My Family and Other Animals

It was nice.

В 2016 вышел шикарный сериал по трилогии — «Дарреллы». Его смотреть одно удовольствие. Основная разница между сериалом и книгами в том, что в нем больше внимания уделено семье и другим человеческим персонажам. В сериале нет такого восхищения животным миром как это встречается в книге, но зато там такие классные герои, что читать книгу потом становится намного проще.

Все-таки порой сложно представить жизнь начала–середины прошлого века на Корфу, поэтому такое погружение через сериал будет скорее полезно. Даже персонажи раскрыты больше, чем в книге.

Тем не менее, книга вдохновляет своей искренней любовью к животным и даже самым непривлекательным тварям. Удивительно, как маленький мальчик был наполнен интересом к природе. Его любопытство и тяга к изучению животного мира может подтолкнуть и вас, если не ковыряться в мышиных норах, то заняться чем-то другим, с не меньшим энтузиазмом.

Для меня эта книга не столько про животных, сколько про любовь к своему увлечению.

This was fantastic. A fun, silly read.

I'm not sure I've ever truly had a book just wash over me before. It's a really fun, lovely romp around a beautiful place with the author as an interesting, fun kid. I was very impressed at how he really sets every scene with description, since one of my writing pet peeves is “three adjectives for everything”.

I absolutely adored this book and forced my family to listen to many excerpts. The unconventional family is utterly charming and their adventures with each other and with the animals of course you are absolutely hilarious. The poetic and evocative descriptions of Corfu were magical. Incredibly well written and a delight to read. The fact that I had already watched the TV show did not detract from the book at all.

My only complaint for this book is that the author reproduces the speech impediments and incorrect English of some of the characters. This is very distracting, and has been considered poor form for several decades. When the book was published it was probably a common style, so the author isn't trying to make fun of the characters, but all the same it is irritating.

First read:

I'd seen this mentioned several times as a favorite book, so I was really happy when redhouse agreed to a trade for it.

And, now that I've just finished reading it, I must say that I absolutely loved this book. The characters are so distinctly described that I could probably pick them out were I in Corfu. Durrell is a master at describing the setting in an amazingly detailed and fascinating way. Most of all, I loved the conversations Durrell set down on paper between family members; the conversations
perfectly reflect the personality of each character.

Write this title down on your eventual TBR. I cannot imagine who
would not be enchanted by this book.

Second read:

I rarely reread, but I have loved watching The Durrells so much that I decided the time had come for a reread. So I did. Loved, loved, loved.