I’ve read Cireșarii (5 volumes) – Constantin Chiriță.
Below, my thoughts.TL;DR. I liked the books; in general, they’re nice lectures. On the other hand, they felt a bit like watching an old, popular movie. You get why it’s popular, but you wish it were made with modern techniques. “12 Angry Men” (1957) is an incredible movie, but it’s not easy to watch.
TL;DR (too long; didn’t read) in real life – I didn’t read the books in detail after a while. I read the first two volumes by paying attention, not so much with the latter two. The third volume – so-and-so.
Some smaller thoughts (with spoilers!):
- The book has metaphors – I liked that.
- The book titles are enchanting.
- There’s lots of emotion.
- I have a longing for the main characters.
- The message was sent through a shepherd, and that’s rather silly. Who would do it like this: send a message, then again?
- The hunter misses his shot by a wide margin – how could this be?
- From stupidity, you make a scar. But if you are stupid, you also do other wrong things, including the error of being a bad person. So, if you have a scar, it’s more likely to be a bad person. I like that – in the book, persons with scars are the evil characters.
- Exaggeration of the children’s powers. They are small supermen, able to win national contests and set records, sometimes without proper training. Or you are thinking better than most adults. The heroes are almost superheroes without any flaws. You can’t empathize with them.
- The lies that some characters do are annoying. “It’s not fine to lie” – they’re children, what could go wrong?
- The book is an unfortunate combination of preciousness and excessive familiarity. Compared to The Life Before Us, the language is forced in Cireșarii.
I read a book, generally, for one of two reasons – utility (information-packed books, for example) and pleasure (feeling good). A novel is generally in the former category. While not 100% bad, I didn’t feel that good reading the books.
