The Stranger | ⭐⭐⭐ | Review

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The Stranger

Written by Albert Camus

Translated from French by Matthew Ward

Published March 1989 by Vintage International

#Literary, #LitFic, #Crime, #Translated, #FranceLit, #Philosophy

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This was a respectively quick read.  A short book that was essentially split into two parts.  The first following a guy around his everyday life for a few weeks, the second being a trial and its outcome.  The first half was perfectly fine, I enjoyed all of the different vignettes of life Camus gives us within there.  I especially liked the scenes walking to the funeral and the description of the old man who lives near the main character as well as that old man's dog.

While the writing style can be simplistic at times it is also incredibly beautiful.  It has moments of incredibly vivid imagery and moments of simplistic description.  I enjoyed the writing very much and might look into some of his other works.

A thing to note about this novel, the narrator is totally a sociopath.  I had to keep reminding myself of this fact, it would be obvious at times and then he would do something and I would get all huffy and have to go, "He isn't going to do things logically because he doesn't think the same way."  This probably didn't help my frustration with the second half of the novel.

As a person who spent two whole years about her life learning about how the government works and then trials respectively this trial made me so outraged.  The trial was the biggest ruse of a trial with the most ridiculous outcome I have ever seen.  I want to explain why, but I won't because spoilers.  Just understand that it is terrible, well written, but not the way things should have gone down.

Some people have mommy issues and some people get put on trial and all's well that ends well or not.