Matt Haig - The Humans

 

Matt Haig - The Humans 

4⭐

Genre: Fiction, Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Contemporary 

Pages: 285

Format:  Paperback

Publisher:  Canongate Books 

Date Published: 9th May 2018

A huge thank you to Canongate Books for sending me a copy of this book. 

 

Book Blurb: 

When an extraterrestrial visitor arrives on Earth, his first impressions of the human species are less than positive. Taking the form of Professor Andrew Martin, a leading mathematician at Cambridge University, the visitor wants to complete his task and return home to his planet and a utopian society of immortality and infinite knowledge.

He is disgusted by the way humans look, what they eat, and the wars they witness on the news, and is totally baffled by concepts such as love and family. But as time goes on, he starts to realize there may be more to this weird species than he has been led to believe. He drinks wine, reads Emily Dickinson, listens to Talking Heads, and begins to bond with the family he lives with, in disguise. In picking up the pieces of the professor's shattered personal life, the narrator sees hope and redemption in the humans' imperfections and begins to question the very mission that brought him there--a mission that involves not only thwarting human progress...but murder.

My Review: 

This is my second Matt Haig book and I must say I enjoyed it much more than the How To Stop Time. It was so well written and easy to read, with very multidimensional characters and a captivating storyline. I also loved how societal issues that we as humans face are presented by someone who is an outsider, which makes a reader look at them from an outsider's POV, too, to see them differently. I enjoyed the issues discussed in this book and how they were presented together with humour and wittiness. Although for some the plot might feel unrealistic, the book itself is entertaining, funny and yet full of important lessons to learn and philosophical statements and thoughts that are important to address, especially in the 21^st century.

The story follows an ET from a faraway planet who was sent to Earth on a mission. His mission is to kill a famous mathematician Professor Andrew Martin from Cambridge University and delete all of the breakthrough work that Andrew worked for throughout his career. The knowledge that Andrew uncovered might tell humans too much about other planets in the universe and the planets from which ET is, cannot allow that to happen. Thus ET takes over Andrew’s body and slowly learns about human nature, the way they talk, dress, love, and communicate. For him, all of these emotions and societal rules are very weird and rather disgusting. However, he meets some people who slowly start to change his opinion and he realises that humans aren’t as bad as he once thought.

Overall: This review is short because I don’t want to spoil anything from the book, and I will do so if I start discussing it in depth. However, it is a very well-written, unique funny, and at times silly book, with loads of important issues discussed in a very simple and entertaining way. My favourite of Matt Haig’s so far! 

About the Author:

Matt Haig is an author for children and adults. His memoir Reasons to Stay Alive was a number one bestseller, staying in the British top ten for 46 weeks. His children’s book A Boy Called Christmas was a runaway hit and is translated in over 40 languages. It is being made into a film starring Maggie Smith, Sally Hawkins and Jim Broadbent and The Guardian called it an ‘instant classic’. His novels for adults include  the award-winning How To Stop Time, The Radleys, The Humans and the number one bestseller The Midnight Library.He has sold over three million books worldwide.

http://www.matthaig.com/

Matt Haig - How To Stop Time

Matt Haig - How To Stop Time 

4⭐

Genre: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Time Travel, Science Fiction, Fantasy

Pages: 345

Format: Paperback

Publisher: Canongate 

Date Published: 6th July 2017 

Huge thank you to Canongate for sending me a copy of this book and for inviting me to be a part of #CanongateReadalong on Instagram

Book Blurb: 

A love story across the ages – and for the ages – about a man lost in time, the woman who could save him, and the lifetimes it can take to learn how to live

"The first rule is that you don't fall in love,' he said... 'There are other rules too, but that is the main one. No falling in love. No staying in love. No daydreaming of love. If you stick to this you will just about be okay.'"

Tom Hazard has a dangerous secret. He may look like an ordinary 41-year-old, but owing to a rare condition, he's been alive for centuries. Tom has lived history – performing with Shakespeare, exploring the high seas with Captain Cook, and sharing cocktails with Fitzgerald. Now, he just wants an ordinary life.

So Tom moves back to London, his old home, to become a high school history teacher – the perfect job for someone who has witnessed the city's history first-hand. Better yet, a captivating French teacher at his school seems fascinated by him. But the Albatross Society, the secretive group which protects people like Tom, has one rule: never fall in love. As painful memories of his past and the erratic behaviour of the Society's watchful leader threaten to derail his new life and romance, the one thing he can't have just happens to be the one thing that might save him. Tom will have to decide once and for all whether to remain stuck in the past or finally begin living in the present.

How to Stop Time is a bighearted, wildly original novel about losing and finding yourself, the inevitability of change, and how with enough time to learn, we just might find happiness.

My Review: 

How to Stop Time has a very interesting premise and explores the meaning of life through someone who ages but doesn’t age as quickly as an average person. Very enjoyable writing and narrative, especially the alternating chapters that explore the main characters' lives throughout the last 400 years and now. Very original and interesting book!

The story follows Tom, who has this very rare condition that makes him age at a much slower rate than a normal person would age. Although he only looks like a forty-year-old, in reality, he is over 400 years old. Being alive since the late 1500s means that he needs to be constantly on the move, changing his identity. This also means that he can’t fall in love, connect with people, stay long in one place, or have a home or a family. Even though over the years he met famous people, travelled all over the world, saw the world change, and had loads of amazing adventures, he just wants to stop running and wants to have a quiet life. However, the secret society, Albatross Society, which looks after people like Tom is not convinced that Tom should have a simple human life but allows him to have a go for eight years. That’s when Tom goes back to London and starts working as a history teacher in one of the secondary schools. There he meets a beautiful French teacher who reminds him of the love of his life, but also recaps his memory that somewhere out there is his daughter that needs to be found and who Tom hasn’t seen for more than 300 years…

I loved the writing of this book, especially the beautiful inner monologues Tom has about life and what it means to him. He also explores the pros and cons of living for so long, including loss, grief, adventures, chance to see the change and history playing out in front of him. I liked how Tom compared places and societies together from different historical periods, highlighting similarities and differences in personalities, beliefs, traditions and cultures. The book itself explores the best and worst of life and displays to us that we should live for this moment and enjoy ourselves as much as we can because the world and we are constantly changing and that the time never stops no matter what.

This book was quite a slow burner and although I enjoyed this story, I hoped for more action and romance. Especially I hoped for more romance as the first rule of Tom’s was not to fall in love and this premise would have made a great forbidden love story together with things that are already explored in this book. I also think some of the chapters were unnecessary, especially one where Tom meets F Scott Fitzgerald or goes on a boat to Tahiti…These chapters didn’t add much to the overall story of this book.

Overall: It was my first Matt Haig book and I really enjoyed reading it. It was a book with a very unique and interesting concept, exploring the purpose of life from a very different perspective. The writing also is very good. My only downside of this book was the fact that there was an amazing opportunity and premise for exploring a forbidden romance but it was not taken. However, it is a very unique book and I would be definitely interested in reading other Matt Haig books to see whether I would enjoy those, too. 

About the Author:

Matt Haig is an author for children and adults. His memoir Reasons to Stay Alive was a number one bestseller, staying in the British top ten for 46 weeks. His children’s book A Boy Called Christmas was a runaway hit and is translated in over 40 languages. It is being made into a film starring Maggie Smith, Sally Hawkins and Jim Broadbent and The Guardian called it an ‘instant classic’. His novels for adults include  the award-winning How To Stop Time, The Radleys, The Humans and the number one bestseller The Midnight Library.He has sold over three million books worldwide.

http://www.matthaig.com/