Translated from: The Devil and Miss Prym
256 pages
The story was about a little village called Viscos, where perfect peaceful life was condemned as hell-like. One day, the devil arrived with a stranger. The stranger offered Chantal Prym, an orphan girl who likes nothing better than to leave her village, some amount of gold as a prize if she chooses to help him announce a bet between him and her people. The stranger would like to prove that Evil, and not Good, was the very essence of human nature and therefore it will always prevail in the end. He promised to give all of his gold to the people of Viscos if, and only if, they do the unthinkable: someone must be found dead in that village within a week.
Quite promising, right? But sadly, the execution didn’t deliver what I expected. I expected a tight-suspense-psychological story of the classic war between Good and Evil. Instead, I found something somewhere and somehow was lacking the formula. The storyline was felt a bit flat for me, not as gripping. Though of course, I read it till the end for wanting to know what decision Miss Prym and the people of Viscos made.
As one of many people that were/still are inspired by The Alchemist, I have to admit that this book didn’t give me new insights, unlike its former. I also missed the awakening-thoughts-from-within in it; felt like reading an old religious book that dwells on old issues. I’m not saying that it gained a half star out of fives, but maybe it’ll help if you didn’t expect too much.
image: www.gramedia.com
Quite promising, right? But sadly, the execution didn’t deliver what I expected. I expected a tight-suspense-psychological story of the classic war between Good and Evil. Instead, I found something somewhere and somehow was lacking the formula. The storyline was felt a bit flat for me, not as gripping. Though of course, I read it till the end for wanting to know what decision Miss Prym and the people of Viscos made.
As one of many people that were/still are inspired by The Alchemist, I have to admit that this book didn’t give me new insights, unlike its former. I also missed the awakening-thoughts-from-within in it; felt like reading an old religious book that dwells on old issues. I’m not saying that it gained a half star out of fives, but maybe it’ll help if you didn’t expect too much.
image: www.gramedia.com
1 comment:
I'm one of The Alchemist admirers.
Although Coelho's next books did not create same effect as his first one, I still like Veronica Decides to Die and By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept.
*disappointed with The Zahir :-(*
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