Sunday, July 19, 2009

The Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer

The Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer
Fiction/Literature


Max Tivoli is born in the early 1900s in San Francisco with an unknown condition. Max is born an old man and ages backwards. Based on his rough calculations, be believes he will die in his 70s. He becomes friends with Hughie, who is his age and quickly accepts him for who he is. Their friendship endures for their entire lives as they seem to be the only people that understand each other.

When Max's father disappears, he and his mom have to rent out part of their house. This is when Alice Levy enters Max's life. She is his one true love and he tries to spend the rest of his live making her love him. Alice and Max meet each other three times in their lives. Since Max doesn't like to try and explain his situation, Alice doesn't always know that it's Max, as he ages backwards while she ages like we all do.

This is really a story of friendship and love. I enjoyed Hughie and Max's relationship, but I found that I couldn't quite understand Alice and why she was so afraid of Max.

I've seen the movie The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and even though the story line isn't the same at all, the premise of the main character is the same. Oddly enough, I found that having seen this movie kind of ruined the book for me. I could only picture Brad Pitt aging backwards as Max Tivoli. It was weird.


First Line: "We are each the love of someone's life."


Rating:

(3.5/5)

No comments: