracked and drifts off into a whole new direction, often not related to the story This could be very clever, [...]

Loved Alex, loved this authors writing, loved his book Very witty and clever What a journey I was taken on of a young boy and his illness, how it affects the child and the parents Oh my this book made me laugh out loud and sob too The French oral exam hilarious Brilliant book thank you Mr Greene

After The Fault In Our Stars and other successful John Green novels, we had high expectations for Matt Greene s debut novel Ostrich From the synopsis, it seemed like exactly the kind of book I could appreciate, and something in the same vein as TFIOS with the characters having to deal with tragedy.The story is written from the perspective of Alex, a 12 year old boy recovering from brain surgery Written in a non linear, slightly disjointed pattern, readers of The Curious Incident of the Dog in th [...]

Writing about people suffering from serious illnesses is a difficult thing to tackle but Matt Greene does a brilliant job in his d but novel Ostrich tells the story of Alex, a young boy who has brain tumour and suffers from epilepsy which, despite the fact that he s smart and seems to be among the best pupils at school, inevitably makes him feel like an outsider Through the course of the book Alex undergoes brain surgery, falls in love even if he doesn t know this at the time , gets behind the w [...]

The story is about Alex Graham and his mum and dad plus his hamsters Jaws, Jaws 2 and Rickey.Ales is poorly but manages to go to school most of the time, have friends, enjoy the lessons and keep up with his parents marriage Chloe Gower is a very independent girl who judges Alex s problem parents with her own who have separated some time before Is it a like for like match in reality or is this the only way Alex can explain the issues which are manifesting themselves at home When Chloe explains wh [...]

This book started off so great to only eventually let me down.This is a story about a young teenage boy dealing with brain surgery, family issues, making friends, girls, and maybe having a mind that s slightly autistic or something in that nature It started off so great I laughed out loud literally several times in the beginning but the story slowly but surely lost my interest There were several lengthy paragraphs that were just hard to get through Also the story jumped around quite a bit and I [...]

A really interesting read the voice of a young boy who is ill One of the freshest most original voices I have read in a while Don t want to give away too muchbut it isn t really a tear jerker as you would expect Instead, it leaves you thinking after you finish reading.which is really the best kind of read I have to share some favorite lines I can swear in sixty seven languages But I can apologize in only three, which means I could get beaten up in sixty four countries Chloe Gower is an albinoe d [...]

Alex has a brain tumour, he has just come out of hospital after having a hole drilled in his head But he is also a teenage boy and has to sort out the strange behaviour of his hamster Jaws 2, the mysteries of his parent s marriage, school work and school social life He has so much to learn, how to narrate his life as French schoolboy Serge in his exams, and how sex works from the acres of pornography on the internet.Being of a certain generation my closest experience to Ostrich has been Adrian M [...]

netgalley copy I really, really wanted to love this book It was compared to The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time which is what made me pick up this one in the first place as I did love that one Unfortunately while this book was interesting and unique at the beginning with the preteen stream of consciousness narration and a lot of fun tangents at the start it just got old after a while The first half of the book kept my interest but most of the rest of it was a bit bothersome to get [...]

Sometimes when authors are trying to be really inventive and original in the way they tell a story, they miss the boat This is one of those cases The book is about a 13 year old with a brain tumor and his attempts to achieve his goals despite the illness Sounds good right Well, it is written as a train of thought with everything that comes to the boys mind spilling on to the page It gets confusing and hard to follow Mostly though, it just isn t interesting It is set in England, so I will give it [...]

Ostrich by Matt Greene is a blunt book about the different ways one person can feel ostracised hence the title through the eyes of a twelve year old boy.First Paragraph I can tell my parents are unhappy by the way they smile at waiters In that small act of ingratiation I can see the custody battle to come It won t be fought in the courtroom but in HMV and Game Stocks in Nintendo will soar as my affections are auctioned off to the highest bidder My teeth will rot PLOTAlex is an almost thirteen ye [...]

readingchallenge2017 my book about someone with a disability audio book The synopsis pulled me in with an intrigue based on the notion the book is about nothing yet, but something eventually I dove in to discover the story Instead, I read a lot well listened , but yet nothing Within the sections there are a few quips of wit that entertain, but Alex often went on tangents without ever really coming back to a story concept that made a point I expected it all to wrap up in the end, with some moral [...]

Man did this book take me forever to finish I m not exactly sure why But It was a pretty good book, my only complaint, is that I m not 100 percent confident in my understanding of it I mean I m pretty sure I got most of what happened But I feel like it was a little fuzzy in places, so even though I have a pretty good idea about what happened, I m not positive But anyway, it made me laugh Alex was a pretty funny kid I can t tell you how many times this book reminded me of a John Green book I mean [...]

Quirky Very well written and amusing I especially liked discerning the spelling mistakes that Alex does as part of the narrative Innocent and completely understandable from the point of view of a 13 year old Especially the way he links these wrongly spelled words to instances which depict the actual meaning Ostrichize His take on many such words and events is quite intelligent if not just plain hilarious All in all a good satisfying read

I would like a discussion about this book rather than a review because I didn t really get it.Did the boy believe to the end that his parents were divorcing In which case that was cruel not funny.Some bits were funny but there were lots of boring stuff in for example the exchange of letters to the boy s school.

I found the main character insufferable I am sorry.

Not for me.I didn t give up but found bit s of it hard going Better to be honest Didn t agree with any of the written reviews.

Gave up on it Really struggled to get in to it and wasn t keen on the writing style

Alex Graham, 13, is the precocious narrator of this novel Recovering from brain surgery because of a tumour which caused him to suffer from seizures, he sets out to play detective and investigate the state of his parents marriage It can be helpful to use the word state when describing a marriage because it makes you think of the people involved as particles Right now Mum and Dad s marriage is a gas Alex suspects a divorce is imminent because they have been behaving strangely his hypothesis is su [...]

ALS JE EROVER NADENKT WAT IK HEB GEDAAN De penetrant loerende struisvogel op het omslag van Hou je mond en zeg iets lijkt symbool te staan voor de onbehaaglijkheid die deze debuutroman oproept In het gemankeerde hoofd van een puber is het niet gemakkelijk je weg te vinden.Op een van de eerste pagina s laat Matt Greene zijn jonge hoofdpersoon met een verklaring komen voor dit beeld ik weet hoe het is om gestruisvogeld te worden, wat een beter woord is voor buitengesloten omdat struisvogels niet k [...]