Contact

Contact
Carl Sagan

I've always wanted to read this one since seeing the movie, so when I saw it at my local used book store, I picked it up. It ended up being the edition with the movie cover (I try to use the same picture on the blog as the edition I read), which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I don't think it's ideal.

If you've seen the movie, you should consider giving the book a try. However, don't expect it to be the movie. The two, while basically following a similar plot, have little in common. There are a few reasons for this, brevity, for the movie's sake (we cannot go in depth into the main character's childhood in a movie with certain time constraints). Also, the political climate of the time changed between the writing of the book and the production of the movie. In the book, the soviet union has a big effect on the landscape.

Because of the movie, I actually had a difficult time reading this book. Every time I read dialogue with the main character, I hear Jodie Foster. The book did not exactly keep me up late into the night reading, though it did keep me reading at a steady pace. There were parts where the story was suspenseful, though at other times, it dragged on. I can only tolerate so much political back-and-forth.

A far as sci-fi goes, this is a very plausible story. This could all take place tomorrow, and I liked that about this book. It made it more real, you could dive right into it because its all there, ready to be grasped and taken in stride.

All in all, I'm very glad I finally did read this book. It explored themes that the movie could never delve into. Where the movie is a good drama, the book is a treatise on what it means to be human in a universe so vast as to be effectively incomprehensible. It was an excellent read.

-Very tasty